Prism The Gift Fund
| Prism The Gift Fund | |
|---|---|
| Type | Charitable company / donor-advised fund |
| Logo | |
| Founded | 25 February 2003 (company); registered 25 September 2003 |
| Founder(s) | Anna Josse; Gideon Lyons |
| Dissolved | |
| Registration ID | Charity 1099682; Company 04677253 |
| Status | |
| Headquarters | |
| Location | 20 Gloucester Place, London W1U 8HA |
| Area served | |
| Services | |
| Registration | |
| Key people | Anna Josse (CEO, co-founder, company secretary); Gideon Lyons (co-founder); Adiva Kalms (deputy CEO) |
| Website | prismthegiftfund.co.uk |
| Remarks | |
Prism The Gift Fund (also styled Prism the Gift Fund) is a UK charitable company (no. 04677253) and registered charity (no. 1099682). It is one of the largest grant-making vehicles in England and Wales by income, but functions mainly as a donor-advised fund (DAF) and administrator for other givers rather than as a public-facing cause charity. Year to 30 June 2025: income £91.37 million; expenditure £81.16 million.[1][2]
The Commission activity line is “Encouraging charitable giving.” Objects are general charitable purposes. It helps “other charities or voluntary bodies” by making grants and providing advice. Area of operation is listed as throughout England and Wales; in practice grants go worldwide under donor instruction.[1]
Co-founder Anna Josse has said the model was copied from United States DAFs after she set up and ran the British arm of the New Israel Fund in the 1990s. Prism’s own site describes that period as work for a “USA based charity, the New Israel Fund.” Civil Society (2025) quotes her: “In 1994, a US charity called the New Israel Fund, which strengthens democracy in Israel, was looking for its first full-time director in the UK. I took that job and that’s where I learned a huge amount from the Americans about fundraising and donor-advised funds.”[3][4][5]
By its own 20-year account (2025) Prism had taken in over $1 billion, distributed over $500 million, held more than $500 million of assets, made 9,321 DAF grants and managed 239 collective funds.[5]
What a DAF does
Prism is a single registered charity holding many restricted funds. A donor (or a group) pays money into Prism, often with Gift Aid. Prism’s trustees remain legally responsible for each onward grant. The donor “advises” the destination. Prism markets three products:[3]
- Donor Advised Funds — an alternative to a private family foundation, aimed at high-net-worth givers (historically a £25,000-a-year floor).[6]
- Collective Funds — a “regulatory roof” for campaigns that do not want their own charity number (examples have included Choose Love and a UK account for the World Food Programme).[5]
- Foundation administration — back-office for existing registered charities.
The structure means the public register shows Prism’s totals, not each underlying donor’s name. Prism says it lists every grantee that received £50,000 or more in its annual report.[7] That still leaves the original donor, and grants under £50,000, off the published list.
Israel / Zionist connections
The charity is not itself an Israel-appeal vehicle in the sense of UK Toremet Limited or UK Friends of the Association for the Wellbeing of Israel's Soldiers. It is an infrastructure charity through which Israel- and Jewish-communal money routinely moves, and whose founders and several trustees sit in that network.
- Josse founded and ran New Israel Fund UK before Prism. She has also been identified as a trustee of the Bluston Charitable Settlement, one of the family foundations listed as a UK funder of Beit Halochem UK.[8]
- Prism has provided foundation administration for Bluston Charitable Settlement, Jerusalem Foundation in the UK and The Peltz Trust (the last dissolved June 2023). The Jerusalem Foundation has been criticised for work in occupied East Jerusalem; Bluston and Peltz appear on donor lists for IDF-adjacent welfare charities.[8]
- Collective-fund clients on Prism’s published list include ISGAP UK (Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy), Keshet UK Charitable Fund and PJ Library in the UK (a programme of the US Harold Grinspoon Foundation).
- The 2024 report is cited on Powerbase as listing Campaign Against Antisemitism among grants given.
