Executive Leadership

Eric Cohen
Chief Executive Officer

Eric Cohen has been the Executive Director of the Tikvah Fund since 2007.  He was the founder and remains editor-at-large of the New Atlantis, and he serves as the publisher of Mosaic. Mr. Cohen has published in numerous academic and popular journals, magazines, and newspapers, including the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, Weekly Standard, Commentary, The New Republic, First Things, and numerous others. He is the author of In the Shadow of Progress: Being Human in the Age of Technology (2008) and co-editor of The Future is Now: America Confronts the New Genetics (2002). He was previously managing editor of the Public Interest and served as a senior consultant to the President’s Council on Bioethics. Mr. Cohen currently serves on the board of directors of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, the Witherspoon Institute, and National Affairs and on the Editorial Advisory Board of First Things.

Rabbi Hershel Lutch
Chief Financial & Operating Officer

Rabbi Hershel Lutch is the chief financial and operating officer of Tikvah and serves as its corporate secretary. Rabbi Lutch leads Tikvah’s finance, administrative, business process reengineering, and operating functions, and is involved in Tikvah’s strategic planning, development, and program management initiatives.

Before coming to Tikvah, Rabbi Lutch, who began his career as the executive director of two Maryland Jewish day schools, served as COO (North America) of Aish HaTorah, the global leader in Jewish outreach and innovation. As COO of Aish, Rabbi Lutch managed Aish’s dramatic growth into a $65MM organization, engaging over 700,000 participants each year.

Rabbi Lutch is an international leader in the field of Jewish education and outreach and serves on several civic and Jewish nonprofit boards. He also has an active interest in government advocacy: he has served as a guest chaplain in the U.S. House of Representatives, has testified before legislative committees, and has led missions to Israel with members of Congress.

Rabbi Lutch earned his MBA and MS in Nonprofit Management (MSM) from the University of Maryland and his semicha (rabbinic ordination) from the Chief Rabbinate of Jerusalem. He lives in Baltimore with his wife and three children.

Amiad Cohen
Director-General, Tikvah Israel

Amiad Cohen is the director-general of the Tikvah Fund in Israel, publisher of the Hebrew-language Hashiloach journal, and a partner in several business initiatives in the security and technology fields. He served as deputy commander of the elite “Egoz” unit in the Israel Defense Forces and for several years was head of security coordination in his native settlement of Eli. He previously directed the industrial and fiscal innovation divisions of the Mateh Binyamin Regional Council.

Sean Clifford
Chief Strategy Officer

Sean Clifford is the chief strategy officer at Tikvah. He most recently served as an entrepreneur-in-residence with Learn Capital, an education-focused venture fund. Sean has spent much of the past eight years in startups. He was the founder and CEO of Canopy, a tech company that leveraged AI to protect children from harmful online content. He also served as the head of growth for Skills Fund, a fintech venture in the education sector. Prior to that, Sean spent eight years in Washington, DC as Vice President of Baron Public Affairs. While there, he advised leading tech companies, nonprofits, and Fortune 500 corporations operating at the intersection of politics, business, and culture.

Sean earned his BA from Williams College, an MA in the Great Books from St. John’s College, and an MBA from Wharton. He and his wife, Meredith, have been married 15 years and have four children (ages 4 to 11). They are happily settled in Austin, TX, where Sean serves on the board of Congregation Tiferet Israel and hosts Torah on the Rocks, a monthly Torah study featuring engaging speakers and great cocktails.

Rabbi Mark Gottlieb
Chief Education Officer

Rabbi Mark Gottlieb is chief education officer of Tikvah and founding dean of the Tikvah Scholars Program. Prior to joining Tikvah, Rabbi Gottlieb served as head of school at Yeshiva University High School for Boys and principal of the Maimonides School in Brookline, MA, and has taught at The Frisch School, Ida Crown Jewish Academy, Hebrew Theological College, Loyola University in Chicago, and the University of Chicago. He received his BA from Yeshiva College, rabbinical ordination from the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, and an MA in Philosophy from the University of Chicago, where his doctoral studies focused on the moral and political thought of Alasdair MacIntyre. Rabbi Gottlieb’s work has been featured twice in the Wall Street Journal and his writing has appeared in First Things, Public Discourse, SEVEN: An Anglo-American Literary Review, The University Bookman, Tradition Online, the Algemeiner, From Within the Tent: Essays on the Weekly Parsha from Rabbis and Professors of Yeshiva University, and, most recently, Strauss, Spinoza & Sinai: Orthodox Judaism and Modern Questions of Faith. He is a trustee of the Hildebrand Project and serves on the Editorial Committee of Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought. He lives in Teaneck, NJ with his wife and family.

Alexandra Rosenberg
Senior Director of Development

Alexandra Rosenberg is senior director of development at Tikvah. She is responsible for Tikvah’s comprehensive development program, directing and coordinating strategy for the Jewish Leadership Conference and related community-building efforts, expanding charitable support, and managing donor relations. Prior to joining Tikvah in January 2022, Alex spent seven years at the National Review Institute—the nonprofit parent organization of National Review magazine, helping lead their development and events departments. She holds a BA in political science and international studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She lives in Bergenfield, New Jersey with her husband and two children.

Alan Rubenstein
Senior Director, University and Young Professionals Programs

Alan Rubenstein was educated in Liberal Arts at St. John’s College in Annapolis, MD, and also at Georgetown University. He was a senior consultant for the President’s Council on Bioethics and currently serves as Hanson Scholar of Ethics at Carleton College in Northfield, MN. At Carleton, he teaches ethical thought through close reading of great literature of the West—in particular, Plato, the Hebrew Bible, and Shakespeare. He is currently Director of University Programs for the Tikvah Fund. His published essays have focused on the philosopher Hans Jonas, the Hebrew Bible, and Judaism in middle America. He is married and a father of three children.

Dr. Jonathan Silver
Warren R. Stern Senior Fellow of Jewish Civilization
and Senior Director of Tikvah Ideas

Dr. Jonathan Silver is the senior director of Tikvah Ideas, where he is also the Warren R. Stern Senior Fellow of Jewish Civilization. The editor of Mosaic, he is also the host of the Tikvah Podcast on which he has hosted hundreds of writers, rabbis, educators, military officers, artists, and political figures, including members of Israel’s Knesset, the U.S. Senate, and the prime minister of Israel.