Tucson Hebrew Academy will honor one of its founders, Bertie Levkowitz, at its 2019 Tikkun Olam Celebration next month. Daniel Asia, president of THA’s board of trustees, remembers meeting her back in 1988. “When we first got to Tucson I met Bertie and her then-husband, Jack, and I went… Read more »
Posts By Debe Campbell
Tucson J introduces goat yoga – no kidding!
Participants at the Tucson Jewish Community Center weekly Goat Yoga class get a workout and then some. They are joined by miniature kids from Goats of Tucson Yoga. At the hour-long evening program, the yogis usually are more interested in the costumed creatures than yoga poses, especially when plank,… Read more »
Israeli to bring intercultural storytelling power
Award-winning storyteller, author and educator Noa Baum returns to Tucson this month for several public events as well as workshops for high school students, college students and faculty, and nonprofit leaders, all aimed at fostering intercultural understanding. “We believe in the power of story to reach across the divides… Read more »
Shinshinim’s first weeks in Tucson end with road trip
Editor’s note: This is a new, occasional column to update the community on the activities of the Weintraub Israel Center’s shinshinim (Israeli teen emissaries). Tuson? Taksen? Tucson? And then we are told that we’re about to live a whole year, in the middle of the desert, with a complete… Read more »
In Israel’s south, English classes give kids a leg up
Leaving home is difficult, especially since I had lived nowhere else besides Tucson, except for sleepaway camp and teaching in Israel for short stints during the summers. A year ago, however, I traded in the Arizona desert for Mitzpe Ramon, a small southern Israeli desert town in the middle… Read more »
PJ Library program offers cash for multi-family gatherings
If you’ve been meaning to get together with friends but haven’t found the time, here’s an additional incentive: PJ Library’s Get Together program offers up to $100 reimbursement for hosting two or more families to gather and have some fun. PJ Library of Southern Arizona is participating in Get… Read more »
Chat on migration opens Jewish History Museum season
Tucson’s Jewish History Museum marked its reopening for the 2019-2020 season with a gallery chat by Scott Warren, Ph.D., a humanitarian aid worker and academic geographer. Focusing on the topographies of migration, Warren addressed the geographic sense of landscape and place and how memory and erasure can affect them.… Read more »
Israeli cannabis researcher to speak at UA symposium
Professor David “Dedi” Meiri of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, Israel, will be the keynote speaker at the upcoming University of Arizona Inaugural Interdisciplinary Cannabis Symposium. The symposium, sponsored by the UA’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, BIO5 Institute, College of Medicine-Tucson, and College of Science,… Read more »
Everything has a season: dealing with change
In October 1965, Columbia Records released a hit song by the Byrds called “Turn, Turn, Turn.” While my friends and I loved its beautiful harmony, I never suspected that its words would accompany me through life, spanning decades of historical and personal events from the Vietnam War to the… Read more »
Growth at Chabad Oro Valley inspires new facility, more leaders
Since opening in 2012, Chabad Oro Valley, led by Rabbi Ephraim and Mushkie Zimmerman, has grown its roster of participants to about 500 — and outgrown its current space. For the High Holidays, Chabad Oro Valley will celebrate in a new 3,388-square-foot home in Sun City’s Mountain View Plaza,… Read more »
Nuclear expert will speak on Iran issues
Carolynn Scherer Katz will present “Iran Update: a Jewish Perspective” at a Hadassah Southern Arizona lunch later this month. Scherer Katz is a scientist and team leader of the nuclear nonproliferation and systems analysis team at Los Alamos National Laboratory. She was instrumental in drafting Safeguards-by-Design documents for the… Read more »
Rabbi’s corner: Is your faith solid or fluid?
There is a tale about a rabbi whose synagogue was infested with mice. When the conventional method to get rid of them didn’t succeed, he turned to a fellow rabbi for advice. “Simple,” said his colleague, “give them a Bar Mitzvah and they won’t step foot in your synagogue… Read more »
PJ Library celebrates founder’s birthday
Harold Grinspoon, the founder of PJ Library, celebrated his 90th birthday July 27. Members of Southern Arizona’s PJ Library prepared a gift for Grinspoon, thanking him for making free Jewish-themed books available every month for children across the world, ages 6 months-8 years. The colorful birthday-thank you book, created… Read more »
Business briefs 9.13.19
Keith Marcum joins the Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona as communications and marketing manager. Most recently, he managed marketing and sales for Kuumba Made Inc., in Tucson. Before that, he was marketing manager at IMPACT of Southern Arizona, a Tucson non-profit. He is a graduate of James Madison… Read more »
Netanyahu’s push to annex the Jordan Valley, explained
(JTA) — Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that if he is re-elected next week, he’ll immediately annex a big part of the West Bank: the Jordan Valley. That’s kind of a big deal. On the other hand, it’s not really — yet. That specific eastern swath of the West Bank… Read more »
How should Jews treat each other? Jewish thinkers have come up with a plan.
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Despite our differences, Jews around the world have remained bound together by a shared history, by the Torah and by our core values, Israeli President Reuven Rivlin told Jewish thinkers from around the world. The 30 scholars and activists met this week in Jerusalem to hammer… Read more »
Rancho Sahuarita founder Robert Sharpe succumbs to brain cancer
Robert (“Bobby”) Sharpe died Aug. 28, 2019, in Snowmass Village, Colorado, after a long battle with terminal brain cancer. Born and raised in Minnesota, Sharpe’s career took him to the movie business in Los Angeles and the garment industry in Minnesota before he was drawn to Tucson, where he… Read more »
Five hacks for the best Rosh Hashanah celebrations with family, friends
I can’t help but wonder why Hallmark and the retail world at large haven’t co-opted the Jewish New Year. True, while there may “only” be some 5 million to 7 million Jews in the U.S. (depending on who’s counting), Rosh Hashanah is a particularly important holiday on the Jewish… Read more »
Tucson Jewish Community Center aims for autumn Garden of Hope opening
Gan Tikvah, the Garden of Hope, is nearing completion at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. It will have a fluid connection to the current Sculpture Garden and provide a shady and tranquil pocket park for all seasons. It will offer an outdoor venue for classes, programming, and, with dramatic… Read more »
Stronger together: To find unity in today’s world, we must embrace diversity
As each news cycle seems to create new challenges to our Jewish community’s sense of wholeness, how will we respond — individually and collectively? Will we become broken and divided — or if not — how will we retain our footing so that we may remain connected to each… Read more »