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Articles by Dan Pine
This podcast asks: What would Maimonides do?
W.W.M.D.? What would Maimonides do? That is the question underlying “Maimonides and the Goodness of the World,” the first episode in a series on great Jewish thinkers from the long-running radio show and podcast “Philosophy Talk.” But it’s hardly the only question “Philosophy Talk” host Josh Landy, a professor of French at Stanford University, has pondered about the 12th-century rabbi, physician and Torah commentator. “Why should we care about what Maimonides had to say?” Landy asks.
Fake it till you make it: S.F. rabbi’s new book asks skeptics to suspend disbelief
To persuade skeptical Jews to believe in God, Rabbi Noa Kushner suggests something akin to the Nike credo: Just do it. The spiritual leader of The Kitchen, an independent congregation in San Francisco, lays out her theological schemata in a new book, “Pretend You Believe: How to Enter Religion,” which will hit bookstores in mid-October. In her book, Kushner poses a challenge to readers who find it difficult to suspend their disbelief about religion and the existence of God.
Inch by inch, this ‘gardenista’ helped preschoolers grow at the Palo Alto JCC
After 40 bloomin’ years on the job, Debbie Togliatti is hanging up her trowel. The gardening specialist at the Oshman Family JCC preschool — or, as she calls herself, “gardenista” — will retire July 10. She leaves behind a legacy of planting Jewish values one child, one seed, at a time. Her friends at the JCC in Palo Alto threw her a farewell party on May 9, with nearly 200 well-wishers on hand.
Stanford students pitch startup ideas in Hillel contest for $30K prize
Stanford University junior Jessica Korobkin set out to give her fellow students a chance to practice tikkun olam, the Jewish concept of repairing the world. What she got back were dozens of ingenious proposals reflecting Silicon Valley's innovation ethos - everything from making bricks out of fungi to reducing the carbon footprint of oyster farms.
Cal valedictorian: ‘Nervousness shows that we care’
Asher Cohen will head to Yale University this fall to attend its prestigious medical school. The newly minted Cal graduate and future physician is excited about this next chapter of his life but acknowledges he's a bit nervous. "I'm a math major at Berkeley," he told J. a few days before graduating, "so I know very little about the human body." Odds are he will master the medical reference Gray's Anatomy in short order. Cohen is just 20 but has already accomplished so much.
Mobile museum teaches local teens how hate takes root
The students in Piedmont High School's sophomore acting class had never heard the word "putsch." But they were about to find out what it means. Their class on Tuesday took place inside a bus that doubles as one of four Mobile Museums of Tolerance (MMOT). Parked near Piedmont City Hall for the week, it was outfitted to seat 30, movie theater-style, with three screens projecting films and photos that brought history to life.
Prodigal comedian Moshe Kasher returns for Bay Area gigs
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. You’d think stand-up comedian Moshe Kasher would feel a bit of bravado about returning to the Bay Area this month to headline San Francisco’s Punch Line. Instead, the former Oakland resident finds it “more stressful” to play local comedy clubs. “I’m so conscious about what material I did last time and what’s new and fresh,” he told J.
Mom ‘rides’ waves on water bike for daughter who died of overdose
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. At one point during her 28-mile ride on a “water bike”from Marin County to the Farallon Islands, Jessica Schiller found herself pedaling across open ocean with no land in sight. Suddenly, she had unexpected companions: a pod of dolphins leaping alongside her. That’s when Schiller felt that her late daughter Naomi, who died two years ago of a fentanyl overdose, was with her. Schiller undertook “Naomi’s Ride”on Oct. 4.
Federation chair-elect Laura Lauder seeks to strengthen community
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Some 80 years ago in Canton, Ohio, a man named Paul Heller chaired the Jewish Welfare Fund, a precursor to the modern-day Jewish federation. Now Heller’s granddaughter, Laura Lauder, is following in his footsteps as the next board chair of the Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund. Her term begins Jan. 15.
Diverse Israeli girls soccer team gets an assist in Bay Area
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. For nearly a year, 15-year-old soccer player Shira Sima hasn’t worried about defenders outflanking her on the pitch. Instead, she’s worried about Hezbollah rockets raining down on her home. Shira plays on the girls team for the Hapoel Mateh Asher Regional Council, which covers about 30 Israeli communities along the Lebanese border and west of the Galilee. The outbreak of the multi-front war since the Oct.
