In 2014, Maya Savir, author of On Reconciliation, made her first trip to South Africa and Rwanda, two societies that had each gone through a long and painful process of reconciliation, one following apartheid and the other genocide. What she learned there became a book, first published in Hebrew in 2017 and now appearing in Todd Hasak-Lowy’s superb English translation, that asks whether lessons from South Africa and Rwanda might offer anything to Israelis and Palestinians confronting their own long-running conflict.

Savir serves as Israel country director for Search for Common Ground, the largest international organization dedicated to peacebuilding. Before that she spent a decade working in Africa for an NGO focused on the treatment and prevention of malnutrition. Following October 7 and the war in Gaza, she added a new chapter that asks whether reconciliation is still worth imagining. The English edition includes a foreword by the Palestinian peace activist Aziz Abu Sarah, co-author of The Future Is Peace.

Savir and Hasak-Lowy will be in conversation with the Reverend Ben Daniel, senior pastor of Montclair Presbyterian Church. Pastor Ben has long been active in interfaith work, including organizing the Silicon Valley Jewish-Presbyterian dialogue group, and is the author of The Search for Truth About Islam. Together they will discuss what Savir learned, what forgiveness does and doesn’t have to do with reconciliation, and what it might take to imagine a future beyond the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The event is hosted by the Faith Trio, a partnership of the Islamic Cultural Center of Northern California, Kehilla Community Synagogue, and Montclair Presbyterian Church. The three congregations came together in the years after September 11, 2001, and have since met regularly for shared study of their overlapping scriptures, annual dinners, art exhibits, and programs to counter hunger.

Savir and Hasak-Lowy will also speak in San Francisco on Wednesday, October 14, at 7:00 p.m. at Congregation Beth Sholom, in an evening co-presented by New Lehrhaus. RSVP for the San Francisco event here.

Who this is for:

• Anyone following the Israeli-Palestinian conflict who wants to think past the day’s headlines
• Readers interested in truth and reconciliation processes in South Africa and Rwanda and what they might teach other divided societies
• Members of faith communities looking for ways to support Israelis and Palestinians working for peace

What you'll leave with:

• An introduction to Savir’s On Reconciliation and the years of work in South Africa and Rwanda behind it
• A clearer picture of what reconciliation does and doesn’t require, including its relationship to forgiveness
• The chance to hear directly from the author and translator and ask your own questions

Friday, October 16, 3:30–5:30pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

For more than two millennia, thriving Jewish communities made their homes across Iraq, speaking distinctive Jewish varieties of Arabic. Judeo-Baghdadi Arabic, also known as Yahudic, developed among the Jews of Baghdad and the towns to its south, preserving ancient linguistic features alongside Hebrew and Aramaic elements that set it apart from the Arabic spoken by their Muslim and Christian neighbors. After the mass emigration of Iraqi Jews in the mid-twentieth century, the language began its rapid decline. Today it is critically endangered.

This six-session course is built around everyday Baghdadi Jewish life. Each session takes up a theme, so the words you learn come with their cultural setting. You’ll learn the distinctive sounds of the language, greetings and conversational formulas, and how to talk about family and work, food and drink, and the holidays. The last session covers proverbs, colorful expressions, and yes, the swear words.

Who this is for:

• Anyone curious about the Jewish languages of the Middle East
• Students of Iraqi Jewish history and culture
• Anyone with Iraqi Jewish roots who wants to connect with the language of their family
• Learners who have taken New Lehrhaus’s other Jewish language courses.

What you'll leave with:

• The sounds and basic vocabulary of Judeo-Baghdadi Arabic, with greetings and phrases you can use
• An understanding of the Hebrew and Aramaic elements that set it apart from the Arabic of Baghdad’s Muslim and Christian neighbors

No prior knowledge of Arabic or Hebrew is required.

Schedule: Six Sundays: October 18 and 25; November 1, 8, 15, and 22, 11:30am–1pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

This intermediate, in-person Yiddish course uses physical movement, conversation, texts, and media to explore how Yiddish describes bodies in motion and talks about sports, exercise, and physical activity. The course is conducted entirely in Yiddish and assumes proficiency with the alef-beys. There will be some physical movement during class, but it's a course for every kind of body.

Who this is for:

• Intermediate learners who already read, write, speak, and understand some Yiddish
• Students who want a face-to-face class
• Anyone who learns better by moving than by sitting still

What you'll leave with:

• The vocabulary to take part in, or lead, a movement class in Yiddish
• Stronger reading and listening skills, built on Yiddish writing and media about exercise from different eras, movements, and places

Nine Mondays: October 19, 26; November 2, 9, 16, 23, 30; December 7, 14, 5:30–7pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

After the expulsion of 1492, Sephardic Jews who settled in Morocco brought their Spanish with them. Over the centuries, living among Arabic and Berber speakers and drawing on their own Hebrew traditions, they turned it into a new language: Haketia. At its peak Haketia had 30,000 speakers. Fewer than 1,000 remain today, and this course gives you the chance to help document it.

