Oscar-winning director Ari Sandel (\”West Bank Story\”) racked up yet another prize when Americans for Peace Now presented him the 2008 Cine-Peace Award.
There were Hollywood stars and powerful studio heads, politicians, multinational rappers, Israeli Cabinet ministers, the Keshet Chaim dance ensemble, two-dozen Israeli Boy and Girl Scouts, a 3-D film segment, a tennis legend, professional and amateur comedians, resounding shofars, electronic fireworks and tables groaning with biblical fruits.
Nessah Young Professionals\’ Aug. 26 annual gala drew more than 600 local Iranian Jewish young professionals and college students to the Area nightclub in West Hollywood, where they danced the night away to live music while also raising money on behalf of the Friends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF).
Hundreds of well-dressed, young Jewish philanthropists packed Cuban restaurant La Bodeguita de Pico the night of Aug. 14 to show off their support of the Cuban Jewish community.
Pelosi, on a break from her post as the first female Speaker of the House, landed at American Jewish University (AJU) on Aug. 11 to promote her new book, \”Know Your Power: A Message to America\’s Daughters\” (Doubleay). Faced with an acrimonious audience, one of Congress\’s most outspoken critics of the Bush administration was lambasted for opposing impeachment proceedings against the president
The Iranian-American Jewish community is avidly following the presidential election scene, and Craig Taubman taped a Chanukah show.
For the young Jews of Detroit now living in Hollywood, Bob Aronson might as well be a movie star. The gentle-voiced CEO of the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit has the money, power and prestige to throw a respectable Hollywood party. More importantly, he knows the magic ingredient required to attract young, aspiring industry types to the much-stigmatized Jewish mixer: Make it free.
The new Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco is a hip amalgam of modern art. Daniel Liebeskind\’s peculiar architectural dazzle looks like a giant Rubik\’s Cube in metallic steel, standing on its tip beneath the city\’s downtown skyscrapers. Beside it is the Jessie Street Power Substation, a brick and terra cotta structure in the classical revival style, a landmark building first erected in 1881 that Liebeskind adapted to the project.\n\n
The earnest message was delivered in an opulent setting. First, the customary cocktails and hors d\’oeuvres were served in the Sheinbaum\’s plush backyard, where a clover-shaped pool, statues and sculptures seemed fixed into the landscape of the Brentwood Hills.
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