ICRF International Co-Presidents

David Abramson z”l, was ICRF’s Co-President of the International Board of Trustees and past Chair of ICRF’s Chicago Chapter. David passed away on August 10, 2025 from the effects of cancer.

David truly embodied the spirit of leading by example, serving ICRF with extraordinary dedication for more than 18 years. As Co-President of ICRF International, his steadfast leadership propelled our mission to invest in the best and brightest cancer researchers in Israel to new heights.

Richard Edelheit retired as the national real estate leader for RSM US LLP where he oversaw all activities for the firm’s national real estate practice. Rick is currently the Co-President of the ICRF International Board of Trustees and sits on the ICRF Chicago Board of Directors. Previously, Rick was the International Treasurer of the Israel Cancer Research Fund.

Rick graduated from Northern Illinois University, with a B.S. in Accounting. He currently resides in Highland Park, IL with his wife.

Chair

Rick Wise is a Managing Principal and Co-Founder of Oak Residential Partners, a national real estate investment company focused on the acquisition and management of institutional-quality multifamily properties.

Mr. Wise sits on the Investment Committee for both Oak Residential Partners and Oak Commercial Partners, a related company he co-founded in 2016 that invests in industrial and other commercial real estate assets. He holds an MBA in Finance from University of Chicago and earned a B.S. in Accounting from the University of Illinois.

Rick lives in Northbrook, IL with his wife and three nearly grown children. He joined the ICRF board in 2022, became co-chair in 2024, and chair in 2025.

Immediate Past Chair

Charles “Chip” Serlin, a resident of Highland Park, was a member of the ICRF Chicago Board for 18 months before being appointed Chair in 2020.

Chip has more than 18 years of experience in the consumer auto sales, auto finance and auto insurance business. Prior to that, he worked as a certified public accountant for Altshuler Melvoin and Glasser (1995-2002) and Coopers and Lybrand (1990-1994).

Board Members

Brad Akers is the CEO of Buyhive Technologies Inc., founded in 2017, which is a leading distributor of workplace health and safety products, including air purifiers, disinfecting wipes, sanitizer dispensers, protective gloves, and more.

Brad graduated from Brandeis University, and resides in Deerfield, IL with his wife and children. He joined the ICRF Chicago Board in February 2021.

Jessica K. Altman, MD, is a Professor in the Division of Hematology/Oncology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. She also serves as Director of the Acute Leukemia Program at Robert H. Lurie Cancer Center of Northwestern University.

Jessica’s clinical and research interests include acute and chronic leukemias, anemia, myelodysplastic syndromes, and myeloproliferative diseases. She has published and presented extensively in these disease areas. She is the chair of the clinical trial audit committee of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center. She is also a member of the Northwestern Medicine Developmental Therapeutics Program, the Signal Transduction in Cancer Program, and the Hematologic Malignancies Program at the Robert H. Lurie Cancer Center. She joined the ICRF Chicago Board over 7 years ago and sits on the Medical Advisory Committee.

Bruce Barron Now retired, Bruce Barron is a co-founding partner of Origin Ventures, an early-stage technology focused venture capital firm that is investing out of its sixth fund and has almost $500M of capital under management. He previously served on the Board of Directors of several tech companies, including GrubHub, which went public in 2014 and Tock, which was sold to SquareSpace in March 2021. In addition to serving on the Chicago and International Boards of ICRF, he serves on the board of the Chicago Baseball Cancer Charities and previously served six years on the national board of the American Cancer Society.

Rob Bernstein joined the ICRF Chicago Board in 2021.

Rob joined Laner Muchin in 1995 and has been a partner since 2003. His practice has been concentrated in defending employers in employment disputes and proceedings throughout the country, counseling employers on their day-to-day labor and employment issues, as well as handling collective bargaining negotiations, arbitrations, and a variety of other labor and employment matters on behalf of employers.

Rachel Bikshorn has been a member of the ICRF Visions young leadership board since 2023 and is currently one of the Visions Board Co-Chairs. She works as the HR Admin and Recruiting Specialist at Compass Lexecon, an economic and analytics consulting firm. Outside of work, she is on the Young Leadership Division board of JUF and enjoys going to concerts and spending time with her family, friends, and her 2 black cats, Brooks and Belle.