- Former trustee James Libson (appointed 20 April 2017, resigned 31 December 2023) is a partner at Mishcon de Reya and a former director of the Antisemitism Policy Trust (2009–2016).[9]
- Current trustee Jeremy Adrian Amias (from 2 April 2024) is also a trustee of The Abraham Initiatives.[10]
- Founding-era directors included Andrew Stone, Baron Stone of Blackheath (2003–2019) and Amir Bhatia, Baron Bhatia (2003–2010).[11]
Press TV (Miller, February 2024) described Prism as “a charity that operates and acts for a range of Zionist and other charities,” naming Josse as helping to run it and linking Bluston / Peltz / Jerusalem Foundation administration to the wider UK funding stream for occupation and IDF welfare. That article also lists AWIS swimming-pool and “enlistment festival” activity as the kind of military-adjacent work some of those client foundations have supported — not as grants booked in Prism’s own name.[8]
Al Mayadeen’s “Together for Palestine” commentary treats UK DAF and pass-through charities as part of the same infrastructure that can move money toward Israel-related causes with limited public naming of the original donor. (The live page returned 403 at the time of writing; the argument is the same structural point as Press TV.)
Finances
| Year end | Income | Expenditure |
|---|---|---|
| 30 June 2021 | £80.39m | £52.78m |
| 30 June 2022 | £114.87m | £57.60m |
| 30 June 2023 | £115.26m | £68.72m |
| 30 June 2024 | £94.08m | £69.36m |
| 30 June 2025 | £91.37m | £81.16m |
Source: Charity Commission register financial history.[12]
Long-term investments were £271.64 million at 30 June 2024.[1] Prism has said donors may keep their own wealth managers; one 2025 profile put assets across about 40 managers.[13]
Funds received from other charities
The Commission governance record lists transfers into Prism from, among others: STP Ecclestone Foundation (2012); The Genie Trust (2018); Kohn Foundation (2021); The Edith and Ferdinand Porjes Charitable Trust (2022); The Harbour Charitable Trust (2022); The Paisner Charitable Trust (2025, two entries); L Messel and Co Charitable Trust (2026).[14]
Grants received from
Grants given
- Campaign Against Antisemitism (listed on the existing Powerbase page from the 2024 report of grantees at £50,000 and above).[16]
The published £50,000-plus list changes each year and should be read from the accounts PDF, not treated as a complete grant book.
Organisations working with Prism
Organisations managed by Prism
Bluston Charitable Settlement | Jerusalem Foundation in the UK | The Peltz Trust
Collective Fund clients
ACT for Cancer Foundation | Acumen Fund UK Branch | AmazoniaAlerta | Amber River Foundation | Amna Charitable Fund | Choose Love | ClimateForce Australia Collective Fund | Farming the Future Collective Fund | Flackstock Charitable Fund | Fondation Maeght International Council Fund | Georgia's Fund | Harry Kane Foundation | Impact 100 London | Impande UK Charitable Fund | ISGAP UK | Keshet UK Charitable Fund | Lemon Tree Trust Collective Fund | Lynedoch Village | Make My Money Matter Collective Fund | Matrix Causes Fund | Ned's Fund | Oliver's Wish Foundation | Onceayear Global Ocean | Phoenix Court Works Foundation | Pirate Youth Studio Fund | PJ Library in the UK (a programme of the Harold Grinspoon Foundation) | Prime Advocates Foundation | RefuAid | Refugee Youth Service | SchoolOnline Mission Charitable Fund | Sylvie Nunn Trust | Tessa Jowell Foundation | The Life You Can Save UK | The Long Covid Research Initiative | The Lotus Flower | The SKR Legacy Collective Fund | The University of Toronto UK Fund | True Travel Foundation | Ukrainian Action Fund UK | World Food Programme | Y Tree Foundation | Disrupt Foundation
The mix is wide — climate, refugees, sport, universities — with a visible Jewish/Israel cluster (ISGAP, Keshet, PJ Library, Jerusalem Foundation administration, NIF origin story).
