News & Impact

The last thing Gillian remembered was crossing the street on a green light. When she woke up, she was in the ICU, hooked up to machines and in a body cast. Doctors told her she’d never walk again. “I cried for my mum,” Gillian recalls. “I wasn’t thinking straight. My mother had died years ago in Johannesburg.” After months in the hospital, Gillian tried to get back to her life. “But I couldn’t,” she says. “I was angry, confused, and paralyzed—literally and emotionally. I remember when a friend wheeled me into the JFCS building.  I felt at my lowest. I… Read More

By the time Jonah was 30, he’d had more than a dozen surgical procedures to treat Crohn’s disease, a chronic disorder that affects the gastrointestinal tract. The surgeries prevented his debilitating condition from worsening, but they didn’t cure him of it. Because of Crohn’s, he has been unable to have a career. “I was deeply depressed by the way my life was turning out,” he says. “Fortunately, a family friend told me about JFCS’ Disabilities Program. It has been a lifesaver. I’ve not only received emotional support, but also solid, practical guidance and other services that have kept me… Read More

Bay Area Reporter by Cynthia Laird Jewish Family and Children’s Services has announced that its board of trustees member Joyce Newstat and her spouse, community and business leader Susan Lowenberg, have established the Seymour Newstat Endowment Fund at JFCS to benefit Holocaust survivors who participate in the agency’s social and educational program called Cafe by the Bay. Read More from the Bay Area Reporter… Read More

Jewish Family and Children’s Services (JFCS) is pleased to announce that its Board of Trustees member Joyce Newstat and her spouse, community and business leader Susan Lowenberg, recently established the Seymour Newstat Endowment Fund at JFCS to benefit Holocaust survivors who participate in the agency’s social and educational program called Café by the Bay. Specifically, the fund will support Café by the Bay’s annual Passover seder, which attracts many Holocaust survivors throughout the Bay Area. Remaining distributions from the fund will be used to educate young people about the Holocaust and to advance moral courage, tolerance, and social justice. The… Read More

J Weekly by Dan Pine She was only 14. A sensitive Jewish girl with a flair for writing, trapped in the maelstrom of the Holocaust. The only repository for her deepest feelings: a diary, found abandoned soon after the war. Her name was not Anne. Her name was Rywka. Read More from J Weekly… Read More

The JFCS Holocaust Center in partnership with Lehrhaus Judaica today announced the publication of The Diary of Rywka Lipszyc. After more than 70 years in obscurity, the diary of a teenage girl that was found at Auschwitz in 1945 will be revealed for the first time to the public on March 10, 2014. Accompanied by rich background materials and edited by National Jewish Book Award recipient Alexandra Zapruder, the diary is destined to become an important source of inspiration for students of the Holocaust around the world. In 1940, the Nazis forced young Rywka Lipszyc (pronounced Rif-ka Lip-shitz) and her… Read More