{"id":434918,"date":"2026-05-10T14:48:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-10T14:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/434918\/"},"modified":"2026-05-10T14:48:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-10T14:48:09","slug":"whatsapp-co-founder-donates-200m-to-shaare-zedek-medical-center","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/434918\/","title":{"rendered":"WhatsApp co-founder donates $200m to Shaare Zedek Medical Center"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Koum Family Foundation has donated $200 million to Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem<\/a>, the largest single donation ever made to an Israeli hospital, the hospital announced in a statement.<\/p>\n

The gift will fund the construction of a new medical tower at the hospital and will lead to the official renaming of the institution as Koum Shaare Zedek Medical Center<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The foundation was established by Jan Koum, the co-founder of WhatsApp<\/a>. The hospital said the donation followed months of strategic discussions between Shaare Zedek\u2019s leadership and the foundation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are proud to partner with Shaare Zedek Medical Center, an institution that defines medical excellence in Jerusalem and beyond,\u201d Koum said in the statement. \u201cThis gift reflects our confidence in a future of medical innovation and research that will benefit patients in Israel and around the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

The partnership was led by Shaare Zedek President Prof. Jonathan Halevy, Director-General Prof. Ofer Merin, and Akiva Holzer, the hospital\u2019s director of special projects, together with Yana Kalika, president of the Koum Family Foundation.<\/p>\n

\"NewNew Sha’are Zedek Hospital medical tower planned for Jerusalem. (credit: Shaare Zedek Hospital)<\/p>\n

Shaare Zedek said the donation would support the development of a 24-story medical tower covering more than 1.5 million square feet. The tower is expected to include expanded surgical and emergency care facilities, significant underground protected spaces, and a rooftop helipad for direct helicopter<\/a> access.<\/p>\n

The hospital said the project was in advanced planning stages and had been approved by the Israeli government and the Jerusalem Municipality. It is being designed and planned by Mochly-Eldar Architects, with Margolin Bros. Engineering and Consulting serving as the project manager.<\/p>\n

Hospital: Expansion will meet growing medical needs<\/p>\n

Shaare Zedek said the expansion was intended to meet growing medical needs in Jerusalem and the surrounding region. The hospital treats more than one million patients annually and has expanded in recent years to more than 1,000 inpatient beds, according to the statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is truly a special moment in Shaare Zedek Medical Center\u2019s 124-year-old history,\u201d Halevy said. \u201cThis record donation by The Koum Family Foundation reflects remarkable confidence in our hospital, our staff, the city of Jerusalem, the nation of Israel, and a heartfelt embrace of Zionism.\u201d<\/p>\n

Halevy said the hospital was grateful that \u201cone of the Jewish world\u2019s great philanthropic visionaries has chosen to link his name with Shaare Zedek\u2019s unique brand of medical excellence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Merin said the donation was \u201ca mark of honor for every employee of our hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis partnership will allow us to forge ahead with the construction of our new medical tower, which will set a new standard for Israeli healthcare and further establish our hospital\u2019s position as a national and global leader of advanced and compassionate medicine,\u201d Merin said.<\/p>\n

He added that the hospital was grateful to Koum and the foundation \u201con behalf of the Shaare Zedek staff, patients and families, and indeed of all the people of Jerusalem.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Koum Family Foundation has donated $200 million to Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem, the largest single…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":434919,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[25431,42,4144,3794,43,5622,40,38,41,39,83772,3324],"class_list":["post-434918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-donations","tag-headlines","tag-hospital","tag-jerusalem","tag-news","tag-shaare-zedek-medical-center","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-tower","tag-whatsapp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434918\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}