Brian Bromberg earned his Bachelor of Science in Accounting from the University of Illinois and is a licensed Certified Public Accountant. He brings extensive experience in operations, accounting, and strategic relationship building.

Brian began his career as a CPA serving middle‑market accounting firms in Chicago. He later spent more than 22 years as President of Grafsolve LLC, a leading provider in the graphic arts supply industry. Throughout his career, he has cultivated strong business relationships across the banking, legal, wealth management, and insurance sectors. Brian is known for his ability to foster meaningful connections that help clients and partners grow and thrive.

Brian is deeply committed to community service. He is a dedicated board member of the Israel Cancer Research Fund (ICRF), supporting groundbreaking cancer research conducted by Israel’s leading doctors and scientists. He also serves as the senior board liaison to the ICRF Visions (Junior) Board, helping mentor and guide the next generation of philanthropic leaders.

In addition, Brian serves as the Treasurer of Rebecca’s Dream, an organization devoted to promoting mental health awareness, education, and reducing the stigma surrounding mental illness.

Outside of his professional and philanthropic work, Brian enjoys spending time with his wife and daughter, golfing, and traveling.

Mark Cohen lives in Northbrook with his wife Lauren, their two children, Riley and Jayden, and their dog, Cappy.

Mark is thrilled to be part of ICRF’s Chicago board, where he is on both the Golf Outing and Gala committees this year. He is involved in ICRF because it gives him an outlet for both his passion for Israel and his hatred of cancer. Mark specifically enjoys helping run charity golf outings and has sat on many organizing committees specifically to help improve fundraising.

Professionally, Mark is a Certified Business Performance Advisor and works in business development for the outsourced Human Resources company Insperity.

Tony Elman is very passionate about both Israel and cancer research. ICRF is the best of worlds in its goals to both better Israel in its research efforts and find cures for the deadliest disease in the world. Tony’s past charitable efforts have included both AIPAC and JUF. Tony is the lead partner and trial attorney at Elman Joseph Law Group, LLC which concentrates in Plaintiff’s personal injury trial work. Tony attained his BA at University of Michigan and his JD at Tulane Law School. His favorite hobbies are tennis, skiing, hiking, traveling, trading stocks and Bitcoin. Tony lives in Highland Park, IL with his wife and two children.

Joshua Epstein joined the Visions Board, ICRF’s young leadership board in 2023 and is currently the Visions Board Co-Chair. Josh is committed to the ICRF’s core values and mission, in addition to being eager to lend his support to cancer research, the people of Israel and the Jewish community at large.

Josh is currently an associate at Mayer Brown LLP in the firm’s Fund Finance group. He specializes in structuring, documenting and negotiating a broad range of complex financial transactions on behalf of financial institutions. In addition to ICRF and his professional work, Josh is on the board of the Young Lawyers Section of the Chicago Bar Association.

Josh earned his BBA from the University of Miami (FL) and JD from Loyola University Chicago. From Northbrook, Josh currently resides in Deerfield with his wife, Natalie, and their dog, Clark.

Sam Fields is a Chicago native who got into hockey at the age of eight. Just weeks before he was to head off to NHL training camp, he was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), a particularly aggressive form of cancer. He was given 2 weeks to live!

That was in 2003. Now over 40, Fields has been cancer free for almost 2 decades. He credits Gleevec® for saving his life. He has been on the ICRF Chicago Board for more than seven years.

Paul T. Fox is a founding shareholder of Greenberg Traurig’s Chicago office where he serves as Chairman. He has practiced in commercial litigation for over 35 years and been a member of the Trial Bar for the United States District Court in Chicago for 20 years. Paul also teaches trial advocacy at Northwestern University School of Law and at the National Institute for Trial Advocacy (NITA).