Rodef Sholom’s new sanctuary integrates Marin’s natural beauty
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. After half a century, Congregation Rodef Sholom will welcome the Jewish New Year in a most unusual place: its own sanctuary. Make that its brand-new sanctuary. For decades, the San Rafael synagogue has shifted its High Holiday services to the Marin Civic Center to accommodate more worshippers. But this year it will make an exception on Oct. 2, Erev Rosh Hashanah, so that congregants can begin 5785 in their new home.
Neo-Nazis are still a menace to America’s future
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. If the 2017 tiki-torch march in Charlottesville, Virginia, seemed like a one-off organized by a handful of antisemitic kooks, Spencer Sunshine has bad news for you. Sunshine, a sociologist, writer and activist, has monitored America’s far right for decades.
Mitzvah Milers are pumped to pedal in MS fundraiser
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Dan Siegel rides a three-wheel bicycle with electric assist, a high headrest and a recumbent seat, which takes pressure off the back and knees. He’ll ride it in the Waves to Wine charity cycling event next month to raise money for multiple sclerosis research.
Bay Area Jewish community is part of Kamala Harris’ political story
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. When Sam Lauter joined a group of informal advisers to Kamala Harris’ successful campaign for San Francisco district attorney in 2003, he knew the young prosecutor was going places. He just didn’t know how far. “I would be lying if I said I saw this,” said the Bay Area political consultant and Democratic Majority for Israel board member, commenting on Harris’ imminent nomination as Democratic presidential nominee.
East Bay wrestler with Israeli roots is going for Olympic gold
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Growing up in Walnut Creek, Amit Elor would wrestle high school boys and “make them cry,” according to her former coach. And that’s when she was still in middle school. Now Elor, an East Bay native whose Israeli parents moved to California in 1980, will compete in the 2024 Paris Olympics as the youngest woman ever to qualify for the U.S. wrestling squad.
Petaluma skateboarder Minna Stess ready to fly at Paris Olympics
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Skateboarder Minna Stess just missed qualifying for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. She wasn’t about to let that happen again with this summer’s games in Paris. The 18-year-old from Petaluma resident clinched one of the 12 spots on the U.S. skateboarding team after her performance in June at the Olympic qualifying series in Budapest, Hungary. Stess told J.
Emil Knopf, Holocaust survivor and Levi Strauss exec, dies at 91
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Emil Knopf had a favorite expression, according to his niece Yola Kalinski. However vexing the circumstances may appear, he would invariably say, “It’s no big deal.” As a Jewish Holocaust survivor, who hid as a child in the Polish forests before reaching Bolivia and, ultimately, San Francisco, Knopf knew what was and what wasn’t a big deal.
New Yorker cartoonist reverse-engineers his craft in new book
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Phi Witte sees things in black and white. The Piedmont resident is a cartoonist who specializes in the single-panel gag cartoon — the kind that appears in every issue of the New Yorker, where James Thurber and Charles Addams pioneered the artform in the 1930s. Witte has published cartoons there, as well as in the Wall Street Journal, the Times of London, Barron’s and Reader’s Digest.
Piedmont cartoonist reverse-engineers craft in new book
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Phil Witte sees things in black and white. The Piedmont resident is a cartoonist who specializes in the single-panel gag cartoon — the kind that appears in every issue of the New Yorker, where James Thurber and Charles Addams pioneered the artform in the 1930s. Witte has had more than 1,000 such cartoons published in outlets such as the Wall Street Journal, the Times of London, Barron’s and Reader’s Digest.
Marc Klein, Bay Area editor who led Jewish journalism into the digital age, dies at 75
Added former J. managing editor Sherwood Weingarten, “Under his auspices, the paper went from a small community weekly into a much larger operation." In 1984, when Marc Klein showed up in San Francisco, the Jewish Bulletin was just that: a community bulletin that ran on mimeographs, manual typewriters and carbon paper. By the time he completed his nearly 28-year tenure as editor and publisher, a thoroughly modernized Bulletin — renamed J.
