The Brief

In the days following the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel, as people mourned and Israel’s retaliatory airstrikes in Gaza intensified, a group led by young Jewish progressives began holding vigils around Los Angeles.

They would recite the Mourner’s Kaddish, a prayer in honor of the dead — for both Israelis who died in the attack and Palestinians killed in the airstrikes.

Asher Kaplan was at one of these vigils in Sherman Oaks when some cars pulled up alongside them, “blasting music, yelling at us, telling us that we were Nazis, you know, all this stuff,” he said.

Kaplan said those critics — like him and many in the crowd — were also members of the local Jewish community.

Since the attacks took place, American Jews have drawn together in their grief. At the same time, longstanding divisions within the Jewish community over Israel have been deepening.

It’s felt here in L.A., where the Jewish community leans liberal and criticism of the hardline Israeli government, at least pre-war, was not uncommon.

But even among Jewish progressives, feelings about Israel’s response are complex. Some are calling for a ceasefire. Others are grappling with mixed feelings, trying to reconcile their progressive values with outrage, grief, and a sense of feeling abandoned by the larger left.

“They’re on the one hand trying to balance their commitment to the rights of Palestinians with their commitment to Israel's rights,” said Dov Waxman, a political scientist with UCLA’s Y&S Nazarian Center for Israel Studies, “and the rights of Jews to live in the land, in Israel, in peace.”

‘A diversity of opinions’

Kaplan volunteers for IfNotNow, a national Jewish progressive group founded in 2014 that opposes Israeli occupation in Gaza and the West Bank. Last week the group protested in front of Vice President Kamala Harris’ house in Brentwood, calling for an end to the airstrikes.

“I'm connected through friends and family to people that have been impacted by this, that have lost their lives and been taken hostage,” Kaplan told LAist. “I don't think that dropping 6,000 bombs on Gaza in the span of a week is an effective strategy for returning the hostages safely.”

Asher Kaplan of IfNotNow, a progressive Jewish group that has called for a ceasefire.

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Brian Feinzimer

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Kaplan, who grew up in Pico-Robertson’s Jewish enclave and is the grandson of a Holocaust survivor, has found himself defending this stance with bystanders, friends, and relatives lately. Conversations sometimes turn angry.

“There have always been a diversity of opinions within the Jewish community about the state of Israel,” he said, “and criticism of the way that the country conducts itself is not criticism of Jewish people or Judaism.”

But emotions over the conflict are extremely raw, informed by the ever-present trauma of the Holocaust, and ongoing concerns about antisemitism.

As many Americans on the left have taken to the streets in support of Palestine, some of L.A.’s most progressive Jewish leaders say they feel isolated from other Americans who otherwise share their views.

‘I’ve never felt so alone’

In her sermon on Yom Kippur, less than two weeks before the Hamas attack, Rabbi Sharon Brous made clear her feelings about Israel’s conservative government.

“The fact is there can be no democracy with occupation,” she stated, speaking to her progressive IKAR congregation in Pico-Robertson.

Brous still feels this way. But she also feels abandoned by non-Jewish progressives, who she says have been less vocal and supportive about the loss of Israeli lives. Brous made this analogy:

“To imagine if there, God forbid, had been a massacre like this on American soil under the Trump administration,” she said. “And then, if the world responded to that massive loss of life by saying, ‘Well, but they lived under this government, so it's really their fault.’”

It’s a frustration that’s been shared by other Jewish progressives, among them Rabbi Joel Simonds with the Wilshire Boulevard Temple.

“I've never felt more connected to my Jewish community, and I've never felt so alone in the larger world,” said Simonds, who directs the Jewish Center for Justice, which works with other progressive groups on issues like voting rights, environmental justice, LGBTQ rights and other causes.

Simonds said that while he’ll remain dedicated to his work with progressive coalitions, “Will I sit at the table with coalition partners that I sat at the table with a month ago? Maybe not, because I feel a sense of hurt."

He said he can’t speak for all Jewish progressives, but Simonds knows where he stands on the conflict.

