Beit Hatfutsot: The Museum of the Jewish People in Tel Aviv has announced gifts totaling $10 million from board co-chair Alfred Moses and his family and the Milton and Tamar Maltz Family Foundation of the Jewish Federation of Cleveland.

The two families each pledged $5 million in support of core and special exhibits, the School of Jewish Peoplehood Studies, a genealogy center, and a Web portal and database upgrades. The gift from Moses, a prominent lawyer and co-founder of Promontory Financial Group who served as a liaison to the Jewish community during the Carter administration and as ambassador to Romania and in other capacities during the Clinton administration, will support construction of the Great Hall of Synagogues at Beit Hatfutsot.

"The Great Hall of Synagogues...will portray unity but also diversity in its creation of synagogues, old and new, from many lands, presenting the different architecture, different styles, braiding together myriad threads of the Jewish spirit into one theme, as a gathering place for Jews to celebrate their Jewishness," said Moses. "Synagogues have always been a communal home for culture, learning, celebrating and just congregating."

"Beit Hatfutsot is a singular place, in the heartland of Judaism, the land of Israel," said Milton Maltz, founder of Malrite Communications Group, who with his wife helped establish the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in Cleveland and has supported various other museums. "It is a focal point for world Jewry and those interested in the Jewish story and its universal lessons. It embraces the total of Jewish history, all view points, past, present, and future. It presents the Jewish narrative in stimulating, impactful, current, appealing, and varied educational approaches relying on technology and geared to young people."