Yearly Archives 2013

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The need for a firm barrier between church and state is as clear now for Susan Galloway as it was in grade school, when she was expected to sing carols at the Christmas show. Galloway grew up in McHenry, Ill., a town northwest of Chicago with… Read more »

Jack Ruby, the Dallas nightclub proprietor who murdered Lee Harvey Oswald in 1963, was born Jacob Rubenstein in 1911. (Central Press/Getty Images)

NEW YORK (JTA) — We were sharing a pastrami sandwich and pickles at the Los Angeles landmark Canter’s Deli. I was 24. She was nearly 50 years older, with a piercing voice as loud as her flaming red wig. Her name was Eva Rubenstein Grant, and she was a… Read more »

BOSTON (JTA) — At the opening-night celebration of the Boston Jewish Film Festival’s 25th birthday, festival volunteers handed out deli-made kugel for ticket holders to nosh while waiting on a line that extended back to the parking lot. Once inside the Coolidge Corner Theatre in Brookline, the celebration last… Read more »

(JTA) — Diaspora Jews often find themselves exasperated with the Israeli rabbinate. But on one significant issue, an Israeli rabbinic authority is looking far more enlightened and merciful than his peers in the United States. Recently elected Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi David Lau surprised more than a few people last… Read more »

Aaron Micah Green, son of Rachel and Jonathan Green, will celebrate becoming a Bar Mitzvah on Saturday, Nov. 23 at Congregation Anshei Israel. He is the grandson of Fay Green of Tucson, Barry Green of Fort Worth, Texas, and Renata and the late Ralph Limmer of Huntsville, Ala. Aaron… Read more »

Lauren Janae Grabell, daughter of Ellen Eichler-Grabell and Lawrence Grabell, will celebrate becoming a Bat Mitzvah on Saturday, Nov. 16 at Congregation Anshei Israel. She is the granddaughter of Bernard Eichler and the late Molly Eichler of Millburn, N.J., and Lisa Grabell and the late Allan Grabell of Tucson.… Read more »

Benjamin Joseph Rivera, son of Rachel Rivera and Dennis Rivera, will celebrate becoming a Bar Mitzvah on Saturday, Nov. 9 with Congregation Or Chadash at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. He is the grandson of Miriam Effron of Shoreline, Wash., Stephen and Clydean Troner of Tucson, and the late… Read more »

JENNIFER P. SCHNEIDER, M.D., Ph.D., has published “Understand Yourself, Understand Your Partner: The Essential Enneagram Guide to a Better Relationship” with co-author Ron Corn, M.S.W.… Read more »

LORI RIEGEL has rejoined the ARIZONA JEWISH POST as advertising manager. She was a salesperson at the AJP from 2006 to 2008, then served as religious school director at Temple Emanu-El and religious and cultural education coordinator at Handmaker Jewish Services for the Aging, where she currently runs the… Read more »

Mitchel (Mickey) David Berens, 83, died Oct. 7, 2013. Raised in Chicago and Whitehall, Ill., Mr. Berens graduated from high school and briefly attended college. He started an automobile dealership business that expanded into four dealerships, then moved to Tucson in 1970. Survivors include his wife of 58 years,… Read more »

Joy Ladin leads a full and productive life, but her path has not been easy. “Very early on, there was an awareness that I wasn’t in the right gender,” Ladin told the AJP from her home in Hadley, Mass. The first openly transgender person to work at an Orthodox… Read more »

This wall at the Holocaust History Center presents information on 120 of the survivors who have lived in Southern Arizona since the 1940s. The center is seeking information on 110 other survivors who have lived here. (Martha Lochert)

The Holocaust History Center at the Jewish History Museum held a ribbon cutting ceremony on Sunday, Oct. 20. The inaugural exhibit at the center goes “from dark to light,” with one long wall presenting the history of the Holocaust and the opposite wall dedicated to the lives of 230… Read more »

Shannon Rzucidlo

After Shannon Rzucidlo, 26, went on a Birthright Israel trip this summer, NEXT, a division of the Birthright Israel Foundation, reached out to keep her connected, offering resources to help her create a Rosh Hasha­nah meal for friends. “I think my NEXT High Holiday meal was my ‘coming out’… Read more »

(L-R) Capt. Kyle Canty, Northwest Fire Department; Capt. Richard Johnson, Tucson Fire Department; Division Chief Kelly McCoy, Northwest Fire Department; Capt. Mark Lytle, Green Valley Fire District; Capt. Scott Laird, Rincon Valley Fire District; Tzvia and Emil Riven (in front of Laird); Lt. Thomas Tucker, Tucson Airport Authority Fire Department; and Capt. Kris Blum, Tuscon Fire Department, plant a tree on Mount Carmel to honor the Rivens’ son, Elad, who died in 2010 fighting Israel’s worst forest fire. (Courtesy Greater Tucson Fire Foundation)

  “We went as seven firefighters and came back as seven ambassadors for Israel,” says Capt. Scott Laird of the Rincon Valley Fire District, who spent Oct. 15-25 in Israel as part of Southern Arizona’s first Firefighters Without Borders delegation. The group sought to learn, firsthand, about how Israel’s… Read more »

From entertainment at the Fox Tucson Theatre to a cornucopia of new restaurants, to entrepreneurial innovations, downtown Tucson has been transformed — and more changes are on the way. “It’s been very gratifying and good for the Fox to offer significant programming downtown,” says Craig Sumberg, executive director of… Read more »

Southern Arizona will take part in the fourth annual “Global Day of Jewish Learning” on Sunday, Nov. 17, joining Jewish communities in more than 40 countries across six continents. A project of the Aleph Society and Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, the day is an opportunity for people in Southern Arizona… Read more »

(L-R) David Zoller, Ariel Hirsh, Scott Lacritz, Dov Hirsch, Yakir Hirsch and Sammy Zoller play ‘Shabbat Showdown.’ (Benji Zoller)

Adding entertainment and education to the Shabbat table didn’t happen overnight for Shabbat Showdown game creator David Zoller. The deck of Jewish-themed trivia cards evolved organically as Zoller helped his children with their studies. “My kids were coming home from their third and fourth grade day-school classes with so… Read more »

Armenians are marched to a nearby prison in Mezireh by armed Turkish soldiers in Kharpert, Armenia, in April 1915. (Photo: Project SAVE via Wikimedia Commons)

Ninety-nine years after the Turkish genocide of the Armenians, one of the most poignant symbols of Armenian suffering is being held hostage — by the White House. The prisoner is an 18-foot long rug. It was woven by four hundred Armenian orphan girls living in exile in Lebanon, as… Read more »

As the 112th Congress drew to a close last winter, nearly two-thirds of the U.S. Senate voted to ratify an international treaty that would help ensure millions of people with disabilities around the world have basic rights, open markets to American business abroad, and reassert the United States as… Read more »

The Reid Park Zoo will host a Chanukah celebration for the Jewish community on Monday, Dec. 2 at 5 p.m. Chabad of Tucson will rent the 17-acre venue from the City of Tucson to mark the fifth night of Chanukah with a display of holiday lights, light sculptures and… Read more »