Marc Klein, Bay Area editor who led Jewish journalism into the digital age, dies at 75
(J. via JTA) — In 1984, when Marc Klein showed up in San Francisco, the Jewish Bulletin was just that: a community bulletin that ran on mimeographs, manual typewriters and carbon paper. By the time he completed his nearly 28-year tenure as editor and publisher, a thoroughly modernized Bulletin — renamed J. in 2003 — had become inarguably one of the nation’s best Jewish newspapers. Klein, the old-school newsman who guided J.
Marc Klein, former editor who led J. into the digital age, dies at 75
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. In 1984, when Marc Klein showed up in San Francisco, the Jewish Bulletin was just that: a community bulletin that ran on mimeographs, manual typewriters and carbon paper. By the time he completed his nearly 28-year tenure as editor and publisher, a thoroughly modernized Bulletin — renamed J. in 2003 — had become inarguably one of the nation’s best Jewish newspapers. Klein, the old-school newsman who guided J.
The Catskills opens JCC Film Fest May 30
Documentary celebrates lost world more marvelous than Mrs. Maisel ever knew By Dan Pine, J. The resorts are gone now, either demolished or rotting in the humid air of upstate New York. But for nearly a century, the Catskill Mountains served as a lush playground for America’s upwardly mobile Jews. Though it slathers on the nostalgia thick as sour cream on a blintz, Lex Gillespie’s 2023 documentary, The Catskills, affectionately recounts the history of this iconic time and place.
Newsom unveils post-Oct. 7 plan to fight antisemitism in California
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Updated at 6:10 p.m. April 8. Before the Oct. 7 terrorist attack and Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, Jews were already the target of more than 60 percent of religiously motivated hate crimes in California. Anti-Jewish “violence and threats have escalated” in the state since that day, according to the governor’s office. In San Francisco, hate crimes targeting Jews quadrupled last year compared with 2022.
Israeli products back on shelves at North Bay market after outcry
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Like most grocery stores, Community Market sells a variety of Passover foods. But late last month, in protest of Israel’s war in Gaza, store managers at its two North Bay locations cleared the shelves of all products imported from Israel. Once word got out, Sonoma County Jews quickly organized.
Ephraim Margolin, 97, ‘architect of Israel’ and famed attorney
Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. Most people hope to live a good life. Ephraim Margolin lived a great one. Not just an eyewitness to history, he was an active participant in it: escaping Europe before the Holocaust, fighting in Israel’s War of Independence, becoming a renowned civil rights attorney and serving the Jewish community, both locally and globally. Ephraim Margolin died March 10 in San Francisco. He was 97.
J. hires journalist, author and professor Chanan Tigay as editor-in-chief
After an 18-month nationwide search, J. The Jewish News of Northern California has hired Chanan Tigay as its new editor-in-chief. Tigay, a journalist, author and professor, is “perfectly positioned to navigate J. through the current crises and challenges in the Jewish community, from antisemitism to an increasingly dispersed and unaffiliated Jewish community,” J. CEO Jo Ellen Green Kaiser said Monday. The editor-in-chief position doesn’t open up at J. often.
New book fills history gap about Israel’s Mizrahi-led Black Panther movement
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New book fills history gap about Israel’s Mizrahi-led Black Panthers
It’s the early 1970s. Revolution is in the air, and the Black Panthers are on the march. But these are not the streets of Oakland or Chicago, and the protesters are not African Americans. This is Jerusalem, and these are the Black Panthers of Israel. The Israeli Panthers were founded more than half a century ago by Mizrahi Jews, mostly young men whose families had made aliyah from Arab countries.
Oakland Hebrew Day School alum Eyal Twito, 22, killed in Gaza
An Israeli paratrooper and former student at Oakland Hebrew Day School, Capt. Eyal Mevorach Twito, was killed on Monday fighting in Gaza. He was 22. Eyal and his family had strong ties to the East Bay Jewish community. His parents, Moti and Shiri Twito, served on the OHDS faculty as shlichim (emissaries from Israel) between 2008 and 2011, and they enrolled their four children at the school.
Devastation and hope on Federation fact-finding mission to Israel
Laura Lauder was stopped at the gate when she arrived at Kfar Aza, a kibbutz nearly destroyed in the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attack. With Israeli artillery booming in the distance, she and her companions were told to exit their armored vehicle and don flak jackets and bulletproof helmets. “That’s when it got real,” said Lauder, a Bay Area Jewish community activist and philanthropist.
