Željka Cvijanović, a member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, attended a gala dinner in New York ahead of a summit hosted by the Israeli daily newspaper Israel Hayom. The newspaper’s publisher is billionaire Miriam Adelson, one of the largest donors to Donald Trump and the Republican Party.
On the social media platform X, Cvijanović stated that she held a series of meetings and conversations at the dinner with – as she described them – Jewish and American officials.
Among them were Mike Waltz, the U.S. Ambassador to the UN; Yehuda Kaploun, President Donald
Trump’s Special Envoy for Combating Antisemitism; Jerusalem Mayor Moshe Lion; and former Mossad Director David Barnea.
She expressed special thanks to Miriam Adelson for the invitation and for what she described as “warm hospitality.”
It is worth noting that the connection between the authorities in Republika Srpska and the Adelson family stems from a friendship between Igor Dodik—son of SNSD President Milorad Dodik—and Matan Adelson, the son of Miriam Adelson.
What is the Israel Hayom summit?
According to the organizers, the event was an official reception marking the opening of the summit, hosted by Miriam Adelson. The summit itself – the second such event organized by Israel Hayom in New York – is taking place today, November 11, at the InterContinental Hotel in Times Square, under the theme “An Alliance Put to the Test.”
The topics include security, diplomatic, and economic cooperation between the U.S. and Israel, as well as the attitudes of the younger generation of American Jews toward Israel; a portion of the program is also dedicated to the issue of antisemitism. The summit takes place a week after the U.S. congressional elections.
Among the guests is Barnea, who stepped down as director of the Mossad in June, while Waltz – formerly a national security advisor to Trump – also spoke at the newspaper’s inaugural summit in New York last year.
Who is Miriam Adelson?
Born in Tel Aviv, Miriam Adelson is a physician and the widow of casino magnate Sheldon Adelson. She is the largest individual shareholder of Las Vegas Sands and also owns the Dallas Mavericks basketball team. Forbes estimates her net worth at $30 billion.
Through family foundations, she funds programs focused on the Holocaust and the fight against antisemitism. In 2018, Trump awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the United States.
In a speech to the Israeli parliament in October 2025, Trump credited the Adelsons with the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, the 2018 relocation of the U.S. embassy, and the recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. He also recounted that when he asked Miriam Adelson whether she loved the U.S. or Israel more, she refused to answer, remarking that such a question could be problematic.
Following October 7, 2023, she wrote a column in Israel Hayom calling for critics of Israel worldwide to be completely written off, stating that foreign sympathizers of Hamas “should be dead to us.” She also supported the crackdown on pro-Palestinian student protests in the U.S. in 2024, describing them to Forbes Israel as “gatherings of radical Muslim activists and activists from the Black Lives Matter movement.”
The Adelsons are Trump’s largest financial backers, having contributed $122 million to his campaigns since 2016.
During the 2020 elections, Miriam and Sheldon Adelson were the top donors, contributing approximately $200 million to the Republicans. These donations followed moves by the Trump administration, such as relocating the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
For Trump’s 2024 campaign, according to Federal Election Commission data, she contributed a total of $95 million in four installments between July and September – amounting to at least $100 million over the course of that year. Trump himself later stated that she had secured $250 million for him, “directly and indirectly.”
She also provided funds for this year’s Congressional elections. In the first three months of 2026, she contributed $40 million, and by the end of October, she had given at least $68 million to various Republican campaign committees, Klix.ba writes.
