Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife, Sara, arrive in New York, Sept. 29, 2013. (Kobi Gideon/GPO/Flash 90) WASHINGTON (JTA) — Worried that he may be losing the biggest stick in his arsenal when it comes to Iran — the threat of a U.S. strike — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrived in Washington for a meeting Monday with President Obama prepared to speak out. But friends,… Read more »
The “Seeking Kin” column aims to help reunite long-lost relatives and friends. BALTIMORE (JTA) – Teenagers Mark Matsuki and Leon Feldman came to study in the Boston area this summer as strangers and left as friends, unintentionally regrafting family-like branches of a tree that first took root four generations… Read more »
SUSAN CLAASSEN, artistic director of Invisible Theatre, will tour in “A Conversation with Edith Head” this fall. As “Edie,” the legendary Hollywood costume designer, Claassen also will emcee Tucson Fashion Week’s runway presentation on Oct. 18 at the Tucson Museum of Art, appearing with fashion designer Betsey Johnson. FRANK… Read more »
A son, ZEV LOREN NEUMAN, was born to Eszter and Ariel Neuman of Los Angeles on Aug. 13, 2013. Grandparents are Yael and Shlomo Neuman of Tucson and Eva and Tamas Lengyel of Los Angeles.… Read more »
Hannah Elyse Peskin-Owens, the daughter of Joy Peskin-Owens and the late Jon Owens, will celebrate becoming a Bat Mitzvah on Saturday, Oct. 5 at Congregation Anshei Israel. She is the granddaughter of Marilyn Peskin Kaufman and Paul Kaufman of Tucson, Anne Owens of Glendale, Ariz., and James C. Rowland… Read more »
Jade Isabelle Skolnik, daughter of Lori and Bruce Skolnik, will celebrate becoming a Bat Mitzvah on Saturday, Oct. 5 at Congregation Or Chadash. She is the granddaughter of Sylvia and the late Gerard Krumm of Tucson and the late Aron and Ruth Skolnik. Jade attends Sabino High School. She… Read more »
BALTIMORE (JTA) – Needing a gift for retiring New York Yankees reliever Mariano Rivera, the Baltimore Orioles pitched their idea for a sculpture to the Israel-born artist Omri Amrany. No surprise there, even though Amrany knows nothing about baseball. The 59-year-old Amrany, now living in the Chicago area, has… Read more »
Margaret Ellen Morf, 79, died Aug. 26, 2013. Born in Safford, Mrs. Morf graduated from Good Samaritan School of Nursing in Phoenix when she was 20. She married her high school sweetheart, Paul Morf, and they moved to Juneau, Alaska, where he was an airline pilot and co-founder of… Read more »
David Sadker Congregation Or Chadash will hold a retreat, “Courage & Renewal: A Sabbath Dedicated to Our Hidden Wholeness” Friday, Oct. 18 through Sunday, Oct. 20 at the Redemptorist Renewal Center, 7101 W. Picture Rocks Road. “It is said that on the Sabbath we are given an extra soul — the… Read more »
Holocaust survivors Meyer and Susan Neuman with their children, Rosie (left) and Phillip upon arrival in Tucson. (Courtesy Rosie Eilat-Kahn) Although the mission of Tucson’s Jewish History Museum is to tell the stories of Jewish settlers in the American Southwest, the museum is about to highlight another imperative. After raising funds for expansion and purchasing the building on the adjoining Stone Avenue property four years ago, “we started doing… Read more »
Idan Raichel (Yeara Livny) On Oct. 9, the Idan Raichel Project, Israeli world music pioneers, will kick off their U.S. tour with a live concert at the Fox Tucson Theatre. Voted “Musical Group of the Decade” in an Israeli national media poll, the Project blends a range of cultures, languages and musical influences… Read more »
Dorothy Kret (Sheila Wilensky) Dorothy (Dot) Kret isn’t your typical matchmaker. For the past 25 years she’s been helping people with disabilities “become employable and employed,” as the DK Advocates mission statement puts it. “My mother always said what my company does is today’s version of a yenta,” she says, using the word… Read more »
Ryan Ballis, center, with award from the Wounded Warrior Project, is flanked by Quentin Irion, the group’s outreach coordinator (left) and Derek L. Duplisea, Wounded Warrior alumni director for the Western United States. (Courtesy Mark Ballis) Each year, caring and energetic 12- and 13-year-olds contribute immeasurably to the social action efforts of the Jewish community in Tucson and around the world. These B’nai Mitzvah students participate in a “mitzvah project,” as these endeavors have come to be known, adding another layer of meaning to the… Read more »
Stuart Milk The Tucson Jewish Community Center will host “A Conversation with Stuart Milk,”co-founder and board president of the Harvey Milk Foundation, on Sunday, Oct.13 at 6 p.m. Milk was instrumental in steering a bill through the California legislature in 2009 to make May 22 a state holiday honoring his uncle… Read more »
Dan Fellner Dan Fellner of the Road Scholars Speakers Bureau of the Arizona Humanities Council will present “Jews in Eastern Europe” at a Hadassah Southern Arizona luncheon on Sunday, Oct. 13. Fellner has more than 25 years of experience in corporate public relations, television news and university teaching in the United… Read more »
Robert A. Williams, Jr. Robert A. Williams, Jr., the E. Thomas Sullivan Professor of Law and American Indian Studies at the University of Arizona Rogers College of Law, will speak on “Savage Anxieties: The Invention of Western Civilization,” the topic of his most recent book, at the fall opening luncheon of the Brandeis… Read more »
Esther Sternberg, M.D., will speak on “The Science of the Mind-Body Interaction in Illness and Healing” at a Tucson Maimonides Society dinner on Thursday, Oct. 10 at 6:30 p.m. at Hacienda del Sol, 5501 N. Hacienda del Sol Road. The Tucson Maimonides Society is a program of the Jewish… Read more »
The University of Arizona School of Music will present “A Barber/Britten Music + Festival: Symposium, Concerts and Film,” directed by professor and composer Daniel Asia, on Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 12-13. American composer Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings” is a classical music standard that can be heard in several… Read more »
De’oujenai, age 9, with Linda Solomon (Sheila Wilensky/AJP) Drivers heading north on Alvernon Way pass a digital sign in front of Our Family Services, which runs a New Beginnings housing division for the homeless: “One-third of Tucson’s children live in poverty. Fifty-two percent live with a single parent.” Linda Solomon, an award-winning Jewish photojournalist, aims to change… Read more »
The CANDLES Holocaust museum in Terre Haute, Ind. NEW YORK (JTA) — No earth was moved at the groundbreaking of one of the nation’s newest Holocaust memorials in May. Instead, the gatherers stood silently, symbolic shovels in hand, on the immaculate lawn where the privately funded $400,000 monument will soon rise. A succession of speakers delivered somber homilies remembering one… Read more »