Earth-based groups embrace the Sephardic Rosh Hashanah Seder
Noémie Hakim-Serfaty is racing against the clock to collect recipes from her aunt, who lives in France. In her job at Urban Adamah, Hakim-Serfaty is one of the people in charge of upcoming High Holiday events at the Jewish educational farm in Berkeley. One of her responsibilities as community programs and ritual manager is planning the menu for a Sephardic Rosh Hashanah seder — and her aunt is the best Sephardic cook she knows.
The Fentanyl crisis is taking the lives of young Jews
Cameron Fuller and his father spoke on the phone nearly every day. So Eric Fuller worried last February when his son failed to return a call. One day turned into two, two days turned to three, and by then he knew something was wrong. The elder Fuller, who lives near San Diego, contacted the landlord of Cameron’s San Francisco apartment and told him, “‘Please go over and tell me what I’m dealing with.” Cameron was found dead in his bed.
Rock ’n’ roll photographer Jay Blakesberg gets retrospective at CJM
Even after decades as one of the Bay Area’s top rock ’n’ roll photographers, Jay Blakesberg still remembers his first time in a darkroom. It was 1977. Together with a friend, the 14-year-old “Jewish kid from New Jersey” had just gotten back from a Jerry Garcia concert, having shot a roll of black-and-white film.
East Contra Costa shul proposes to Walnut Creek temple
Two Contra Costa County synagogues haven’t invoked the “m” word just yet — that would be “merger” — but leaders of Congregation B’nai Torah in Brentwood and Congregation B’nai Tikvah in Walnut Creek are using the language of romance to describe their budding relationship. “At this stage, we’re past dating,” said B’nai Torah president Denise Duran.
Anti-Israel graffiti scrawled at site of pro-democracy protest in Cupertino
In late July, Offir Gutelzon crossed the Mary Avenue pedestrian bridge in Cupertino as he marched with hundreds of fellow protesters. Waving Israeli flags, they denounced Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposed overhaul of Israel’s judiciary, while motorists below on I-280 honked horns in support.
New online journal elevates today's Sephardic and Mizrahi voices
Rabbi Daniel Bouskila, the son of Moroccan and Algerian refugees, believes most Ashkenazim know little about Sephardic Jewish life beyond food and dress. It’s a problem he labels the “folklorification of tradition” — meaning the vast religious and cultural universe of Sephardic Judaism has been reduced to folklore. “Sephardic Judaism is not a museum exhibit, but a vibrant tradition that has produced some of the greatest writers, thinkers and intellectuals,” Bouskila said.
ADL's Bay Area head takes new senior role at Jewish Federation
After leading the San Francisco office of the Anti-Defamation League for over a decade, Seth Brysk is taking on a newly created, executive-level position at the Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund. His new title will be chief officer of external affairs and partnerships, the Federation announced in a July 25 press release. The job starts on Aug. 16. “I’ve always been interested in serving my community,” Brysk said in an interview.
Why some Jews are returning to Gold Country
Soon after Bernie Zimmerman moved from San Francisco to rural Nevada County, he and his wife, Grace, attended a local New Year’s Eve bash. Right away, he noticed something strange about his neighbors. They were all armed. “Everybody had a gun on their hips,” Zimmerman recalled. “The women were pulling guns out of their purses. At midnight, instead of shooting off fireworks, everyone starts shooting off their guns.” That was back in 1979.
Sam Salkin ends 14-year watch at Sinai Memorial Chapel
Though he’s officially executive director of Sinai Memorial Chapel, Sam Salkin prefers a less lofty title: funeral director, a term he said better defines his hands-on role at the Bay Area’s 122-year-old Jewish mortuary. His job is to aid families at what he called the “most raw and tender time.” Family members arrive in a “variety of states, from being in shock to frazzled to being relieved,” he said. “So the emotions are on a tremendous spectrum.