Choose Love and the DAF argument
Choose Love is a Prism collective fund. Year to 30 June 2024 Prism booked £1,689,256 to Choose Love CIO on the £50,000-and-above grantee list.[17] Prism’s own description of the fund is refugee humanitarian aid.[17]
A 2023 Choose Love donor table (support over $5,000; alphabetical; anonymous donors omitted) listed, among others, Combined Jewish Philanthropies, Goldman Sachs Gives, Jewish Communal Fund, Open Society Foundation and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. Commentary on that list has treated several of those names as Zionist or US-establishment pass-throughs and argued that Prism’s DAF wrapper “obscure[s] public knowledge of where funding for recipients originates.” The same commentary names Josse as an Orthodox Jew, former director of New Israel Fund UK, former Manchester JSoc chair, and a traveller to a seminary in occupied Palestine, and states that Prism administers the Jerusalem Foundation plus Bluston Charitable Settlement (Josse a trustee) and the Peltz Trust.[18][8]
That is an argument about infrastructure and opacity, not a claim that every Choose Love pound is an Israel grant. The same year’s Prism accounts also show large named grants to IDF-adjacent and Israel institutions (below). Both things are true at once.
Selected Israel / Jewish / Zionist grants
Thresholds change: 2021–23 lists often start at £25,000; 2024 uses £50,000; the 2025 accounts dropped the named grantee schedule and give only regional totals (UK £57.87m, USA £5.26m, Europe £5.22m, “other global regions” £4.68m).[19] Figures below are from the published lists, not a complete grant book.
2021 also booked grants below the later £50,000 line to IsrALS, UK Friends of I.D.C., UK Jewish Film, United Synagogue and University Jewish Chaplaincy, and listed State of Israel Bonds among investment managers/holdings.[20] Country analysis in that year put grants “to Israel” at £1,112,110 (and a smaller inbound figure). The 2024 accounts put grants “to Israel” at £1,897,116 (with a £624,414 comparative).[17]
Collective funds with an Israel brief
Named in the 2024 notes, in addition to Choose Love, ISGAP UK and PJ Library in the UK:[17]
| Fund | Prism description |
|---|---|
| Aluma Fund | “Raising funds in support of a range of charitable organisations based in Israel, in order to protect and bolster the values and equality and freedom in Israel.” |
| Ariel Sopher Collective Fund | “Raising funds for charities in support of the Jewish community.” |
| Know No Sorrow UK Fund | Holistic care for orphans in Israel, “especially … children under the age of 25 who became instant orphans as a direct result of the October 7th terrorist attack in Israel.” |
| ISGAP UK | UK account for the US Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy. |
Related-party administration
Prism employs nobody. Staff sit in Prism Administration Limited, owned by Anna Josse and Gideon Lyons. Fees paid by the charity to that company: £2,082,071 (2024) and £1,782,301 (2025). The notes say charges are agreed with the donor before money is received and recharged to the relevant fund at cost.[19]
Funds at 30 June 2025: total £346.4 million, of which DAF restricted £332.4 million and collective funds £12.0 million.[19]
People
Staff
| Name | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Anna Josse (Anna Jacqueline Josse, b. September 1964) | CEO, co-founder, company secretary since 25 February 2003 | Ran New Israel Fund UK; director/shareholder of Regent Capital; co-director of Prism Administration Limited with Lyons. Manchester University; former JSoc chair; period at a seminary in Israel; Social Market Foundation. Trustee/advisor to several charities including Bluston Charitable Settlement.[3][6][8] |
| Gideon Lyons (Gideon Jacob Lyons, b. January 1962) | Co-founder | Co-director, Prism Administration Limited; Regent Capital group.[21] |
| Adiva Kalms | Deputy CEO | Listed on Prism site.[3] |
Current trustees / directors
Address on filings: 20 Gloucester Place, London W1U 8HA.[2]
| Name | Appointed | Other Commission trusteeships / notes |
|---|---|---|
| Charles David Bueno de Mesquita (Charles Mesquita) | 29 January 2014 / 27 January 2014 (CH) | Longest-serving current director |
| Penny Lovell (Penny Ann Lovell) | 31 October 2016 | |
| Jonathan Gold (Jonathan Paul Gold) | 17 May 2021 | |
| Anthony Collard (Anthony Francis Collard) | 1 September 2022 | |
