Grantee Stories

On Friday, November 15, the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco brought over 200 people together in community to enjoy meaningful rituals, live music, and a tasty buffet dinner from Wise Sons.

For many years, the Helen Diller Institute at UC Berkeley has hosted a variety of Israeli faculty members to teach classes and speak at public programs, fostering robust discourse between Israeli and American academics.

In September, Koret was proud to support the UC Press, an organization whose timely and relevant publications unite curious readers with the academic world. The UC Press has existed for over 130 years and publishes in the arts, sciences, humanities, and social sciences, moving the needle of scholarly discourse with each publication.  

ANU Museum of the Jewish People has become a nexus for helping people—in Israel and around the globe—to explore their feelings, process their grief, grow their resilience—and take the long view of Jewish history in the wake of the October 7th attacks. This summer, we had an opportunity to talk with Naama Klar, the director of ANU’s Koret International School for Jewish Peoplehood, and Tal Gottstein, the executive director of the Koret Center for Jewish Civilization (a partnership between ANU and Tel Aviv University), about three new major projects: an immersive, emotional art exhibition; an educational workshop—and training program—on building resilience; and a broad-based catalog and archive of social media and other documentation from October 7th to preserve for scholars in the future.

Humans have many ways to mourn. Channeling grief into creativity, making something that can be seen, or heard, or read can be comforting and healing. And for the viewer, the listener, the reader, these expressions can be equally moving. The ANU Museum’s exhibition titled October 7: A Space of Anguish, Loss, Anger, Memory and Sorrow, presents the work of 25 Israeli artists. Some pieces are reactions to the attacks, several are earlier works by artists who were killed on October 7 or died subsequently, all of them memorialize what has been lost.

The word resilience is very front-and-center, even a bit buzzy, in our times. In the protracted post-October 7 uncertainty, Israelis and Jewish people everywhere aspire to strengthen their resilience coefficient, to take the long view of Jewish and world history in a particularly fraught period. In the summer of 2024, we had a chance to chat at length with three leaders at ANU about three new major projects begun in the aftermath of October 7. One of them, the Jewish Resilience Project (JRP), is a workshop—and training program—designed to promote healing by increasing individual and collective resilience.

A foursome of PhD candidates in history at Tel Aviv University is building a database for the future. “The Civil Archive of the October 7th War” will document, by gathering and cross-indexing social media posts from various public platforms and forums, how civilians—not the government, not the military—are feeling about the October 7 attacks and the ensuing war. If you think of social media threads as spontaneous testimony, the database will provide an archive of aggregated, integrated social commentary from diverse viewpoints, giving the broadest possible context for future research.

This year, Swords to Plowshares (Swords) celebrates 50 years of serving the Bay Area’s veterans. Swords provides comprehensive support for everything from VA benefits, housing, job retraining, and community. Koret spoke with two Swords ambassadors about the challenges of re-entering civilian life, and the successes of the organization’s approach to building trust and developing community.

Jewish Story Partners (JSP) believes that films generate empathy, inviting Jews and non-Jews alike to see each other across perceived boundaries and gain insight into the human condition. JSP has funded 85 films in its first two years, selected from well over 700 applications. We spoke with Roberta Grossman, JSP’s co-executive director, about the diversity of films JSP funds and the range of additional support it offers filmmakers to maximize impact.

St. Anthony Foundation has been a pillar of San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood for over 70 years, and provides a plethora of services in pursuit of their goal to serve as a gateway to stability. But the dining room is regarded as the heart of the organization. We spoke with CEO Nils Behnke about the organization’s deep-seeded values of dignity and respect, the importance of treating every individual they serve as a guest, and the role that food plays in building relationships.

Koret stands with our grantees—both in the U.S. and abroad—who are showing up for Jews and Israel during this time of need. We are inspired by the courage and resilience of Israelis fighting for their country and, in turn, the Jewish Community. Learn more about how our grantees are helping.

“Pan American Unity,” Diego Rivera’s largest mural, is monumental both in size and in scope. How the 30-ton mural travelled seven miles from CCSF to SFMOMA is its own great saga. Read more about the universities, interns, docents, and custodio who brought this mural to the public.