Israeli journalist turns to fiction to untangle Mideast conflict
As Ruth Marks Eglash began writing “Parallel Lines,” her debut novel that tells the story of three teenage girls in Jerusalem, she found herself influenced by another novel about teenage girls: “The Hunger Games” by Suzanne Collins. There are no gladiatorial death matches in Eglash’s book, but in painting a portrait of the social tinderbox that is modern Jerusalem, the author brushes up against a dystopian view of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Chabad’s Tiburon Jewish Fest celebrates the chai life with wine, music and vibes
A hot klezmer band, cool kosher wine and a warm haimish vibe welcomed visitors of all ages to the very first Tiburon Jewish Festival. Drawing hundreds of attendees over the course of three hours on a Sunday afternoon, the free event on July 30 was the first of what organizers hope will be many to come.
Chabad’s Tiburon Jewish Fest celebrates the chai life with wine, music and vibes
A hot klezmer band, cool kosher wine and a warm haimish vibe welcomed visitors of all ages to the very first Tiburon Jewish Festival. Drawing hundreds of attendees over the course of three hours on a Sunday afternoon, the free event on July 30 was the first of what organizers hope will be many to come.
San Francisco's Jewish Community Library breaks from parent org
Independence Day came a few days early this year for the Jewish Community Library in San Francisco. On July 1 the 62-year-old library, which houses more than 40,000 Jewish-themed titles, became independent, officially ending its long-standing ties with Jewish LearningWorks. The change came after Jewish LearningWorks finished a strategic planning process in 2022. The S.F.-based agency decided to narrow its focus to a core mission: professional development of educators.
'The Catskills' reveals a world more marvelous than Mrs. Maisel knew
Updated July 17 The resorts are gone now, either demolished or rotting in the humid air of upstate New York. But for nearly a century, the Catskill Mountains served as a lush playground for America’s upwardly mobile Jews. Though it slathers on the nostalgia thick as sour cream on a blintz, Lex Gillespie’s 2023 documentary, “The Catskills,” affectionately recounts the history of this iconic time and place.
Joseph Pedott, Chia Pet mogul and S.F. philanthropist, dies at 91
Joseph Pedott played a small yet delightful role in the greening of America. He was the man who popularized Chia Pets, those terracotta figurines on which grew a lush carpet of sprouts. The S.F. entrepreneur made a fortune with the Chia Pet, but he accomplished much more than that over the course of his busy life. He became a world-class salesman, a marketing whiz and a dedicated philanthropist, including to the Jewish community. Pedott died June 22 after suffering a heart attack. He was 91.
Berkeley artist seeks home for sculpture honoring creator of LGBT rainbow flag
Skip to content Editor’s note: This story first appeared on J. The Jewish News of California. It came to him one raucous night in 1978 while dancing at Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. Gilbert Baker took in the colored lights, the swirling bodies, the reflections off the mirrored ball, and in a flash he conceived a symbol to represent his LGBTQ+ community: a rainbow flag. That flag has since become the ubiquitous banner of gay communities and pride parades everywhere.
Local Israeli sculptor seeks home for piece honoring ‘gay Betsy Ross’
It came to him one raucous night in 1978 while dancing at Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. Gilbert Baker took in the colored lights, the swirling bodies, the reflections off the mirrored ball, and in a flash he conceived a symbol to represent his LGBTQ community: a rainbow flag. That flag has since become the ubiquitous banner of gay communities and pride parades everywhere. And Baker, who died in 2017, has been remembered as a latter-day, queer Betsy Ross.
Swastika spray-painted on Peninsula Sinai synagogue in Foster City
It had been more than 40 years since Foster City’s Peninsula Sinai Congregation faced an antisemitic graffiti attack. That streak ended over the weekend when a nearly 2-foot-wide swastika was discovered spray-painted on the south side of the synagogue. A congregant out for a late afternoon stroll on Sunday, noticed the vandalism and contacted the synagogue. Foster City police are investigating the incident, which the Anti-Defamation League labeled a hate crime.
Documentary of S.F. daughter’s time-lapse childhood comes to Max
In his latest documentary, veteran San Francisco filmmaker Jay Rosenblatt captures his daughter Ella’s entire childhood, from precocious toddler to college-bound senior — in a mere 28 minutes. Oscar-nominated “How Do You Measure a Year?” is now streaming on Max, giving a larger audience the chance to meet Ella Rosenblatt, who sat for annual on-camera interviews on every birthday from age 2 to 18.
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