The Florida Holocaust Museum Raises Over $1.2 Million at Annual “To Life” Gala

St. Petersburg, FL (February 13, 2025) – The Florida Holocaust Museum hosted its annual “To Life” Gala on Saturday, Feb. 1 at The Vinoy, which raised $1.26 million, over $100 thousand more than last year’s total. The evening’s co-chairs were Dana Justus and Andrea Silverman, both grandchildren of Holocaust survivors.

Museum Board Chair, Joshua Bomstein, presented the Legacy Award to Judah Rubin, Owner and Principal at Rubin Real Estate Advisors. Judah has provided pro bono support to the Museum since 2019 and played a pivotal role in the process of designing and executing its exciting renovation and expansion project.

“The work I do for The Museum has always felt like a small thing,” Rubin said in his acceptance speech. “It made me think to share with you, ‘what is a small thing you can do?’ It doesn’t need to be a grand gesture or broad sweeping change. Do the small thing to help eliminate antisemitism. Do the small thing to reduce the hate we see in our society.”

Sandy Loebenberg-Mermelstein, advisory committee member and life member of The Museum, granted the Loebenberg Humanitarian Award to Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor, Founder and Executive Director of CyberWell. Tal-Or founded CyberWell with the vision of leveraging the best available technologies & AI to curate implementable solutions for addressing online Jew-hatred. CyberWell is an Israeli nonprofit dedicated to understanding and defeating online antisemitism using open-source intelligence and sound data.

“The Florida Holocaust Museum represents a joint commitment to honor those who perished in a chapter of great darkness and evil to ensure that our future could be brighter,” Montemayor said. “Today, 1 in 3 Jews will take active steps to hide their identity after experiencing online antisemitism. Let us demand a different outcome. Life as we know it depends on it.”

The Museum’s Interim CEO & Chair Emeritus, Mike Igel, who recently became a father, brought this year’s theme of “Illuminate & Advocate” to life by delivering a powerful speech about raising proudly Jewish children amidst the current global explosion of antisemitism. “Even as someone motivated every day by Holocaust history, after my daughter was born the question of how to make the Holocaust’s lessons live on became more intensely personal than it’s ever been.,” Igel said. “I will tell her that she is living proof of our power to make a better world. So many people before her did extraordinary things so she could be here, and one day it will be her turn to do great things in their memory.”

Donations from To Life, which at nearly 600 attendees is The Museum’s largest event of the year, will fund future Museum improvements, Holocaust education, and fighting antisemitism.

The FHM thanks all of its sponsors and supporters for making the night possible.