HONORS
“Among Neighbors” has been awarded the 2026 Jewish Film Award for Best Holocaust Film by the Jewish Film Festival Network. The voting panel included more than 350 people representing 60 film festivals across North America and considered films from around the world. The idea for the documentary about violence against Jews in Poland after WWII began when Anita Friedman, the longtime executive director of the S.F.-based Jewish Family and Children’s Services and the documentary’s executive producer, first visited her father’s native village in Poland 20 years ago. This is the 17th accolade for the film, according to Yoav Potash, writer, director and producer of “Among Neighbors.”
The film also received a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award from the Robert & Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center. The award went to Yoav Potash, writer, producer and director of the film, and Anita Friedman, executive producer of the film as well as executive director of S.F.-based Jewish Family and Children’s Services. The award, created in 1969 by reporters who covered Kennedy’s presidential campaign, honors media professionals exploring human rights and social justice.
Dr. Tami Hendriksz has been named physician of the year 2026 by the Napa Solano Medical Society. Hendriksz works at Touro University California, a Jewish-run medical school on Mare Island in Vallejo, as the campus provost, chief academic officer and dean of the college of osteopathic medicine. She also practices pediatric medicine in Solano County.
Stanford University’s Taube Center for Jewish Studies has presented its annual awards to students who demonstrate exceptional scholarship.
The Donald and Robin Kennedy Undergraduate Award went to two scholars. Ben Kinder won Best Seminar Paper in Jewish Studies for “Forging a Shared Identity: Sephardi and Ashkenazi Relations in Late Ottoman Palestine, 1882-1914.” Reid Smith won Best Essay in Jewish Studies for “What Stanford Students Mean When We Say Zionism: A Research-Based Argument on Divergent Conceptual Frameworks in Campus Discourse.”
Sophie Szew earned the Nelee Langmuir Award for the Best Seminar Paper in Holocaust Studies. Using the framework of disability critical race studies known as DisCrit, she wrote “Disabling the Historiography of Jewish Resistance: How a DisCrit Analysis of Communal Care During the Holocaust Deconstructs Hierarchical Narratives of Survival.”
Raizel Mahgel-Friedman, a senior at Jewish Community High School of the Bay, has earned an Emerging Scholars Award from Yeshivat Maharat, a New York institute that educates and ordains Orthodox women. High school seniors must be nominated by teachers or spiritual leaders before applying for the award, which bestows a $2,500 scholarship toward a gap year of studying in Israel.
The California Legislative Jewish Caucus hosted its first Jewish American Heritage Month celebration at the state Capitol on May 18, honoring the contributions of Jewish Californians. The Northern California recipients are Galya Blachman of San Francisco for co-founding the Noe Valley Chavurah community; Dorene Kastelman of Santa Clara County for her decades of leadership in public service and Jewish community groups; Daniel Lurie for founding Tipping Point Community (prior to becoming San Francisco’s mayor) to combat poverty in the Bay Area; Jodi Muirhead of Santa Clara for her school board leadership and nonprofit service; Carol Saal of Palo Alto for her philanthropy and volunteerism in California and Israel; and Manny Yekutiel for founding Manny’s, a community event space in S.F.
COMINGS & GOINGS
Dean Goldfein will serve as interim head of school at Wornick Jewish Day School in Foster City for the 2026-2027 school year. He will helm the school during the search for a permanent leader. Goldfein previously served as founding head of school at Contra Costa Jewish Day School for 25 years before retiring last summer. Goldfein will step into his role at Wornick in July.
Saul Kaye is the new rabbinical fellow at Temple Israel in Alameda. Kaye is a musician who performs with his wife, Cantor Elana Jagoda, at events and prayer services. He previously studied Jewish mediation teaching at the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. Kaye is currently enrolled as a rabbinical student at the Academy of Jewish Religion. He will begin his new position in July.
Ben Lieberman is the new community engagement manager at Or Shalom Jewish Community in San Francisco. Lieberman started at the Reconstructionist congregation in September as a youth educator, then stepped into his new role in May. He previously served as senior youth educator at Congregation Beth Sholom and Jewish community liaison at Wise Sons Deli.
HAPPENINGS
“Your Presence Is Mandatory,” the novel by San Francisco author Sasha Vasilyuk about a Ukrainian Jewish World War II veteran, and family secrets unveiled against the backdrop of the 2014 Russian-Ukrainian war, has been translated into Russian by Max Nemtsov. The publisher, Freedom Press, follows the Soviet-era practice called tamizdat of publishing dissident Russian literature abroad, according to Vasilyuk. Her novel won the coveted Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature in 2025.
OPPORTUNITIES
JIMENA: Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa is accepting applications for its Sephardic Leaders Fellowship Educators Cohort. This virtual fellowship brings educators together to explore Sephardic history and gain practical tools for teaching about Sephardic and Mizrahi Judaism in their communities. Virtual sessions meet every two weeks between Aug. 18 and Dec. 15. Applications are accepted until July 24. Find out more at tinyurl.com/jimena-fellowship.