Rabbi Joel Simonds at the Wilshire Boulevard Temple University Synagogue campus in Brentwood.

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“I like to consider myself a progressive and a liberal,” he said. “I'm not going to abandon those terms just because I have been frustrated with individuals who claim to be progressive. All that being said, I'm not a pacifist. I do believe in just war.”

Multiple truths

As the war escalates, it’s become clear that there’s no lockstep, just as there are no easy answers. UCLA’s Waxman said that right now, it’s difficult for people to accept and speak to multiple truths.

“It’s important that we can do both of these things, that we can denounce Hamas unequivocally for its terrorist attack, and also criticize the conduct and the way in which Israel is conducting its war against Hamas,” Waxman said. “But in this moment where passions are running so high on all sides and tempers are so inflamed, it seems, it is difficult for people to do that.”

As Rabbi Brous observes, the struggle for Jewish progressives is to reconcile the gray areas.

“The challenge of our time,” Brous said, “is to hold more than one truth at once, and to continue to hold above all else our humanity and one another's.”

Inglewood officials are working on a full rewrite of the city map for the first time in nearly 40 years, laying out how they want the city to grow and change for the next two decades.

Along part of Manchester Boulevard, city planners are setting up an option for developers to rebuild rows of small storefronts with a mix of homes and commercial space. On La Brea Avenue, south of Centinela Avenue, they envision the possibility of dense housing and business blocks as high as six stories.

Jerome Johnson, an Inglewood local, said he’s lived through three decades of change in the city. He recalled watching a “raggedy market” at the corner of La Brea and Centinela make way for the two-story shopping center that’s there today. He said the potential developments around the intersection could be a catch-22.

“There’s a shortage of housing,” Johnson said. “But you don’t want it to turn into New York City.”

It’s all part of the ongoing process for Inglewood’s new general plan, the foundational guide that governs things like what kind of buildings can be built where in the city and how they need to look. A draft land-use plan will go before the Inglewood City Council on Tuesday, then go into the environmental impact review process.

“This is really a historic milestone for the city,” Bernard McCrumby, Inglewood development services director, told The LA Local. 

McCrumby said planners are aiming to open up room for new housing and to revitalize some of the city’s flagging business corridors, without changing the city’s existing residential blocks or sacrificing the grocery stores, barbershops and local restaurants that make neighborhoods tick.

“The stadiums and arenas are here, they’re not going anywhere,” McCrumby said. “Now we can plan around those.”

The last time the city did a full update of its general plan was 1987, when horses were still racing at Hollywood Park and the “Showtime” Lakers were winning championships at the Forum. Edward Vincent Jr., the city’s first Black mayor, had only been in office for four years. 

The city has made intermittent updates to its planning guidelines since then — notably remapping a band of Inglewood along the Metro K line before it opened — but city documents indicate planners spent the past couple years working on a comprehensive rewrite. 

The new update to the general plan could set the city’s direction until 2050.

Planners hope to change some of the city’s commercial corridors into mixed-use zones that allow for housing and businesses alongside each other or even stacked on top of each other.

Those zones could go in place along Century Boulevard and Arbor Vitae Street as well as Manchester, Centinela and La Brea.

The rest of the update, McCrumby said, is aimed at lining the city’s zoning regulations up with state law and the city’s current reality on the ground.

City staff held several community meetings over the last year as they put together the draft and still aren’t done gathering feedback. 

The next year will see at least one more community meeting and a 45-day public review period, according to city documents. McCrumby said that, with the anchor of the land-use map in place, planners will continue to work on the rest of the general plan, targeting final City Council approval of the plan and accompanying environmental impact report next spring.

You can get all the details on the general plan at nextlevelinglewood.com and attend the City Council meeting at 2 p.m. on Tuesday to give a public comment.

We also want to know what you think of the proposed changes. Email isaiah@thelalocal.org with your questions or thoughts.

Students within the Los Angeles Unified School District showed improvements on state reading, math and science standardized tests for a third consecutive year, district authorities announced Tuesday.

