Leadership Team

Rabbi Jill Jacobs

CEO

Rabbi Jill Jacobs (she/her) is the CEO of T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights, an organization that trains and mobilizes more than 2,300 rabbis and cantors and their communities to bring a moral voice to protecting and advancing human rights in North America, Israel, and the occupied Palestinian territories. She is the author of Where Justice Dwells: A Hands-On Guide to Doing Social Justice in Your Jewish Community and There Shall Be No Needy: Pursuing Social Justice through Jewish Law and Tradition, both published by Jewish Lights.

She has published in The Washington Post, Slate, NBCNews.Com, JTA, the Forward, the Jerusalem Post, and other publications, as well as chapters in more than a dozen edited volumes. She has appeared as a commenter on MSNBC, CNN, CodeSwitch, and other media. She has been named three times to the Forward’s list of 50 influential American Jews and to Newsweek’s list of the 50 Most Influential Rabbis in America. The New York Times featured her as one of "Six New Yorkers Who Made the City a Better, Cooler, Fairer Place in 2023."

She holds rabbinic ordination and an MA in Talmud from the Jewish Theological Seminary, an MS in Urban Affairs from Hunter College, and a BA from Columbia University. She is also a graduate of the Mandel Institute Jerusalem Fellows Program. She lives in New York with her husband, Rabbi Guy Austrian, and their two daughters.

To arrange an interview with Rabbi Jacobs, email vcano@truah.org.

Sasha Raskin-Yin

Deputy CEO

Email Sasha Raskin-Yin

Sasha Raskin-Yin (she/her) is a lifelong learner, community builder, and nonprofit leader. She comes to T'ruah having supported Jewish organizers, donors, and professionals at Avodah, the Jewish Social Justice Roundtable, and as the Executive Director at Amplifier. Sasha has designed learning, launched and directed programs, overseen diversity equity and inclusion, led strategic planning, held lay leader relations, and more. Sasha is committed to shared humanity, being real about what's challenging, and building toward a better
future for the sake of thriving, not just surviving, Jews included, for the long haul. Sasha is an alumna of M2’s Senior Educators Cohort, Avodah’s Justice Fellowship, and JFREJ's Grace Paley Organizing Fellowship. She has an MA in Anthropology with a focus on Jewish immigration and assimilation in the US, and loves a good conversation over tea.

Sarah Novick

Chief Programs Officer

Email Sarah Novick

Sarah (she/her) became a community organizer because she loves building collective power to improve people’s lives and make societal structures and systems more just and fair. She is honored to be T'ruah's Chief Programs Officer after having served as the organization's Director of Organizing. Before T’ruah, Sarah led Jews United for Justice and the JUFJ Campaign Fund’s Washington, DC organizing work. While there, she worked with grassroots leaders and partners as part of powerful coalitions to achieve legislative campaign wins for housing affordability, racial equity, and workers’ rights, as well as electoral campaigns that have resulted in the most progressive DC Council to date. Prior to community organizing, Sarah spent nearly a decade in the education field, first as an elementary special educator in New York City and then as a student and researcher of positive youth development while pursuing a doctorate in education in Boston. Sarah lives in Silver Spring, MD with her partner, Yosef Berman, who serves as the rabbi of the New Synagogue Project, their two kids, Adira Brucha and Leora Gittel, and her mom, Peggy.

Shira Danan

Chief Communications Officer

Email Shira Danan

Shira (she/her) is a writer and proud RK (rabbi’s kid) who has worked as an editor and social media manager in the private and non-profit sectors. As a comedy writer, she has written for many publications, including the New Yorker, The Onion, McSweeney’s, and Mad Magazine. She earned a Bachelor’s degree in Religion from Columbia University in 2007, and spent a year studying Theology & Religious Studies at Cambridge University. Shira lives in Queens with her husband and two sons.

Ronit Schlam

Chief Development Officer

Email Ronit Schlam

Prior to finding her path on the Jewish social justice circuit by joining the T'ruah team in 2011, Ronit (she/her) enjoyed a career in performing arts. She helped launch and run the Castleton Festival, an annual international opera festival under the artistic direction of Maestro Lorin Maazel, and has worked for and consulted with organizations including Lincoln Center, the Châteauville Foundation, the Newport Folk Festival, and the Saratoga Jazz Festival. She plays classical piano, enjoys photography, and is driven by the great potential for communication and understanding by way of artistic expression. A native of Queens, New York, and a long-time Brooklynite, she now lives in Manhattan with her husband. They travel far and wide, as often as they can, treading lightly upon the earth.

Our People