It’s almost monsoon season and it’ll be raining toads — Colorado River toads (a.k.a. Sonoran Desert toads), that is! The Colorado River toad is a large, bumpy, brown amphibian that is a common nocturnal visitor to Tucson yards every monsoon season. Most of the year they live buried in… Read more »
Cats have been domesticated for thousands of years, but there are many popular myths that can hinder the care of these animals. In many cultures, including those of Russia, Japan and ancient Egypt, cats have been revered, or seen as all-knowing and good luck. Unfortunately, this reverence has led… Read more »
The March of the Living Western region delegation approaches the memorial at the Majdanek concentration camp. In front, (L-R): Hallie Goldstein, Kelsey Luria and Gabby Levy (Tucson Hebrew High Facebook page) The beauty of the Polish countryside was eerie, says Cameron Busby, one of 12 Tucson teens to participate in this year’s March of the Living, an annual education program that unites Jewish teens worldwide in Poland on Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day, to march between the Auschwitz and Birkenau… Read more »
Ian Kinsler is thriving in Detroit after being traded from the Texas Rangers. (Hillel Kutler, JTA) The rarity arose in the initial meeting of first-year Detroit Tigers manager Brad Ausmus and his second baseman Ian Kinsler, newly traded from the Texas Rangers: a Jewish player reporting to a Jewish manager. Ausmus was “raised the same way I was,” Kinsler learned, with one Jewish parent and… Read more »
Palestinian children play in a damaged building with a swastika and the Star of David painted on it in a Gaza refugee camp in 2005. The ADL survey found that 93 percent of respondents in the West Bank and Gaza have anti-Semitic views. (Abid Katib/Getty Images) The Anti-Defamation League’s Global 100 Index of Anti-Semitism is the broadest public opinion survey of attitudes toward Jews ever conducted. It is one of the most important efforts we have undertaken in our history as an organization. The survey was conducted in more than 100 countries and territories, and… Read more »
One small step by Israelis could become a giant leap for the State of Israel. At a Tel Aviv University laboratory, a team of 20 Israelis is building a spacecraft they believe will make Israel only the fourth country — after the United States, Russia and China — to… Read more »
Jon Ben-Asher, Tucson Hebrew Academy’s new interim head of school, is off and running. He attended THA in the late 1970s and early ’80s and recalls being assigned to watch Carl Sagan’s “Cosmos” as homework. “Cosmos” is back on TV, modernized and even more spectacular. So is Ben-Asher’s view… Read more »
Ernesto Portillo, Jr., left, a columnist for the Arizona Daily Star, facilitates a panel discussion at the Jewish Community Relations Council's private screening of "The Dream is Now" on May 13 at the Loft Cinema. “The Dream is Now,” a documentary depicting the plight of young undocumented immigrants, was shown at a private screening for members of the Jewish and Latino communities on May 13 at the Loft Cinema. Following the film, four undocumented college students told their stories about living in America —… Read more »
University of Arizona graduate student Molly Keenan at Masada during her Birthright Israel trip in January. (Courtesy Molly Keenan) Molly Keenan smiles and shakes her head with disbelief at all the work that went into hosting her first Passover Seder last month, which she did with encouragement from NEXT, Birthright Israel’s program for alumni of the free Israel trip. “I’m a procrastinator, and I was kicking myself two… Read more »
Marilyn Heins, M.D. Summer activities? The good news is that parents and children have lots of choices: day camp, sleepaway camp, summer school, sports teams, music lessons, family vacations, visits from relatives, unaccompanied plane travel for children to visit relatives. The bad news is many choices means much logistical planning. Before you… Read more »
Elderly Ukrainians receive food packages at the Hesed social welfare center in Donetsk run by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. (Courtesy JDC) (JTA) — At the end of “Fiddler on the Roof,” the classic musical celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, Tevye and his family flee their village of Anatevka for a better and safer life. In reality, however, not everybody left. Today, several hundred thousand Jews still live in Ukraine,… Read more »
What does my mother-in-law have to do with my married life, columnist Edmon J. Rodman recalls foolishly asking soon after he was married 32 years ago. (Edmon J. Rodman) LOS ANGELES (JTA) — In the Ten Commandments, the Torah tells us to “Honor your father and your mother,” but on mothers-in-law, it’s mum. That is until we come to the two-day holiday of Shavuot and read the Book of Ruth, which records the relationship between Ruth and her… Read more »
Equestrian show jumper and Olympic hopeful Danielle Goldstein practicing her routine in central Israel, May 12, 2014. (Ben Sales) YAGUR, Israel (JTA) — The crowd was sparse and admission was free. Pop music from 10 years ago blared from loudspeakers. A few families sat on bleachers near the athletes, who hopped over a low fence when it was time to compete. The Israeli Equestrian Championships wasn’t the most… Read more »
Shooters shoot. (R to L: Les Hajnal, Lea Rosenfeld, Doris Wise Montrose, etc.)
