From left: Lew Groner, vice president of marketing and communications at Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles; Saba Soomekh; Jasmine Lawi; Gina Nahai; Sinai Temple Rabbi Nicole Guzik; Tabby Refael; Tina Hay; Lisa Ansell, associate director at USC Casden Institute; and USC Casden Institute Director Steve Ross. Courtesy of USC Casden Institute The USC Casden Institute, Sinai Temple and the Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles partnered to recognize the contributions of Iranian Jewish women in literature and academia and to commemorate Nowruz, the Persian New Year, for the Los Angeles Jewish community.
The Los Angeles Jewish Film Festival, Simon Wiesenthal Center and AKLA held the Los Angeles premiere of the drama “One Life,” starring Anthony Hopkins, at the Museum of Tolerance on March 14.
The event opened with a reception sponsored by the David and Janet Polak Foundation. The program drew an audience of 300 and featured an introduction by Sir Nicholas Winton’s son, Nick Winton, sharing that March 14 marked the anniversary of the first transport of children from Czechoslovakia to the U.K.
The audience was moved to tears at the end of the screening by the surprise live appearances and introduction of several children of the children that Winton saved.
The film is currently playing in theaters across Los Angeles.
From left: Rabbi David Baron, Beverly Hills City Councilmember Sharona Nazarian, StandWithUs CEO Roz Rothstein and Beverly Hills City Councilmember John Mirisch attend a screening in Beverly Hills. Photo by Orly Halevy
Nearly five months since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, a raw and chilling documentary about that day’s Nova music festival massacre screened at the Saban Theatre in Beverly Hills.
The film, “#Nova,” features minute-by-minute video and audio shot and recorded by victims of music festival attack in Israel as they fled for their lives, phones in hand.
At the Nova music festival, more than 300 partygoers gathered at an outdoor trance music festival near Israel’s border with Gaza were killed. The film shows what they experienced, from the festivalgoers arriving at the party and dancing through the night, to them fleeing for their lives after the arrival of gunmen from Gaza.
The hourlong film was shown at the Beverly Hills venue on March 4.
Nova massacre survivor Talia Biner attended the screening and shared her personal story as well as her reaction to those who’ve cast doubt about Hamas’ atrocities on Oct. 7.
“You’ve seen what happened to us. All the videos you saw I have those in my cell phone, I have watched them and still [watching the screening] … was the hardest thing I’ve done in a while,” she said from the Saban stage. “I didn’t speak about what happened to me. Only after two months did I realize people were saying the things that I heard, and the things that I saw, didn’t happen.”
Briner, who worked as a surgical nurse before Oct. 7, brought a guitar onstage and performed a song she wrote about the experience.
Before the screening, StandWithUs CEO Roz Rothstein and Temple of the Arts Rabbi David Baron delivered remarks, and Temple of the Arts Cantor Nathan Lam recited a prayer.
Community leader Rachel Sumekh leads the workshop, “Rewriting the JoC Leadership Narrative,” on March 13 in Beverly Hills. The event was designed to highlight stories about Jews of color. The Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles provided support. Photo courtesy of Jews of Color Initiative
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