Posts By April Bauer

Neighbors of the new US embassy in Jerusalem are worried — about traffic and rising rents

The U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem sits on a traffic circle recently named for President Donald Trump. The compound is in the middle of Arnona, a quiet residential neighborhood in the city's south. (Ben Sales)

JERUSALEM (JTA) — As he strolled on his leafy, narrow street overlooking what is now the United States Embassy in Israel, Ben Katz stepped back to dodge the side-view mirror of an oncoming truck, which had jutted onto the sidewalk. A few hundred feet past Katz’s garden apartment, four… Read more »

At U.S. embassy dedication, a day for marking history and praising Trump

People watching President Donald Trump speak on a video shown at the opening ceremony of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem, May 14, 2018. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israeli leaders and citizens responded with euphoria as the Trump administration moved the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem on Monday, designating a pre-existing consular building as the official U.S. diplomatic mission to the Jewish State. Hundreds of revelers, many wearing Trump’s signature red baseball caps commemorating the… Read more »

Rabbi Aaron Panken remembered as joyful leader who embodied the ‘best of the Reform movement’

Rabbi Aaron Panken teaching a Talmud class to Hebrew Union College students. (Courtesy of HUC)

NEW YORK (JTA) — Rabbi Andrea Weiss, an associate professor of Bible at the New York campus of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion and its incoming provost, remembered the joy that Rabbi Aaron Panken brought to his work. Weiss recalled how Panken would pop into his colleagues’ offices asking if… Read more »

OP-ED To fight anti-Semitism, first you have to define it

A Turkish demonstrator holding a banner with a Nazi swastika and Star of David in Istanbul, Jan. 2, 2009. (Mustafa Ozer/AFP/Getty Images)

(JTA) — In recent years we have witnessed anti-Israel demonstrations that have turned overtly anti-Semitic and even violent, but police ignored initially as only political activity. We have seen prosecutors and judges rule that an arson attack on a synagogue is not anti-Semitic because the perpetrator was motivated by… Read more »

This Jewish lawmaker wanted to keep Chinese immigrants out. Should a park be named after him?

A view of the Julius Kahn playground in San Francisco. (Omunene/Flickr Commons)

SAN FRANCISCO (J. the Jewish News of Northern California via JTA) — Julius Kahn III grew up in San Francisco, playing in Julius Kahn Playground, named for his grandfather. The view from this clearing in the opulent Presidio Heights neighborhood is among the best in the city, meaning it’s… Read more »

Dining Out Guide

Cafe Poca Cosa 110 E. Pennington St., 622-6400, www.cafepocacosatucson.com Claire’s Cafe & Art Gallery 16140 N. Oracle Rd., Catalina, 825-2525, www.clairescafe.net Coffee X Change 6841 E. Camino Principal, 751-4739 8501 E. Broadway Blvd., 885-2024 www.coffee-x-change.com dedicated a gluten free bakery and coffee shop 4500 E. Speedway Blvd., Ste. 41,… Read more »

How Israel’s tech scene is helping wounded combat veterans

Shoshi Rushnevsky, the founder of Restart, hopes "Makers for Heroes" will make the lives of wounded veterans a little easier. (Ben Sales)

TEL AVIV (JTA) – When Elad Horovitz was shot in the head during Israel’s 2014 war in Gaza, his first concern was survival, not how to maintain peripheral vision while driving. Horovitz, then 20, was shot through his left ear and right eye. Somehow he survived, losing half of… Read more »

At ADL, Rod Rosenstein praises Trump — and extols those who defend the rule of law

Rod Rosenstein speaking at the Anti-Defamation League's annual conference in Washington, D.C., May 6, 2018. (Ron Kampeas)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Rod Rosenstein came to the annual conference of the Anti-Defamation League with plaudits for Donald Trump despite being at the center of the president’s contentious relationship with his Justice Department. He extolled Trump’s call for unity in the wake of the Charlottesville white supremacist rally in… Read more »

An eye doctor who moved to Israel is now making a difference in Africa

Dr. Morris Hartstein, center, frequently travels to Gondar, Ethiopia, to run clinics where he sees up to 500 patients at a time and performs some surgeries. (Courtesy of Hartstein)