| Sharonjit Clare | 8 December 2022 | |
| Jonathan Simmons (Jonathan Elliott Simmons) | 20 July 2023 | |
| Jeremy Adrian Amias | 2 April 2024 | The Abraham Initiatives |
| Charles Banner, Baron Banner (Charles Edward Raymond Banner KC) | 1 August 2024 | |
| Nneka Orji (Nneka Stella Orji) | 1 June 2025 | UK Youth |
Josse is secretary, not a Commission trustee.[10][11]
Former directors
| Name | Appointed | Resigned | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Amir Bhatia, Baron Bhatia | 25 February 2003 | 19 October 2010 | Founding director |
| Andrew Stone, Baron Stone of Blackheath | 25 February 2003 | 4 March 2019 | Founding director; later the subject of House of Lords standards cases |
| Myra Nicole Waiman | 25 February 2003 | 31 October 2016 | Founding director |
| Keith Lassman | 31 January 2007 | 7 November 2011 | |
| Charles Christopher Walker | 5 June 2012 | 4 November 2014 | |
| Tracey Lynn Reddings | 20 June 2012 | 8 February 2022 | |
| Yoni Amias | 2 March 2015 | 22 November 2017 | |
| James Libson (James Lewis Libson) | 20 April 2017 | 31 December 2023 | Mishcon de Reya; former director, Antisemitism Policy Trust |
| Joanna Winston | 31 October 2016 | 1 November 2022 | |
| Ajaz Ahmed | 12 November 2018 | 1 November 2022 | |
| Dolar Popat, Baron Popat | 2 July 2019 | 22 March 2024 | |
| Michael Howard Ridley | 31 October 2016 | 30 November 2023 |
Related companies
Prism Administration Limited (04613212) is the operating company associated with Josse and Lyons. PSCs have included Jaja Capital Limited and Enigmatic Capital Limited. The same pair appear on Regent Capital entities.[21]
Contact
- 20 Gloucester Place
- London W1U 8HA
- Tel: 020 7486 7760
- prismthegiftfund.co.uk
See also
- New Israel Fund
- Bluston Charitable Settlement
- Jerusalem Foundation in the UK
- The Peltz Trust
- Campaign Against Antisemitism
- Beit Halochem UK
- UK Toremet Limited
- Anna Josse
- James Libson
- British Jewish charities investigated by the Charity Commission
Resources
- Talking common sense to the big givers, Jewish Chronicle
- Charity Commission register, 1099682
- Companies House, 04677253
- David Miller, Press TV, 1 February 2024
- Together for Palestine, Al Mayadeen
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 PRISM THE GIFT FUND, Charity Commission register, 1099682.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 PRISM THE GIFT FUND, Companies House, 04677253.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 About, Prism The Gift Fund.
- ↑ Léa Legraien, In conversation with Anna Josse, Civil Society, 7 March 2025.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 How we raised $1 billion for charitable causes, Prism The Gift Fund, 15 January 2025.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Jennifer Lipman, Talking common sense to the big givers, Jewish Chronicle, 23 March 2017.
- ↑ Anna Josse, remarks in Funding the Future: What 20 Years of Prism Has Taught Us, 2025.
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 David Miller, How British ‘charities’ are aiding Israeli genocide in Gaza, Press TV, 1 February 2024.
- ↑ James Lewis LIBSON personal appointments, Companies House.
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 Trustees, PRISM THE GIFT FUND, Charity Commission register.
- ↑ 11.0 11.1 Company officers, CheckCompany compilation of Companies House filings.
- ↑ Full print, PRISM THE GIFT FUND, Charity Commission register.
- ↑ How Prism the Gift Fund Is Transforming Major Giving, The Dura Society, 27 May 2025.
- ↑ Governance, PRISM THE GIFT FUND, Charity Commission register.
- ↑ Shoresh Charitable Trust accounts, Charity Commission filing linked from Powerbase stub.
- ↑ Prism The Gift Fund, Powerbase stub.
- ↑ 17.0 17.1 17.2 17.3 Prism The Gift Fund, Trustees’ report and accounts for the year ended 30 June 2024, pp. 47–54.
- ↑ Commentary circulated with the Choose Love 2023 donor table and Prism logo, drawing on Jewish Chronicle description of Josse; cf. Together for Palestine, Al Mayadeen; Talking common sense to the big givers, Jewish Chronicle.
- ↑ 19.0 19.1 19.2 Prism The Gift Fund, Trustees’ report and accounts for the year ended 30 June 2025, notes 17–18.
- ↑ Prism The Gift Fund, Trustees’ report and accounts for the year ended 30 June 2021, grant schedule and investment note.
- ↑ 21.0 21.1 Prism Administration Limited, Endole.