Posts By PHYLLIS BRAUN - AJP Executive Editor

SID BRODKIN, born on July 4, 1926 in Brooklyn, N.Y., celebrated his 90th birthday with family in Tucson.… Read more »

Niles Rendleman King, son of Dr. Sloan R. King, will celebrate becoming a bar mitzvah on Saturday, July 30 at Temple Emanu-El. He is the grandson of Nancy Niles and John Sjoblom of Fort Dodge, Iowa. Niles attends Tucson Hebrew Academy where he plays soccer and participates in mock… Read more »

Israel Scouts Friendship Caravan The Tzofim (Israel Scouts) visited Tucson for several days last month. Along with their annual concert at the Tucson Jewish Community Center on June 20, the scouts also gave performances for Camp J and Handmaker Jewish Services for the Aging and spent time with local… Read more »

Sharon Arkin, Ph.D., was honored as the Tucson Jewish Community Center Volunteer of the Year for her Elder Rehab program for those with mild to moderate memory impairment. The Fall 2016 semester of Elder Rehab begins the week of Sept. 19. Participants, who should be over age 50, are… Read more »

Ross Horwitz, who bills himself simply as “Ross the Magician,” has been practicing magic since he was 7 years old. He spent his early life in Chicago and attended a Jewish summer camp in Michigan, where he got his first taste of making the impossible possible from a camp… Read more »

Author and publisher Arthur Naiman has no time for those without humor or creativity. The Chicago-born Tucson transplant by way of New York, Paris and the Bay Area has published more than 30 nonfiction books and started two publishing companies. A philosophy major at Brandeis University, he had no… Read more »

Love of the written word and a desire to understand and help others are the forces that have driven Joan Belzer throughout her life, and, over time, she has found a way to combine them. After discovering the power of graphology, also known as handwriting analysis, Belzer was empowered… Read more »

At 90 years young, Mort Kranitz still has a song in his heart and a spring to his step. The pacemaker he got in June inspired him to take life easier and he now gets into his office at Mort’s Auto Brokerage a little later in the day. Yes,… Read more »

  HARRISBURG, Pa. (JTA) – Taking a seat on the dugout bench of the Portland Sea Dogs, Nate Freiman politely dismisses the premise that he pines to return to the major leagues. Maybe it’s a defense mechanism now that he’s two seasons and three organizations removed from his last… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) –  “I am proud to be a Vlach,” says Yiannis Boutaris, the mayor of Thessaloniki, Greece’s second largest city. Ostensibly, we’re here at the Washington Hilton to discuss Boutaris’ bid to put the Jewish back in Thessaloniki, a city — perhaps best known as Salonika —once home to the largest… Read more »

LONDON (JTA) — For two years, in her travels around the English capital, Natalie Pitimson has toted a library bag emblazoned with a word in Yiddish. “The word ‘schlep’ written on the side perfectly describes my regular hour-long trek through central London,” Pitimson, a senior sociology lecturer at the University… Read more »

EDINBURGH, Scotland (JTA) — The last time that Scotland voted on whether to become independent from the United Kingdom, most of its 7,000 Jews thought doing so was a bad idea. Worried that Scottish independence would encourage nationalism and embolden an already aggressive anti-Israel movement with deep roots in the… Read more »

  (JTA) — Most people know Elie Wiesel as the author of “Night,” one of the first published autobiographical accounts of what life was like inside Nazi concentration camps. The book, which helped shape the American understanding of the effects of the Holocaust, has since become a staple on high… Read more »

Every graveyard tells its own story, says Tucsonan Richard Rosen, former owner of the Bisbee-Douglas Jewish Cemetery, located about 100 yards from the U.S.-Mexico border. Regardless of its current condition, the land still radiates a strong spiritual energy, says Rosen. “There’s something right about it, and there’s also something… Read more »

The Southwest Torah Institute’s Dr. Paul W. Hoffert Spirit Program begins Monday, July 25. The two-week free learning program, “A Tree of Life for Those Who Grasp It,” which takes its title from Proverbs, runs through Sunday, Aug. 7. Now in its 16th year, the program is for Jewish… Read more »

Update July 8: This event has been postponed due to a bereavement.  JFCS hopes to reschedule on a date in August.  Jewish Family & Children’s Services of Southern Arizona will hold a free ethical wills workshop for the Jewish community on Thursday, July 14, from 1-3 p.m. at Handmaker… Read more »

Mitzvah Magic, a joint program of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Women’s Philanthropy and Jewish Family & Children’s Services, is seeking new volunteers. “As a staple program for local Jewish families in need, Mitzvah Magic continues to need your help,” says Danielle Larcom, director of Women’s Philanthropy. Three… Read more »

Art Martin

Handmaker. Life blooms here. In fact, Handmaker itself is blooming. In the last few years, with the hard work of staff and tireless efforts of our lay leaders, Handmaker has seen substantial growth. The dedication of our new two-story Kalmanovitz building, the acquisition and remodel of the SandRuby building… Read more »

  (JTA) — On my bookshelves there are two rows of volumes on the Soviet Jewry movement. Squeezed in among the tomes is a small, well-worn paperback with pages no longer attached to the spine, “The Jews of Silence,” by Elie Wiesel. This slim volume is, however, a bridge.… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Elie Wiesel, the Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate who became a leading icon of Holocaust remembrance and a global symbol of conscience, died on Saturday at 87. His death was the result of natural causes, the World Jewish Congress said in a statement. A philosopher, professor… Read more »