RAANANA, Israel — In August 2014, Dr. Morris Hartstein went on a trip to Gondar, Ethiopia, where thousands of Ethiopians seeking to immigrate to Israel live and wait while Israel considers their eligibility to make aliyah. On his second day there, Hartstein showed up for the afternoon mincha service and… Read more »

An exhibit shows ordinary Americans knew a lot about the Holocaust as it was happening

The "Americans and the Holocaust" exhibition is on display at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. (U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — When Holocaust historians ask what Americans knew at the time, the focus often is on the politicians and lawmakers whose votes and initiatives may have mitigated the Nazi genocide against the Jews. An exhibit opening this month at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum here asks the… Read more »

This British Jewish school has mostly Muslim students

Students at the King David Elementary School in Birmingham celebrate Israel's 70th anniversary, April 19, 2018. (Cnaan Liphshiz)

BIRMINGHAM, United Kingdom (JTA) — Like hundreds of Jewish institutions in the Diaspora, the King David School celebrated Israel’s 70th Independence Day with blue-and-white flags and group singing of the “Hatikvah” national anthem. But the King David is not like most other Jewish schools. Most of the dozens of… Read more »

OP-ED Why Israel is investing in Diaspora Jewish education

Millions of Jews, mainly in North America, are drifting away from Judaism, writes Israel’s minister of education and Diaspora affairs. (David Whelan/Flickr Commons)

JERUSALEM (JTA) — For decades, world Jewry helped Israel. Organizations gathered and sent funds to the feeble, small state; our Air Force and Navy were formed and trained by Jewish volunteers from around the globe. As we celebrate our 70th Independence Day, we should thank the previous generations while… Read more »

‘RBG’ filmmakers hope to inspire Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s millennial fans

Ruth Bader Ginsburg has attained pop culture icon status in the last decade. (Courtesy of Magnolia Pictures)

NEW YORK (JTA) — One of the first scenes in a new documentary about Ruth Bader Ginsburg features the Supreme Court associate justice, then 84, vigorously lifting weights, doing leg exercises and holding herself in a plank position. The much buzzed-about workout routine has only added to her status… Read more »

OP-ED Jews make news, but when is it Jewish news?

A screenshot from Google Images shows several prominent Jews accused of sexual harassment in the past month. (Google Images)

NEW YORK (JTA) — “Is So-and-So Jewish? How Jewish is she? Find out if she’s Jewish.” I often joke that JTA reporters and anti-Semitic bloggers write the same stories, only with different headlines. We proudly search down Jewish celebrities to show the diverse ways that Jews are contributing to… Read more »

Europe’s only Jewish hospice gives Holocaust survivors a dignified farewell

Henny Goudeketing, left, and Anne van de Geest at the main hall of the Immanuel Jewish hospice in Amsterdam, Nov. 1, 2017. (Cnaan Liphshiz)

AMSTERDAM (JTA) — Henny Goudeketting, a 95-year-old Holocaust survivor, is ailing and preparing to leave the world. Goudeketting, who was sterilized in Nazi medical experiments at Auschwitz, has neither children nor other relatives to care for her. Now, after multiple infections and recurrent falls, she’s readying to say goodbye.… Read more »

Why did this Muslim majority country put a Jewish congressman on a stamp?

Rep. Eliot Engel is featured on a Kosovo postage stamp in what may be a first. (Office of Eliot Engel)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Rep. Eliot Engel has become the first U.S. congressman to be featured on a postage stamp in Kosovo. Engel, a New York Democrat, may be the first Jewish member of Congress on a stamp, period. Bella Abzug helped inspire a 1999 stamp celebrating the women’s rights… Read more »

After Nazis killed her family, this woman joined the partisans to fight back

Rose Holm at her apartment holding a photo of her late husband, Joe, Oct. 31, 2017. (Josefin Dolsten)

NEW YORK (JTA) — Nazis came for Rose Holm’s family in the afternoon. By the evening, the 16-year-old was lying among corpses in the underground bunker where she and her family had been hiding. “I was between those dead ones, and I didn’t know if I’m alive or I’m… Read more »

The Trump administration says it wants to shut down the PLO mission. Now what?

The flag of the Palestine Liberation Organization seen above its offices in Washington, D.C., Nov. 18, 2017. (Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — In 1987, Congress passed legislation that declared there would never be an office of the Palestine Liberation Organization on U.S. soil. President Ronald Reagan agreed and signed the law. Seven years later the law was still on the books. But that year the PLO opened an… Read more »