About Dave

Dave is a freelance journalist and photographer. It has been his passion from a very young age to help people clarify moral issues, and he has used his writing as a vehicle to discuss moral issues since his first published article in 1994.

He writes regularly about the Middle East, Judeo-Christian values, opinions and commentary, news, profiles of newsmakers, and much more.

STUDIES
Dave holds a Bachelors of Arts in English Literature from York University (Canada), with also heavy emphasis on Jewish Studies courses.

PUBLIC SPEAKING
Since the late 90s, he has lectured coast to coast on dozens of occasions on subjects as the Middle East, examining newspaper editorials, Jewish continuity, journalism ethics, kosher speech, and media bias. He has led workshops on writing, editing and logical analysis of argumentation.

WRITING
In 1998, with two other young journalists, Dave began Afterword, the newspaper for the young Jewish scene in Canada. The nationally distributed paper has featured interviews with notables such as Larry King, Natalie Portman, Leonard Nimoy, Barenaked Ladies’ frontman Steven Page, Matisyahu, Roseanne Barr, Alan Dershowitz, and actor Mandy Patinkin.

For the past several years, Dave has been researching and working on three books:

• The Kosher Apology: How to Say The Three Hardest Words
• How to be a Grown up Grown-up
• Swords and Words (or, Words of Mass Destruction: a Primer on Kosher Speech)

On this website you will find essays pertaining to those topics, many of which will eventually appear in the books. Other books are also in the works.

Dave’s writings have appeared in major publications including:
The New York Times, Baltimore Sun, Edmonton Sun, eye Weekly, Forward, Franchise Magazine, New York’s Jewish Week, Lifestyles magazine, London Free Press, Metro Toronto, National Post, Ottawa Sun, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Popjournalism, Post City Magazines, Press Review, Toronto Life, The Toronto Star, The Toronto Sun, 24hrs., Western Standard, and Globe And Mail.

PHOTOGRAPHY
Dave apprenticed with Randy Zelcer, formerly of Toronto’s Zephyr Studios, where he shot commercial ads for places like Coca-Cola, and shot various portraits, parties and city-events.
Dave’s more famous photos include:

CNN’s Ted Turner, Prime Minister Jean Chretien, Prime Minister Paul Martin, James Baker, Ariel Sharon, Benjamin Netanyahu, Shimon Peres, Ehud Barak, Ehud Olmert, Ontario Premier Mike Harris, Al Gore, Irwin Cotler, actor Ben Stein, and many others.

Born in Montreal, Dave spent his formative years in Halifax and Toronto. His wife Karen is a psychologist and they have a daughter, Bracha.