Newton Police Department

One of the organizations that sponsors these trainings is the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). The ADL is a non-profit that works to combat anti-Semitism and advocate for Israel. In this context, the ADL runs a National Counter-Terrorism Seminar that has sent hundreds of top ranking officials to Israel to learn about “combatting terror” since 2003. That same year the ADL established an Advanced Training School that brings delegations of Israeli law enforcement to speak to American law enforcement officials, involving over 1,000 U.S. participants since the program began.

The Police Department of Newton, Massachusetts, is among the departments that have sent delegates to Israel. Matthew Cummings served as Chief of the Newton Police Department between 2009 and 2012. Cummings attended a training in Israel with the ADL as a delegate of the National Counterterrorism Seminar in October 2011. Howard Mintz served as Interim Chief after Cummings and served as Police Chief from 2013 to 2015. He attended ADL’s National Counterterrorism Seminar in Israel in November 2014, which was funded by the Gal Foundation.

Chief Matthew Cummings is now a co-founder of DataVis, LLC, a company that specializes in data visualization for police departments.

Mintz had been involved in the response to the Boston Marathon bombing in April 2013, one month after he was appointed to Police Chief. He retired in 2015. In 2017 he served on the Transition Team of Newton Mayor Ruthanne Fuller.