Presidents Dinner keynote Mandana Dayani champions gratitude for pro-Israel voices.

By Ayala Or-El, Jewish Journal (Los Angeles)

Since January, members of Congress and elected officials have received thousands of thank-you messages from the Jewish community, even amid a surge in complaints about issues that frustrate constituents.

It’s part of Jewish American activist Mandana Dayani’s new project, One Mitzvah a Day, which she launched Jan. 15. It’s a text-based platform with a simple, meaningful call-to-action delivered every morning to users.

She encourages the community to send voice messages and emails to political leaders, campus figures, or business leaders who have shown strong support for Israel or the Jewish community.

Dayani will keynote the Jewish Federation of Greater Dayton’s Presidents Dinner, May 18.

Her initiative focuses on expressing gratitude to those who take a stand against antisemitism and support Israel.

The actions are bipartisan and impactful — designed to build bridges and create lasting change.

Dayani, who lives in Los Angeles, recalled a recent visit to Washington, D.C.

“I was talking to one of my friends, who is a congressman, and he told me, ‘Mandana, you know, we can all be as pro-Israel as we want, but every time we say something, we get flooded with phone calls from people saying really horrible things — and we rarely ever get a thank-you.’”

That conversation sparked the idea for One Mitzvah a Day.

“I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about how to mobilize more people and build a bigger infrastructure,” Dayani said.

“I think that since Oct. 7, we’ve seen people taking down bad actors, but I haven’t seen a whole lot dedicated to building up good actors.”

She hopes everyone in the U.S. Jewish community will take part in building up those who have shown support for Israel and Jewish Americans.

In the first two weeks of the project, 5,000 thank-you messages were delivered, including ones from influencers such as Jonah Platt, Noa Tishby, Emmanuelle Chriqui, Steve Leder, and Ginnifer Goodwin.

“We are reaching out to synagogues, women’s action groups, and student groups. We’ve asked people to share it in their family chats and encourage their relatives to sign up,” Dayani said.

“The more, the merrier. The more people we bring to this platform, the greater our opportunity to shift toward a localized approach over the long term.”

Dayani was born in Iran and moved to the U.S. with her family after the revolution, as religious refugees.

As someone who fled a dictatorship, she deeply appreciates the freedom she and her family had found.

“I was 6 years old when I came here. I think I’ve always been aware of how lucky I was to leave. There were so many others like me who couldn’t. That sense of gratitude, truly understanding what injustice feels like and recognizing how profound liberty and freedom in this country are, I never took any of that for granted.”

The 42-year-old activist earned her law degree from the USC Gould School of Law. She’s worked as a corporate attorney, a talent agent representing fashion stylist Rachel Zoe, the chief brand officer of an online real estate marketplace, and the president of Archewell — the media and philanthropic company founded by Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex.

During her tenure at Archewell, she played a significant role in the couple’s business dealings with Spotify and Netflix.

Her true passion, however, has always been activism. In 2018, she cofounded I Am a Voter, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to increasing voter registration and turnout, which garnered over 1 billion unique digital impressions.

Dayani also hosts The Dissenters, a podcast focused on engaging and empowering American citizens in their democracy.

Most recently, just before former President Joe Biden left the White House, he appointed her to serve on the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council Board of Trustees.

“I love leaning into the joy of activism — it’s the common thread in everything I’ve built and done so far,” she said.

One Mitzvah a Day makes it easy for people to participate, requiring less than three minutes of their time. Each morning, participants receive a text message with a URL that generates an email or provides a script for a phone call to an elected official, business leader, or other figure deserving of gratitude.

“In the future, we hope to create more localized initiatives,” Dayani said. “For instance, if Nova survivors are speaking at a statehouse against antisemitism, we can rally people to stand in solidarity with them. That would be a powerful way to translate online engagement into meaningful, in-person activism.”

The feedback since launching the project, she says, has been overwhelmingly positive.

“People were ecstatic—they were eager to take action. For so long, people have asked me, ‘What can we do to help? How can we make a difference?’ When we gave them this opportunity, they jumped at it. They love the energy and the feeling that they’re making an impact in just a few minutes a day.”

Jewish Federation’s Presidents Dinner with Mandana Dayani, 5 p.m., Sunday, May 18 at the Boonshoft CJCE, 525 Versailles Dr., Centerville. Tickets are $125 each. Kashrut will be observed. Participants will be asked to make their pledges to the 2025 Jewish Federation Annual Campaign. RSVP by May 12 here.

To read the complete April 2025 Dayton Jewish Observer, click here.