Joseph Kushner

{{Short description|Polish-born American real estate developer (1922–1985)}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Joseph Kushner

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| birth_name = Joseph Berkowitz

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1922|10|10|df=yes}}

| birth_place = Nowogródek, Nowogródek Voivodeship, Poland (now Navahrudak, Belarus)

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1985|10|5|1922|10|10|df=yes}}

| death_place = New Jersey, US

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| citizenship = Polish
American (naturalized)

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| occupation = Real estate magnate

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| spouse = {{marriage|Reichel "Rae" Kushner|1945|1985|end=died}}

| parents =

| children = Murray Kushner
Charles Kushner
Esther Schulder

| family = Kushner

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Joseph Kushner (né Berkowitz; 10 October 1922{{cite web |work=geni.com |url=https://www.geni.com/people/Joseph-Yossel-Kushner/324838976650002863 |date=23 May 2018 |title=Joseph, Yossel Kushner |quote=Joseph, Yossel Kushner (Berkowitz) Also Known As: "Josef Kuszner" Birthdate: October 10, 1922 (62) Birthplace: Kostrzyn nad Odrą, Poland Death: October 05, 1985 (62) NJ, United States Place of Burial: Elizabeth, Union, NJ, United States Immediate Family: Son of Moshe Berkowitz and Chana Berkowitz }} – 5 October 1985) was a Polish-born American real estate investor and developer. At the end of his career, he owned over 4,000 apartments, houses, and properties. He was the patriarch of the Kushner family and the paternal grandfather of Jared Kushner.

Biography

Kushner was born Joseph Berkowitz on 10 October 1922 in Navahrudak (Polish: Nowogródek), in what was then eastern Poland. His parents were Chana and Moshe Berkowitz. In August 1945, he married Reichel "Rae" Kushner (27 February 1923 – 2004) in Budapest.{{cite web|url=http://www.jewishpartisans.org/partisans/rae-kushner |title=Rae Kushner: biography |website=JewishPartisans.org |author= |date= |access-date=3 June 2019}} Rae Kushner was also from the city of Navahrudak, and is remembered for accompanying her brother and up to 360 others to escape through a tunnel from the Navahrudak Ghetto during the Holocaust. Joseph took his wife’s last name upon marriage. Charles Kushner was the chief benefactor of the Museum of Jewish Resistance.{{cite web|url=https://www.jta.org/2017/06/06/global/jared-kushners-family-is-a-legend-in-this-belarus-town |title=Jared Kushner's family is a legend in this Belarus town |author=Cnaan Liphshiz |date=June 6, 2017 |website=Jewish Telegraphic Agency |access-date=3 June 2019}} In the aftermath of the war, Navahrudak was transferred from Poland to the Byelorussian SSR of the Soviet Union under territorial changes dictated by the Potsdam Agreement.{{cite book |last=Quint |first=Peter E. |date=1997 |title=The Imperfect Union |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fuLpU-zb5LcC |location=New Jersey |publisher=Princeton University Press |page=257 |isbn=9780691086569}} Rae Kushner and her spouse immigrated to the United States as Sh'erit ha-Pletah from the Soviet Union in 1949.

Kushner worked as a carpenter in New Jersey eventually running his own business which was funded by the G.I. Bill and later by the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956.{{Cite news|title= Who is Jared Kushner? |newspaper=The New Yorker |date=January 6, 2020 |url= https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/who-is-jared-kushner }}

The Joseph Kushner Hebrew Academy and the Rae Kushner Yeshiva High School, both in Livingston, New Jersey, are named in their honour.{{cite web |url=https://www.jkha.org/page.aspx?pid=315 |title=Joseph Kushner Hebrew Academy/Rae Kushner Yeshiva High School |website=Jkha.org |date=2016-09-28 |access-date=2017-04-18 |archive-date=2017-01-18 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170118225832/https://www.jkha.org/page.aspx?pid=315 |url-status=dead }}