Yossi Baumol - Bio

Yossi Baumol has been the director of the Hebron Fund since 2005 and formerly served as the director of Yeshivat Ateret Cohanim.

Born to Holocaust survivors in 1953 and raised in Brooklyn , NY, Yossi graduated from Torah Vodaath High School, studied under the sainted Rabbi Tuvia Goldstein ZT"L for 5 years at Yeshiva Emek Halacha in New York, studied briefly at Lakewood Yeshiva in New Jersey and received a degree in Philosophy and English Literature from Brooklyn College. After a short business career in the US, Yossi made Aliya to Israel in 1977, with his wife Sarah and their oldest daughter.

In Israel, Yossi studied Management Systems Analysis at the Finance Ministry’s School of Management Disciplines. Yossi first served as a management consultant at the Jewish Agency. In the 4 months he worked there he caused an uproar with his report showing that loans being made to new immigrants could be doubled in size if the Jewish Agency would only save the investment in collecting the loans and instead turn them into grants. While working at the Jewish Agency, Yossi met the future founder of Efrat, Mr. Moshe Moskowitz and became an Efrat activist, serving on the founding settler’s committee and becoming one of Efrat’s first families in 1983 where he has lived ever since.

In 1978 joined the staff of Shaare Zedek Hospital where he worked in the department that planned the administrative aspects of the move into the new Medical Center. He later headed up the Medical Center’s Forms Department.  From 1982 – 1985 he served as the Chief Assistant for Organization & Planning at the Israeli Social Security  Institute’s Division of Old Age and Survivor’s Benefits.
 
In 1985 Yossi was “drafted” to become the Executive Director of the Hebron Torah Academy founded by Rabbi Dan Beeri. This was the first elementary school to implement the “Barkai”  method.  In August 1990 Yossi succeeded in convincing the Education Ministry to adopt the Barkai Method as a recognized, alternate track of Religious Zionist Public school education. At the same time Yossi was elected as the head of the opposition party on Efrat’s City Council. When the Intifada broke out in 1987 and Efrat students were hesitant to continue commuting to the Hebron Torah Academy, Yossi took advantage of his position on the Efrat City Council to lead the struggle to establish the Orot Etzion Institutions in Efrat – today the largest of more than 30 Barkai schools throughout the world and the single largest educational institution between Jerusalem and Beersheba. Kfar Etzion’s Yochanan Ben Yaakov, a longtime senior Education Ministry official, claimed it was Yossi’s cogent and moving appeal to Education Minister Zevulun Hammer that secured the recognition of Orot Etzion’s status by the Ministry. Yossi was also instrumental in helping the establishment of additional Barkai Schools in the Benjamin and Samaria regions as well as the establishment of the Barkai Yeshiva in Brooklyn. Yossi’s wife Sarah continues to devote all her spare time to the development of Orot Etzion.

In 1988, Yossi was asked by his friend New York City Councilman Noach Dear to join him and others on the first visit of an Israeli Rabbi in the Soviet Union – Rabbi Simcha HaCohen Kook. Working covertly for the underground Religious Zionist organization “Machanayim” headed by Pinchas Polonsky, Yossi smuggled dozens of Jewish books into the Soviet Union, met with refusenik cells in the greater Moscow area and photographed and smuggled out lists of Hebrew teachers and other important information.

In 1990, after having achieved official status for the Hebron Torah Academy and its “Barkai” curriculum, Yossi left Hebron to become the Executive Director of Ateret Cohanim in the Old City of Jerusalem. During his 15 years there, Yossi succeeded in developing the Yeshiva, founding the “Ateret” Pre-Military Academy and putting Ateret Cohanim on the map of American Jewish organizations as the “Jerusalem Reclamation Project”. Yossi had a leading role in running the JRP annual dinner which became the first and foremost NY area celebration of Yom Yerushalayim. It was during this time that Yossi became a popular lecturer and  writer on Religious Zionist topics and served as one of the most outspoken proponents of Eretz Yisrael, often quoted and interviewed by Israeli and foreign media. Thousands of people have been imbued with a love and  appreciation of the Land of Israel as a result of Yossi's unforgettable tours of the the Western Wall Tunnels, the Old City, Kever Rachel, Gush Etzion and Hebron or his lectures in synagogues and communities across the United States.

In 2005 Yossi left Ateret Cohanim to return to Hebron as the head of the Hebron Fund. While he was still working in Jerusalem, Yossi convinced the heads of Hebron Jewish Community to begin purchasing properties from Arabs as was being done by Ateret Cohanim in East Jerusalem and made the initial connection with the Arab middleman that led to the eventual purchase of “Beit HaShalom” in Hebron. Yossi continues to lecture and guide tours together with his administrative and fundraising duties as the executive director of the Hebron Fund.

Yossi's wife Sarah, is an equal and active partner in all his Zionist activities. Also originally from Brooklyn, she is the daughter of Rabbi Israel Wagner of blessed memory who was the Rabbi of Beachhaven Jewish Center and headed the Beit Din of the Rabbinical Council of America for many years. Her late brother, Rabbi Feivel Wagner of blessed memory was the longtime spiritual leader of the Young Israel of Forest Hill. Her other brother is Rabbi Shmuel Wagner, the renowned Mashgiach of Yeshivat Ohr Yerushalayim in Israel. Sarah has also worked in many fields including computer programming, accounting, educational administration and teaching. She holds a degree in medical computer science from Downstate Medical School, a diploma from Matan’s Advanced Talmud program and an MA in Talmud from Bar Ilan University.

Together with Sarah, Yossi raised a family of nine children in the town of Efrat, where he was one of the founding members and served on the Efrat City Council for 10 years. Four of his children are now married and they all live in Judea & Samaria. Refuting the commonly heard complaint that the “settlers” only focus on one issue – the land of Israel, all of Yossi’s children (and spouses) pursue idealistic careers and a wide range of life-choices.