The American Jewish Committee

The American Jewish Committee, widely known as AJC, is one of the enduring institutions of American Jewish life. Founded in New York in 1906, it has used government relations, public advocacy, diplomacy, and education to defend Jewish rights around the world and strengthen the security and vitality of Jewish communities. Its position on Zionism and Israel changed over time, but its central purpose remained consistent: to use the knowledge, standing, and relationships of Jewish-American leadership to confront threats to Jews and promote a life of dignity, freedom, and security.

Founded in response to persecution

AJC was established in February 1906 by 35 prominent Jewish Americans, most of them of German origin. Its creation followed the persecution of Jews in Romania and Russia and the Kishinev pogroms. The founders sought an American organization capable of acting internationally to protect Jews. Its early goals were to defend Jewish civil and religious rights, preserve Jewish economic and cultural life, and organize assistance in times of crisis.

In this respect, AJC was the first ethnic and religious organization in the United States founded specifically to defend the rights of members of a religious and ethnic group outside the country. It was not designed as a mass-membership movement. Its influence came chiefly from the public, professional, and economic standing of its carefully selected members and from their access to American and international decision-makers.

Leadership and the use of public influence

During its early decades, AJC was the most influential Jewish organization in the United States. Its leaders included Oscar Straus, who served as Secretary of Labor and was sympathetic to the Zionist movement; Judge Meyer Sulzberger, the organization’s first president; Louis Marshall, who succeeded him in 1912; and the financier and philanthropist Jacob Schiff. Many of its leaders were Jews who were well integrated into American society, financially established, and affiliated with Reform Judaism.

AJC’s first major public success came through a determined campaign against Russia’s discriminatory treatment of Jews. Under the leadership of Louis Marshall and Jacob Schiff, the organization helped bring about the abrogation of a treaty between the United States and Russia in response to restrictions imposed on Jews. The campaign established a pattern that would characterize AJC’s work: translating the suffering of Jewish communities into legal and diplomatic pressure within the American political system.

At this stage, AJC emphasized Americanization, opposed Jewish nationalism in the United States, and generally sought to work in alignment with the government’s position. Its attitude toward Zionism was therefore cautious. It was willing to assist Jews in Palestine as individuals rather than as part of a political national project, while also expressing support for the Balfour Declaration. Between the two World Wars, the organization became more diverse, even though Jews of German background remained influential, and its position moved from anti-Zionism toward a non-Zionist approach.

From the Holocaust to a new relationship with Israel

Louis Marshall, recognized as a major leader of American Jewry, headed AJC until his death in 1929. Felix Warburg served as president until 1937, and Joseph M. Proskauer led the organization from the early 1940s. The Holocaust and the destruction of European Jewry forced a fundamental reassessment of the Jewish political landscape. Israel came to be viewed as a central refuge for Holocaust survivors, and AJC reconsidered its earlier reservations about the Zionist project.

After a period of deliberation, AJC supported the United Nations partition plan, even after the United States withdrew its support for the decision. Through the positions taken by its leaders and members, the organization helped reinforce the idea that the Jewish state was central to Jewish security and to the future of the Jewish people.

In 1950, AJC president Jacob Blaustein led the formulation of the Blaustein–Ben-Gurion understandings. The discussions took place with Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who signed the document and presented it publicly. The understandings affirmed that Israel would stand with Jewish communities in the Diaspora but would not pressure them to immigrate to Israel. This was an important step in defining the relationship between Israel and American Jewry. It recognized that Jewish life outside Israel was not merely a temporary stage and that Israel and the Diaspora could remain deeply connected without one community negating the independence of the other.

Diplomacy, education, and international engagement

AJC has maintained its independence while working with governments and institutions across the world and emphasizing a nonpartisan identity. This approach expanded the defense of Jewish rights beyond the United States, linking Jewish security and the fight against antisemitism with international relations and recognition of Israel’s importance to world Jewry.

In 1982, AJC launched Project Interchange, an educational seminar program that brings international leaders to Israel. According to the supplied material, the program has brought more than 6,000 diplomats, journalists, and opinion leaders from 90 countries to Israel. The visits introduce participants to Israel, Israeli society, and questions affecting world Jewry. In this way, AJC works not only through political messages but also through direct encounters, education, and long-term relationships.

AJC was the first Jewish organization to renew relations with Germany after the Holocaust. Shortly after German reunification, it opened an office in Berlin. In May 2006, Chancellor Angela Merkel was invited to address AJC at a conference marking the organization’s centenary. According to the supplied material, this was the first time a German chancellor had addressed the organization’s annual gathering. The event represented a transition from relations broken by Nazi crimes to a new diplomatic dialogue shaped by responsibility, memory, and a different future.

Strengthening the Israel–American Jewish relationship

AJC continues to engage with the question of how Israel and American Jewry can sustain a meaningful relationship. In June 2018, it published a collection of essays by 25 thinkers and public figures from Israel and the United States on the relationship between the two communities. Among the proposals was a call for organized Jewish communities to invest more heavily in Jewish and Zionist education, Jewish schools, and educational frameworks, rather than directing the same resources primarily toward political activity and projects regarded as ineffective.

AJC established a Jerusalem office in 1962, which, according to the supplied material, continued operating thereafter. The institutional connection between Jerusalem and AJC’s international work reflects the organization’s dual role: representing Jewish interests in the political arena while cultivating ties among Israel, Jewish communities, and decision-makers around the world.

Why the American Jewish Committee belongs in Moreshet

The American Jewish Committee merits inclusion in the archive because it represents more than a century of organized action for Jewish security, human rights, and the relationship between Israel and the Diaspora. It helped turn the plight of Jews in different countries into an issue of consequence in American and international affairs, while developing a model of Jewish diplomacy based on relationships, expertise, leadership, and public responsibility.

Its historical achievements — from opposing discrimination against Russian Jews, through its post-Holocaust reassessment, to the Blaustein–Ben-Gurion understandings — influenced how American Jewry and Israel understood their mutual responsibilities. Its educational and international work, especially Project Interchange, introduced leaders from many countries to Israel and to the realities of Jewish life. For these reasons, the organization belongs in Moreshet and on Moreshet.com: its history helps explain how a Jewish-American institution shaped the defense of Jews, the life of Jewish communities, and the global conversation about solidarity within the Jewish people.