Financier and philanthropist J. Ezra Merkin assented Tuesday to step down as manager of his hedge funds and to place them into receivership.

The casualties of Bernard Madoff’s alleged $50-billion Ponzi scheme include some of the biggest names in Jewish philanthropy, in addition to titans of the business and real-estate worlds.

It’s not the first time the Russians have gotten worked up over the culture of American celebrity.

But they’ve met a formidable foe in George Clooney. The handsome, publicity-savvy, immensely likeable man-about-the-world is the newest U.N. messenger of peace.