(Anthony Weiss/JTA) LOS ANGELES (JTA) — It’s a sunny morning in Southern California and Lea Rosenfeld, a soft-spoken, bespectacled woman who looks like a Jewish grandmother, squares her feet, faces her target and squeezes off five shots with a handgun. All of them miss. “I never even held a gun in… Read more »
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu talks with Pope Francis during their meeting at the Vatican, Dec. 2, 2013. (Amos Ben Gershom/GPO/Flash90) ROME (JTA) – With a rabbi and a Muslim sheik as his travel companions, Pope Francis is heading to the Middle East with what he hopes will be a powerful message of interfaith respect. It will be the first time that leaders of other faiths are part of an… Read more »
Members of UCLA's student government listen to supporters and opponents of a divestment resolution targeting Israel in a session that stretched into the early morning hours of Feb. 26, 2014. (Courtesy of StandWithUs) LOS ANGELES (JTA) – UCLA has some proud moments in the history of civil liberties. After World War II, UCLA and the University of California, Berkeley, were the hotbeds of opposition to an anti-communist loyalty oath that California tried to impose on academics. Ultimately the professors won in court… Read more »
Hillary Rodham Clinton speaking at the American Jewish Committee's Global Forum, May 14, 2014. (Ronald Sachs) WASHINGTON (JTA) – A month before her foreign policy autobiography, “Hard Choices,” hits the bookstores, Hillary Rodham Clinton made an easy choice: She pitched her diplomatic credentials to a friendly Jewish audience. Clinton’s speech to the American Jewish Committee on May 14 was meant to send a signal to… Read more »
Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras speaks in a synagogue in Thessaloniki in March 2013, the first visit by a sitting prime minister to a Greek shul in more than a century. (Gavin Rabinowitz) ATHENS, Greece (JTA) — When the Anti-Defamation League published its global anti-Semitism survey last week, Greece, the cradle of democracy, captured the ignominious title of most anti-Semitic country in Europe. With 69 percent of Greeks espousing anti-Semitic views, according to the survey, Greece was on par with Saudi Arabia,… Read more »
Josh Zeid: "There’s no better place, if you’re a young player, to be than the Houston Astros." (Hillel Kuttler) BALTIMORE (JTA) – For Houston Astros pitcher Josh Zeid, a recent game against the Baltimore Orioles provided a microcosm of his up-and-down tenure in organized baseball and with the club over the past several months. Entering a 2-2 game in the seventh inning, with two runners on and two… Read more »
Some 250 supporters of the far-right National Democratic Party marching on May Day in Rostock, Germany, are accompanied by riot police, May 1, 2014. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images) BERLIN (JTA) — Armed with ropes and long sticks, a group of teens in Germany’s capital headed out under the cover of night. Their goal: to tear down from lampposts the campaign posters of the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party. The young people are one small posse among those who… Read more »