Superintendent Andrés Chait revealed the preliminary results at the annual opening-of-schools address at East L.A.’s Garfield High School— his first as the district’s leader since the board appointed him to the job in June.

“ These are not just numbers on a page,” Chait said to an audience that included about 1,000 principals, administrators and district supporters. “They are the result of your passion, your persistence, your belief in what students can achieve. These are collective accomplishments.

"They reflect the dedication, skill, and commitment of our entire community,” he said.

Jai Gant-Leau, principal of Eagle Tree Continuation High School, said the “back-to-basics” focus of Chait’s speech was a welcome departure from the tone of recent opening addresses.

“We will continue to rise for the outcomes and expectations for the success of our students. That's the message I got,” Gant-Leau said. “Very different than the others where it was a lot of… bells and whistles.”

Why it matters

Student achievement, as measured by test scores, plummeted during the pandemic. Los Angeles Unified’s growth in 2025 outpaced the state, as test scores exceeded pre-pandemic levels.

This year the percentage of students in all grades who met or exceeded the standard are 39.7% for math, 48.3% for English and 32.1% for science. It’s unclear how this compares to students statewide because those results have yet to be released.

Challenges ahead

Chait also acknowledged the challenges posed by declining enrollment, community fears of immigration enforcement actions and proposed budget cuts.

 “The decisions will be hard, but we cannot lose sight of what defines us,” Chait said. “We are the system that lifts students to opportunity, turns potential into achievement, creates spaces of belonging, healing, growth.”

This is a developing story and will be updated.

We hope you’ve gotten used to the hot weather, because it’s going to be here for a while.

The National Weather Service has issued yet another heat advisory for much of Southern California, less than a week after other high-temperature warnings were lifted.

This week’s advisory will be in place from 10 a.m. Wednesday through Monday. Forecasters expect temperatures to climb steadily over the course of Wednesday and Thursday.

The San Fernando Valley, San Gabriel Valley and other inland areas in L.A., as well as Riverside and San Bernardino counties, will likely see highs ranging from the mid-90s to about 105 degrees. Areas closer to the coast, including downtown Los Angeles and much of Orange County, will hit the 90s. Beaches will hover mostly in the upper 70s.

Humidity will also add to the discomfort. Even though it’s decreasing slightly, it makes cooling down harder, especially at night.

People who work outdoors or do not have air conditioning are especially at risk from the heat and humidity, along with people over 65, young children and other sensitive populations.

Fire risk

Forecasters are warning that conditions are ripe for fires, driven by a combination of wind and dry vegetation.

Southern California hasn’t seen much rain recently, despite the humidity, leaving plants with little moisture and turning them into the perfect fuel.

“Even though the air feels kind of moist, we're in the time of season where it doesn't matter. The fuels are dry and they're ready to go,” said NWS meteorologist Ryan Kittell.

Kittel said people should take extra care with anything that could create a spark, and residents in fire-prone areas should remain aware of their surroundings in case a fire starts.

The fire risk is likely to be concentrated in a few specific areas that will experience higher winds than others, including parts of the 5 Freeway corridor in northern L.A. County, especially around the Grapevine, and in southern Santa Barbara County.

For most of the region, though, winds should stay fairly mild.

Dangerous beach conditions

Southern Californians also have to contend with some ocean-specific risks this week.

Forecasters expect dangerously large waves and strong rip currents to hit the coastline at a time when the heat may drive more people to the beach. The conditions are expected to persist through the weekend.

If you decide to head to the beach, it’s a good idea to ask a lifeguard for advice on the conditions before entering the water. It’s also recommended to swim only near occupied lifeguard stands, stay off of rock jetties and avoid turning your back to the waves.

South-facing stretches of coastline will bear the brunt of the swell, which is being driven by two tropical storms churning hundreds of miles away in the Pacific Ocean.

“Those two systems generated the winds and the waves locally that are pushing towards us, and so that's creating elevated surf and some stronger currents than normal,” Kittel said.

The swell is not expected to cause significant coastal flooding as high tides remain relatively low.