In addition to co-chairing the Governance Committee on the ICRF Chicago Board, Paul is also a member of the ICRF International Board of Trustees, Albany Bank & Trust, and The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

Emily Gottlieb joined the ICRF Board in 2023. As a strong supporter of Israel and having lost her mother to breast cancer at a young age, she is incredibly committed to ICRF’s mission and vision.

Emily is an Executive Vice President at Angeion Group, a leader in class action, bankruptcy, and mass tort administration.    A licensed attorney, she drives business development efforts across the bankruptcy and corporate restructuring sectors. In addition, Emily is the founder of Styled By Em and provides personalized styling services.

Emily lives in Highland Park with her husband and three teenage sons. She holds a JD from Loyola University Chicago School of Law and a BA from the University of Michigan.

David Hakimian, MD is a Medical Oncology and Hematology Specialist at Illinois Cancer Specialists, where he has served as president for the past 10 years. His clinical interests include hematology, breast cancer, colorectal cancer, leukemia, lymphoma, lung cancer, and urological oncology. He completed his MD at University of Illinois Medical School and hematology-oncology fellowship at Northwestern University.

He has served on the ICRF Chicago Board and Medical Advisory Committee since in 2019.

Noel Hara serves as the Senior Vice President and Head of Public Sector at RiverMeadow, where he leads strategy, innovation, and growth across federal, state, and educational markets. In his role, Noel works closely with public sector leaders to accelerate secure cloud migration, modernize legacy environments, and improve mission and citizen outcomes through advanced automation.

Noel lives in Northbrook, Illinois, and is a graduate of Illinois State University. A Hodgkin’s lymphoma survivor, he joined the ICRF Chicago board in 2022 to support cutting‑edge cancer research.

Outside of work, Noel and his wife are proud parents of two college students: their son Nate, a student-athlete and member of the University of Iowa cheer team, and their daughter Jordan, a student and aspiring rock star at Ohio University. When they are not visiting campus for games and music festivals, Noel can be found walking his dog Dexter or at the local spin studio.

Eric Helfand is a Principal with Peerless Development. For the past two decades, Eric has been a proven leader in real estate by navigating multiple economic cycles to deliver exceptional results. Specializing in value-add strategies, Eric has a proven track record in managing the full transaction lifecycle—from sourcing off-market deals to executing successful exits.

Eric is on the Board of the Israel Cancer Research Fund, received a Bachelor of Science in Accounting from Indiana University, and is a Registered CPA in the State of Illinois.

Katie Intrater Kaluzna previously served for five years as President of the Visions young leadership division of ICRF. She is currently Vice President at AtData, where she leads enterprise business development across the company’s fraud prevention and marketing services solutions.

A Chicago resident for more than 17 years and a graduate of the University of Wisconsin, Katie is proud to continue her involvement with ICRF and to contribute her experience and leadership in support of the fight to eradicate cancer.

Edward Kaplan, MD, is a Medical Oncologist and Hematologist in Skokie. He received his medical degree at Loyola-Stritch School of Medicine, with residency and fellowship training at Northwestern University Medical School. He joined the faculty at Rush University and was the cofounder and director of the Comprehensive Center for Gastrointestinal Malignancies at the Rush Cancer Institute. He was also Chairman of the Department of Hematology and Oncology at Rush North Shore Medical Center until 2010.

Dr. Kaplan’s clinical interests include gastrointestinal, breast, urologic, lung, and lymphomas, and the management of patients with BRCA mutations and other predispositions to cancer.

Ed lives with his wife, Lisa, in Skokie and is excited to join the board in 2023.

Jill Kirshenbaum is a Senior Vice President and Senior executive at Briar Capital. Jill and her team bring finance solutions involving owner occupied real estate to clients needing liquidity for growth.  Jill has incredible support from her amazing husband, Gary and their two beautiful children.

Jill joined the ICRF Chicago Board in 2020 and serves on the Executive Committee.

Adi Klinghofer lives in Northbrook, IL with his wife and three teen-aged children. He was born in Israel, but grew up in Deerfield, IL. In 2008, Adi bought a portion of Prestige Distribution, Inc., a commercial specialties distribution and installation company, from David Waxman. Together they have grown the company from a small operation to a national leader in their space with offices in Northbrook and Dallas, TX.

