News & Impact

Last month, an alarming incident in Marin County schools reminded us that antisemitism exists, even in our own backyard. An Instagram account associated with Redwood High School in Larkspur named specific Jewish students in Marin and asked for followers to contribute to a list of names. The account was titled “Redwood students organized (against) semitism.” This incident represents an urgent and growing problem—what has happened in Marin schools is unfortunately not unique. Acts of antisemitism have been reported in schools across the Bay Area, most recently in San Mateo County, and represent a larger, national shift. A study released … Read More

There has been a recent and dramatic rise in antisemitism; from the shooting at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue, to the stabbing on Hanukkah in New York. Attacks on Jews have increased globally, and locally as well. The JFCS Holocaust Center reports a 175% increase in antisemitic acts in schools and community spaces of the past year. As leaders of the Jewish community in the Bay Area, JFCS works diligently to combat hate and antisemitism. We find that education is one of the strongest tools in this ongoing fight. The Holocaust Center continues to play a role in preventing these… Read More

Rywka’s Diary: The Writings of a Jewish Girl from the Lodz Ghetto—first published by the JFCS Holocaust Center—has been awarded this year’s Historical Award by Polityka, Poland’s top newsmagazine. The handwritten diary—miraculously discovered intact amidst the rubble at Auschwitz—is a moving account of the life and dreams of 14-year-old Polish girl Rywka Lipszyc. After more than 70 years in obscurity, the diary was finally published in 2014 and soon after became a worldwide success. The diary has gone on to be translated and published in 15 countries, including Poland. The award, initiated in 1959, is the oldest award in Poland… Read More

J Weekly By Karen Galatz The generation of Holocaust survivors may be passing, but thanks to a just-launched initiative in San Francisco, their testimonies will live on through their children and grandchildren. Called the Next Generation Speakers Bureau, the initiative is the brainchild of Morgan Blum Schneider, director of Jewish Family and Children Services’ Holocaust Center. The bureau is designed to address the challenge of Holocaust education when the last of the survivors are gone. “We want to ensure that the Holocaust remains a story of faces, not just a history of numbers,” said Alexis Herr, the Holocaust Center’s new… Read More

“I want to die with dignity.” Nora is a client of Jewish Family and Children’s Services whose story and strength I find inspiring. She has not only survived the Holocaust, she’s outlived her husband and son. Now, at 93, she’s been diagnosed with cancer. When Nora reached out to JFCS, she tearfully said she hadn’t spoken to anyone in two weeks and that getting around on her own was painful. With no living relatives and only a small fixed income to pay her bills, Nora needs our help. “I was 17 years old when the Nazis took us from our… Read More

Plucked from the ashes of Auschwitz and published in 2014 by the JFCS Holocaust Center, Rywka’s Diary: The Writings of a Jewish Girl from the Lodz Ghetto has been an international sensation, sold alongside The Diary of Anne Frank. The tattered school diary written in Polish by 14-year-old Rywka Lipszyc has captivated readers around the world and has been translated into 15 languages. It is now being published in its native Polish tongue. This month Rywka’s powerful words became available throughout Poland. The new and beautifully designed edition was published in partnership with Austeria Publishing House in collaboration with the… Read More