Business and technologyמוטי כהנא

Mordechai Kahana

Mordechai "Moti" Kahana is an Israeli-American businessman and philanthropist known for his aid work for refugees of the civil war in Syria.

born 1968Aid to Syrian civil war refugeesFounding the Amaliah organizationRescuing Jews from Syria and AfghanistanAutomotive business ventures

Born: 28 February 1968, Jerusalem
Occupation: businessperson
Education: University of Arizona

Mordechai Kahana was born in 1968 in Jerusalem

Kahana was born in Jerusalem in 1968 to a Romanian Jewish family from Iași. He is a descendant of the 18th-century rabbi Aryeh Leib HaCohen Heller.

He was drafted into the IDF in 1986 and served in the Air Force. After his release he moved to New York and worked as a taxi driver.

He founded several companies in the automotive field. They included AAA Auto Rental in 1994, Automoti in 1999, which was sold to Hertz in 2009, and Fuel Recyclers LLC in 2011. In 2005 he patented the Auto Eye, a camera that photographs vehicles from several angles to assess their condition.

In 2011 he founded the Amaliah organization, which supports civil society and women in the Middle East. He led groups bringing aid to Syrian refugees and helped bring Jewish families from Syria to Israel. In 2016 he directed the rescue of religious items from the Central Synagogue of Aleppo.

In 2018 he turned to aquaponic farming at his Rosenfarb farm. In 2021 he arranged the evacuation of Zablon Simintov from Afghanistan, and in 2022 he helped rescue 200 Jewish orphans in Ukraine.