Adi enjoys spending time with family and friends, traveling, playing golf, and eating at great restaurants. He is excited to join the ICRF Chicago Board and is looking forward to help expand the reach of this great cause so that more people can benefit from the outcome.

Jeffrey A. Kriezelman is the founding member of Kriezelman Burton & Associates, LLC and remains of counsel. He recently retired after 50 years, dedicating his professional life to the assistance of those immigrants, intended immigrants and their families seeking the opportunities, the standard of life and, in many cases, the safety offered by the United States.

Jeff continues to serve his community, providing pro bono work for CVLS (Chicago Volunteer Legal Services) and JCFS/HIAS (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society of Chicago). He served as president of HIAS for 7 years. Jeff is also on the board of Midwest AJC and active in JUF. Jeff and his wife Adrienne are the proud grandparents of 10 grandchildren, ages 5 months to 20 years old.

After being diagnosed with multiple myeloma, Jeff was given the anti-cancer drug, Velcade, which helped to save his life. Jeff has been on the ICRF Chicago Board for over ten years.

Michelle Primack proudly joined the ICRF Board in 2019.  As a cancer survivor and strong supporter of Israel, Michelle is committed to ICRF’s mission and vision.  In addition to serving on the ICRF Board, Michelle is also a member of the Illinois Holocaust Museum Women’s Board.  Michelle is an Instructional Coach in the Deerfield Public School District where she engages colleagues in individual, team, and school wide professional learning to address the learning needs of all students.  She is passionate about closing achievement gaps and ensuring that teachers are coached to serve every child, regardless of background or circumstance.

Michelle graduated from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and  lives in Northbrook with her husband and two teenage children.

Rebecca Raff is an experienced wealth manager who is passionate about helping her clients achieve their financial goals. Two areas of significant interest for Rebecca include charitable planning and retirement planning for small business owners. She is a shareholder and Managing Director of Nadler Financial Group, Inc. in Deerfield.

Rebecca lives in Buffalo Grove with her husband and two young daughters. She has been a proud member of the ICRF Chicago Board since 2020.

David L. Reich is an experienced business attorney concentrating in general business matters for private businesses and business owners, including mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, commercial lending, leasing, and real estate transactions.

David is very involved in community development and charitable activities, serving in leadership roles on the board of three foundations, including the ICRF Chicago Board. He enjoys spending time with his family and outdoor activities, including golf, skiing, hiking, and running.

Jeff Robbins, senior vice president and managing director, capital markets, is responsible for new loan origination, based out of Walker & Dunlop’s Chicago office. Throughout his career, Jeff has originated over $1 billion in permanent, interim, construction, and preferred equity/mezzanine financings.

Jeff graduated with a B.B.A. from University of Wisconsin-Madison with a major in Real Estate and Urban Land Economics. He is an active member of the Wisconsin Real Estate Alumni Association and has been on the ICRF Chicago Board since 2017.

Amy Wise is Interior Design Coordinator for Oak Residential Partners, a national real estate investment company focused on the acquisition and management of institutional-quality multifamily properties. Amy is responsible for the design and coordination for the company’s property rebranding and modernization projects.

Amy lives in Northbrook, IL with her husband and three nearly grown children. She joined the ICRF Board in 2022 and has chaired the Women’s Event for the past three years.

Josh Zadikoff  is the CEO of Cornerstone Restaurant Group (CRG), a Chicago-based hospitality company offering full-service management, concept development, brand licensing, and consultation to restaurants and hotels globally. Under Josh’s leadership, CRG has built a portfolio that spans high-profile brand partnerships — including Michael Jordan and Crate & Barrel — alongside beloved Chicago neighborhood staples like Urbanbelly and Dimmi Dimmi. The company was founded by his father, David Zadikoff, a fellow ICRF Chicago Board member.

Josh joined the ICRF Board in 2026, and has been a mentor twice at Revolving Tables, the ICRF Visions Young Leadership Board’s annual networking event.

Josh lives in Highland Park with his wife Emily and their three children.