What is our Story?

ATV was founded in 1981 after years of grassroots efforts to distribute funds in Israel to families in need. The inspiration behind ATV came from a humble meeting with a man from a very important Jewish family who was going through a crisis of his own. He opened our eyes to the struggles of many families living in Jerusalem at the time - meager salaries, severe poverty, and an epidemic of hunger.

At first, we tried to solve this problem on a small scale, raising funds and donating our own money on a regular basis to try to help the few families we knew we could reach. But the number of people we could reach on our own was not nearly as impactful as we had hoped. Unfortunately, the list of recipients who struggled their way through their daily lives grew from the 1 we initially set out to help, to ten, and then to over 1500 families. Invigorated to make a real difference, we formed Congregation Ahavas Tzedoko V’Chesed (ATV).

After founding ATV, our board established a relationship with representatives in Israel from different communities in need - from Tzfat, to Bnei Brak, to Jerusalem and beyond. These representatives made it their jobs to know about the most dire situations - the elderly, Holocaust survivors, widows, divorcees, people in the midst of medical crises, and those suffering from mental health crises.

After cataloguing and assisting families all over Israel, ATV branched out to Jews in need in communities in the United States.

Today, 40 years after its inception, ATV has grown exponentially and has been endorsed by prominent leaders in both America and Israel, including Rav Moshe Feinstein ZTL, Rav Pam ZTL, Rav Eliyashiv ZTL, and Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach ZTL.

We are proud to say that, 40 years later, we have helped countless families across the globe by providing food, clothing, tuition, therapy, medical help, and so much more.

Thousands of families apply for help yearly, each of which goes through our intensive screening process before qualifying for our help. As a humble, no-frills organization that is looking to help without acclaim, we are overwhelmed with how many people - how many fellow Jews - need our chessed each and every day.

Over the past 40 years, more than 80 million dollars has been distributed via our organization. With your help, we pray that the number of needy families will significantly decline over the next 40 years, but that the number of givers will significantly increase.