Congregation Or Chadash will celebrate its 18th anniversary with “Chai Hopes: a musical celebration honoring 18 years of life, faith, and community” on Sunday, Feb. 16 at 3:30 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The number 18 is significant in Jewish tradition because it is the sum of… Read more »
Yearly Archives 2014
JCF plans Endowment Book of Life signing
The Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona will hold a community signing event for its Endowment Book of Life on Tuesday, Feb. 4 from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. Tucson’s Endowment Book of Life, now in its 23rd year, is a living document that… Read more »
UA Mars project reaching out in Hebrew
Ari Espinoza, outreach coordinator for HiRISE (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) at the University of Arizona, wants to help Hebrew speakers learn about Mars. The HiRISE camera on board the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has been taking photos of the planet since 2006. In 2010, HiRISE started working with volunteers… Read more »
PCC seeks family photos, poems, stories for heritage celebration
In conjunction with its performing arts department’s spring musical, “Fiddler on the Roof,” Pima Community College is creating a Family Heritage Celebration. The college is seeking submissions for a multimedia presentation showcasing the heritage of its students, faculty, staff and community, which will culminate in a public celebration on… Read more »
Chabad ‘Spa for the Soul’ aims to help women find balance
Chabad of Tucson will hold a “Spa for the Soul” event for women on Sunday, Feb. 16, 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Hacienda Del Sol Guest Ranch Resort. The event will begin with an hour of mini spa treatments and health and beauty consultations, plus vendor tables and… Read more »
CJE scholarships to help send kids to camp, teen to Israel
Scholarships for Jewish overnight summer camp are available through the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Coalition for Jewish Education. Forms are available for need-based scholarships for students currently attending Tucson’s religious schools or Tucson Hebrew Academy. The scholarships, funded by the Moe and Frances Beren Family Scholarship Fund at… Read more »
Celebrating on the I-80 — literally
There’s television footage currently going viral on the web showing a group of Chabad yeshiva students dancing on Interstate Highway 80 during a traffic jam. “I’ve been covering weather stories for 20 years now and never have I seen what we are about to show you,” said WPXI-TV/ Channel… Read more »
‘Most influential rabbi in America’ to speak at free JFSA event
David Wolpe — named the most influential rabbi in America by Newsweek magazine and one of the 50 most influential Jews in the world by the Jerusalem Post — will speak in support of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona 2014 Community Campaign on Wednesday, Feb. 12. The… Read more »
In the start-up nation, corporate philanthropy is growing
When the Israeli mobile maps start-up Waze accepted a buyout from Google for more than $1 billion in June, each of the company’s 100 employees walked away with an average of $1.2 million from the sale. An even bigger check, though, went to Baruch Lipner, a Canadian Israeli who… Read more »
Tefillin policy tip of the iceberg for Orthodox women
The announcement last week that SAR, a modern Orthodox high school in New York, is allowing girls to lay tefillin is helping expose an increasingly sharp fault line within Orthodoxy. For decades, it has been difficult to sort out the precise dividing lines between the varieties of Orthodoxy —… Read more »
Lifting the veil on the science of counting Jews
MIAMI (JTA) — Fueled by KitKats and Cherry Coke, some two dozen people sit hunched over stacks of questionnaires in a windowless conference room in Miami, a phalanx of 1980s-era push-button telephones in front of them. It’s the first day of work on a new survey of Miami Jews,… Read more »
Jewish day school? Not for one observant Jewish family
WEST BLOOMFIELD, Mich. (JTA) — “I’m sorry, but we’ll have to pass.” That was not the answer I wanted to give. It certainly was not the answer my friend expected to hear. You see, my friend’s son attends a local Jewish day school. My son does not. But the… Read more »
After lull, intermarriage debate reignites
NEW YORK (JTA) — It’s back In the months since the Pew Research Center’s survey of American Jews renewed communal concern about assimilation, the intermarriage debate is flaring up again. Jewish religious and communal institutions had been shifting away from seeing intermarriage as a problem to be combated and… Read more »
Nearly half the Israeli parliament marks Holocaust remembrance day at Auschwitz
OSWIECIM, Poland (JTA) — Watching thousands of Poles dance to Klezmer music just 50 miles from the Auschwitz death camp, Johnny Daniels could feel an ambitious plan taking shape. The experience last year at Krakow’s annual Jewish Culture Festival prompted Daniels, a 28-year-old Israeli and Holocaust educator, to organize… Read more »
Reform Judaism with a Latin flavor takes root in Florida school
MIAMI (JTA) — When Alejandra Schatzky-Cohen and her husband decided to enroll their children in a Reform Jewish day school in North Miami Beach five years ago, they had more on their minds than the average prospective day school parent. The family was living in Caracas at the time… Read more »
How living in Switzerland taught me about anti-Jewish bias
NEW YORK (JTA) — During the height of the recession, I moved to Switzerland. I had already lived in France, Japan, India and Israel, and traveled much of the rest of the world. I’d gone global for work, love, spirituality and cultural infatuation, but this last time was for… Read more »
Bend the Arc’s new leader is a black belt with a radical streak
NEW YORK (JTA) — When Stosh Cotler takes over as CEO of Bend the Arc, a Jewish group that fights for immigration reform, workers’ rights and other domestic liberal causes, she will be one of the few women leading a national Jewish group of its size. But Cotler’s gender… Read more »
Seattle couple gets married … and married … and married
(JTA) — In less than a year, Dane Kuttler and Rowan Parker exchanged vows in 10 different wedding ceremonies at 10 different venues on two coasts under nine different marriage canopies. In what Kuttler calls “Wedding Tour ’13,” the introverted Seattle couple wanted to share their celebration with as… Read more »
Romania has come a long way on Holocaust remembrance, but denial persists
BUCHAREST, Romania (JTA) — Touring the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2005, Romanian President Traian Basescu was unprepared to confront some painful truths. Facing a photograph showing pro-Nazi Romanian troops offloading their Jewish countrymen from cargo trains, Basescu was shocked and saddened. For decades, his country’s educational system had… Read more »
In Iran sanctions debate, what the sides are arguing about
WASHINGTON (JTA) — A loose coalition of advocacy groups and policy experts, including a pair of dovish Jewish organizations, have been coordinating messaging in support of the Obama administration’s Iran strategy. The coalition was convened by the Ploughshares Fund, which advocates for a nuclear-free world. Coalition participants — J… Read more »