“Israel’s national science teams have concluded the international Olympiad season with an unprecedented haul of 26 medals, including 8 gold, 13 silver, and 5 bronze, along with one honorable mention…. The Education Ministry and the Maimonides Fund’s Future Scientists Center, which lead the training of these national teams, proudly announced the final tally as the last three teams of the season returned.”

“Directed by Guy Nattiv and Zar Amir (a rare collaboration between an Israeli and an Iranian filmmaker), ‘Tatami’ draws inspiration from the real-life experiences of Iranian athletes who were punished or forced to seek asylum abroad after refusing to wear a hijab during their international sporting events. We see Leila defiantly release her black mane of hair on several occasions — as in flashbacks to her life in Tehran in which she’s in bed with her husband or partying at an underground club.

But it’s not Leila’s hijab that’s the problem: Midway through the tournament, Leila’s coach, Maryam (Amir, an Iranian exile herself), gets a call from the Iranian authorities demanding that Leila fake an injury and drop out immediately to avoid competing against an Israeli athlete. (Iran doesn’t recognize Israel, and forbids its athletes from competition with Israeli athletes.)”

“As Jews throughout history prayed for their government, they did so with full understanding that their government was never going to get things quite right. While they had confidence that one day a redeemer would come to Zion, this was not that day. This was another stop along the way to redemption. So we pray that the imperfect leaders we have, in Washington and in Jerusalem, succeed in efforts to make us more secure, and that the King of Kings will ‘put into their hearts… compassion to do good.’”

Maimonides Fund has announced its call for applications for the third cohorts of the Jewish Writers’ Initiative Screenwriters and Digital Storytellers Labs. These year-long fellowships offer substantial support for US-based creative talent developing Jewish-themed projects. Applications are open through May 23, 2025.

Related Grantee: Jewish Writers’ Initiative

“In almost any discussion on black-Jewish relations today, the elephant in the room is diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). For years, DEI served as a lifeline for black professionals, opening doors in elite institutions and corporate spaces that had long been shut. Yet even black people are beginning to argue that DEI has outlived its utility — not because its goals were unworthy, but because the framework has been hijacked by ideologues who wield it as a weapon of division rather than a tool for progress.”

Related Grantee: SAPIR: Ideas for a Thriving Jewish Future

“Cartoonmentary” is an animated series that tackles taboo topics, such as miscarriages and Down syndrome, and transforms them into meaningful art, with the goal of helping people who are suffering silently to know that they are not alone. “Cartoonmentary” was developed by Chari Pere in the Jewish Writers’ Initiative 2024 Digital Storytellers Lab.

Related Grantee: Jewish Writers’ Initiative

There are so many fascinating characters in Jewish storytelling. They might appear first in Jewish tradition in texts like the Tanach and Talmud. But their adventures continue through Midrash, legends, folklore, ritual objects, art, and song. Jewish Lore Reactions follows these characters through space and time, tracing the sprawling evolution of their stories across the Jewish diaspora in an incredible, extended chain of imagination: The collective narrative world-building of the Jewish people. Jewish Lore Reactions was developed by Miriam Anzovin in the Jewish Writers’ Initiative 2024 Digital Storytellers Lab.

Related Grantee: Jewish Writers’ Initiative

“Shofar, So Good!” is a podcast about creator Kate Mishkin’s quest to unearth her Jewish roots by diving head-first into life’s trickiest questions. By exploring questions surrounding faith, death, a higher power, and prayer, she stitches together a better understanding of what it means to be a Jewish person. “Shofar, So Good!” was developed in the Jewish Writers’ Initiative 2024 Digital Storytellers Lab.

Related Grantee: Jewish Writers’ Initiative

Mental illness. Addiction. Death. God. What does it take to heal, and how far is Play willing to go? Play Steinberg’s webcomic, “FATHER. MOTHER. GOD.” was developed in the Jewish Writers’ Initiative 2024 Digital Storytellers Lab.

Related Grantee: Jewish Writers’ Initiative

“Our failure as faculty to challenge our protesting students, opting instead to shrink the complicated history of youth activism to a single, unrepresentative (but well-soundtracked) moment of it several decades ago, is symptomatic of a profound intellectual failure on our part. Put in academic terms, we, faculty particularly in the humanities and social sciences, have failed to apply critical theory, the predominant method of analysis in our fields, to our present situation and our own participation in it.”

Related Grantee: SAPIR: Ideas for a Thriving Jewish Future

“As a scholar of Jewish texts, I have spent the past 12 years working with a team of engineers who use machine-learning tools to digitize and expand access to the Jewish canon. Jewish tradition says nothing of ChatGPT, but it is adamant about work. According to the ancient rabbis, meaningful, creative labor is how humans channel the divine. It’s an idea that can help us all, regardless of our faith, be discerning adopters of new applications and devices in a time of great technological change. If you have ever felt the joy of untangling a seemingly intractable problem or the adrenaline rush that comes from applying creative energy to shape the world, then you know that worthwhile labor helps us channel our best selves. And we cannot afford to cede it to the robots.”

Related Grantee: Sefaria

“Each year, I sit in Yom Kippur services and consider how my Jewish values affect my work, and I reflect on whether I conduct myself and my work in a way that honors the humility and responsibility that each of us must hold. What do I regret? What can I do better? To what goals must I commit myself in the year ahead? It seems that each year, there are new sets of ‘Al Chet’ and/or Viddui confessionals offered for contemplation.

To that end, I offer one more to that mix. What can we, in the Jewish philanthropic ecosystem, commit to doing better in the year to come?”