Working with native speakers, you’ll learn the basics of language documentation, from linguistic fundamentals to fieldwork: how to record, transcribe, and analyze a living language. The course meets for six weekly 90-minute sessions on Zoom. 

All sessions are recorded, so you can attend live or follow along later.

Who this is for:

• Anyone interested in Sephardic history and Jewish languages
• Students of linguistics, anthropology, or Jewish studies who want fieldwork experience
• Anyone with Moroccan Jewish roots who wants to help preserve the language
• Alumni of our previous Language Keepers program

What you’ll leave with:

• An understanding of what sets Haketia apart from other forms of Judeo-Spanish
• Fieldwork skills you can apply to any endangered language
• A contribution to the permanent record of Haketia

Six Tuesdays: October 20, 27, and November 3, 10, 17, and 24, 4:00–5:30pm Pacific

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

Lomir redn yidish, let's speak Yiddish! This beginner Yiddish course is designed for students with little or no prior Yiddish who want to learn to speak, read, and write the language. Using the In Eynem textbook alongside authentic Yiddish songs, games, and media, you'll build a practical foundation in Yiddish conversation, vocabulary, grammar, and culture. You'll learn the Yiddish alphabet (alef-beys) in both print and cursive, introduce yourself and others, make everyday small talk, and describe your daily routine, all while exploring Yiddish culture past and present.

Who this is for:

• Beginners with little or no Yiddish (including Duolingo learners ready to go further)
• Hebrew and German speakers who want to build on what they know

What you'll leave with

• Reading and writing the alef-beys in print and cursive
• Introducing yourself, making small talk, and describing your day in Yiddish
• A first acquaintance with Yiddish songs, games, and media

15 sessions, Tuesdays and Thursdays: October 20, 22, 27, and 29; November 3, 5, 17, 19, and 24; December 1, 3, 8, 10, 15, and 17, 5:30–7pm Pacific Time  (No class November 10, 12, or 26.)

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

Conversations about antisemitism often go badly. Some build understanding; others leave people feeling isolated. Why do arguments that persuade within the Jewish community so often fail outside it, and can familiar approaches make understanding harder? How can people talk about Jewish identity, Israel, Zionism, and antisemitism without every conversation turning into a fight?

This two-session online workshop works through real situations from schools, workplaces, civic organizations, and everyday relationships. Participants will look at where people agree and where they genuinely disagree, and practice responses that invite curiosity without minimizing legitimate Jewish concerns. The workshop is open to Jewish and non-Jewish participants alike. Underneath it is one question: can relationships across political, religious, and communal divides make Jews safer, and how do we reach people who see the world differently?

Who this is for:

• Anyone who has struggled to answer a hard question about antisemitism, Israel, or Zionism
• People addressing antisemitism in schools, workplaces, or community organizations
• Non-Jewish friends and colleagues who want to know how to help

What you'll leave with:

• Ways to answer hard questions that keep the conversation open
• A clearer sense of where people agree and disagree about when criticism of Israel or Zionism becomes antisemitism
• Practice with responses that don’t ask Jews to minimize their own experience

Two Wednesdays: October 21 & 28, 6–7:30pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

J. Robert Oppenheimer led the scientific work at Los Alamos, helped bring about the atomic age, and later became one of the best-known victims of the Red Scare. In Robert Oppenheimer: The Sphinx Without a Secret, his new biography in Yale University Press’s Jewish Lives series, David Rieff looks past the public story to Oppenheimer’s inner life: his childhood, his personal relationships, and his deeply ambivalent relation to being Jewish.

Rieff joins Steve Wasserman, publisher of Heyday Books and former editor-at-large for Yale University Press, to talk about the man behind the legend and why Oppenheimer still fascinates more than eighty years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Image: Ben Shahn, Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer, 1954. © 2026 Estate of Ben Shahn / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Who this is for

• Anyone who wants more of Oppenheimer’s story than the recent film told
• Readers curious how his Jewish background shaped him

What you'll leave with

• A fuller picture of Oppenheimer’s inner life, from childhood on
• The chance to put your own questions to the author

Sunday, October 25, 1:30–3pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.

What happens when a novelist writes himself into his own novel, then sends a double to impersonate him in Jerusalem? That’s the premise of Philip Roth’s 1993 novel Operation Shylock, set during the First Intifada and the Jerusalem trial of John Demjanjuk. The book brings Jewish powerlessness and Israeli power face to face, and it keeps blurring fiction and fact, memory and history. In this reading circle we’ll look at how Roth uses fiction to get at “the truth,” how the novel has aged, and what it means to read it now.

Who this is for

• Readers of Philip Roth and twentieth-century American Jewish fiction
• Anyone interested in how fiction has handled Israel, the First Intifada, and Holocaust memory
• First-time readers and rereaders alike

What you'll leave with

• A close, discussion-based reading of the novel
• A sense of how Roth uses doubles and unreliable narration to write about Jewish identity

Four Wednesdays: October 28, November 4, 11 and 18, 12:30–1:30pm Pacific Time

Questions? Our FAQ covers registration, recordings of missed sessions, refunds, and financial assistance.