Posts By PHYLLIS BRAUN - AJP Executive Editor

In Kiryat Malachi, saving Ethiopian families and lives

Therapist Zahava Baruch (right) counsels Ethiopian immigrants Fanta (left) and Weinishe at the welfare department in Kiryat Malachi, Israel.

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona and the Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona fund a variety of programs in our TIPS (Tucson, Israel, Phoenix, Seattle) partnership city of Kiryat Malachi, Israel, including counseling for Ethiopian immigrants. Every Tuesday from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m., there is an unusual… Read more »

Margaret Morf

Margaret Ellen Morf, 79, died Aug. 26, 2013. Born in Safford, Mrs. Morf graduated from Good Samaritan School of Nursing in Phoenix when she was 20. She married her high school sweetheart, Paul Morf, and they moved to Juneau, Alaska, where he was an airline pilot and co-founder of… Read more »

‘Courage and Renewal’ focus of COC retreat

David Sadker

Congregation Or Cha­dash will hold a retreat, “Courage & Renewal: A Sabbath Dedicated to Our Hidden Wholeness” Friday, Oct. 18 through Sunday, Oct. 20 at the Redemptorist Renewal Center, 7101 W. Picture Rocks Road. “It is said that on the Sabbath we are given an extra soul — the… Read more »

Survivors’ lives focus of Holocaust History Center

Holocaust survivors Meyer and Susan Neuman with their children, Rosie (left) and Phillip upon arrival in Tucson. (Courtesy Rosie Eilat-Kahn)

Although the mission of Tucson’s Jewish History Museum is to tell the stories of Jewish settlers in the American Southwest, the museum is about to highlight another imperative. After raising funds for expansion and purchasing the building on the adjoining Stone Avenue property four years ago, “we started doing… Read more »

Israel’s Idan Raichel Project coming to Fox

Idan Raichel (Yeara Livny)

On Oct. 9, the Idan Raichel Project, Israeli world music pioneers, will kick off their U.S. tour with a live concert at the Fox Tucson Theatre. Voted “Musical Group of the Decade” in an Israeli national media poll, the Project blends a range of cultures, languages and musical influences… Read more »

Advocate pairs jobs, people with disabilities

Dorothy Kret (Sheila Wilensky)

Dorothy (Dot) Kret isn’t your typical matchmaker. For the past 25 years she’s been helping people with disabilities “become employable and employed,” as the DK Advocates mission statement puts it. “My mother always said what my company does is today’s version of a yenta,” she says, using the word… Read more »

B’nai Mitzvah projects reach beyond Tucson

Ryan Ballis, center, with award from the Wounded Warrior Project, is flanked by Quentin Irion, the group’s outreach coordinator (left) and Derek L. Duplisea, Wounded Warrior alumni director for the Western United States. (Courtesy Mark Ballis)

Each year, caring and energetic 12- and 13-year-olds contribute immeasurably to the social action efforts of the Jewish community in Tucson and around the world. These B’nai Mitzvah students participate in a “mitzvah project,” as these endeavors have come to be known, adding another layer of meaning to the… Read more »

Equality activist to speak about uncle, Harvey Milk, at JCC

Stuart Milk

The Tucson Jewish Community Center will host “A Conversation with Stuart Milk,”co-founder and board president of the Harvey Milk Foundation, on Sunday, Oct.13 at 6 p.m. Milk was instrumental in steering a bill through the California legislature in 2009 to make May 22 a state holiday honoring his uncle… Read more »

Scholar to explore Eastern Europe’s Jews for Hadassah

Dan Fellner

Dan Fellner of the Road Scholars Speakers Bureau of the Arizona Humanities Council will present “Jews in Eastern Europe” at a Hadassah Southern Arizona luncheon on Sunday, Oct. 13. Fellner has more than 25 years of experience in corporate public relations, television news and university teaching in the United… Read more »

Brandeis to open year with author of ‘Savage Anxieties’

Robert A. Williams, Jr.

Robert A. Williams, Jr., the E. Thomas Sullivan Professor of Law and American Indian Studies at the University of Arizona Rogers College of Law, will speak on “Savage Anxieties: The Invention of Western Civilization,” the topic of his most recent book, at the fall opening luncheon of the Brandeis… Read more »

Doctors to review mind-body interactions

Esther Sternberg, M.D., will speak on “The Science of the Mind-Body Interaction in Illness and Healing” at a Tucson Mai­monides Society dinner on Thursday, Oct. 10 at 6:30 p.m. at Hacienda del Sol, 5501 N. Hacienda del Sol Road. The Tucson Maimonides Society is a program of the Jewish… Read more »

Asia’s ‘Psalm 30’ to be part of UA concert

The University of Arizona School of Music will present “A Barber/Britten Music + Festival: Symposium, Concerts and Film,” directed by professor and composer Daniel Asia, on Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 12-13. American composer Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings” is a classical music standard that can be heard in several… Read more »

Tucson native’s ‘Pictures of Hope’ encourages homeless kids to dream big

De’oujenai, age 9, with Linda Solomon (Sheila Wilensky/AJP)

Drivers heading north on Alvernon Way pass a digital sign in front of Our Family Services, which runs a New Beginnings housing division for the homeless: “One-third of Tucson’s children live in poverty. Fifty-two percent live with a single parent.” Linda Solomon, an award-winning Jewish photojournalist, aims to change… Read more »

Nearly 70 years after WWII, Shoah memorials proliferate

The CANDLES Holocaust museum in Terre Haute, Ind.

NEW YORK (JTA) — No earth was moved at the groundbreaking of one of the nation’s newest Holocaust memorials in May. Instead, the gatherers stood silently, symbolic shovels in hand, on the immaculate lawn where the privately funded $400,000 monument will soon rise. A succession of speakers delivered somber homilies remembering one… Read more »

After U.N. speeches, Israel strikes wary tone on Iran

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responds to President Obama's address in New York, Sept. 24. (Kobi Gideon/ via Getty Images)

The good news for Israel in President Obama’s speech at the United Nations was his insistence that any steps Iran might take to solve the standoff over its nuclear program must be transparent and verifiable. The bad news was that Obama wasn’t clear about what those steps should be.… Read more »

Rabbi’s corner: Judaism is not just for special occasions

Rabbi Samuel M. Cohon

Back when I was a student at UCLA my college job was working part-time as a cantor, leading services Friday night and Saturday morning and all festivals. I was in a “Jewish fraternity,” AEPi, where I also lived. But that did not mean that all members of the house… Read more »

Henry Schofield

Henry Schofield, 80, of Oro Valley, died Aug. 24, 2013. Born in Liverpool, England, Mr. Schofield lived in Simsbury, Conn., before moving to Tucson in 2004. He was the owner of H. Schofield Locksmith Service in Simsbury and Tucson. He served in the U.S. Army and the National Guard.… Read more »

George & Marjorie Ansell

George S. and Marjorie H. Ansell, died Aug. 30, 2013. Survivors include their children, Frederick S. Ansell of Chevy Chase, Md., Laura R. Ansell of New York City, and Benjamin J. Ansell of Los Angeles; and three grandchildren. Services were held at Evergreen Mortuary with Rabbi Robert Eisen of… Read more »

Allan Glaser

Allan Glaser, 92, died Sept. 2, 2013. Born in New York City, Mr. Glaser graduated from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business when he was 18 and was a U.S. Army officer in World War II. Mr. Glaser was a small business owner for 50 years and… Read more »

At 96, publication of kids’ book fulfills dream

On her 96th birthday, Betty Rosenberg Perlov became a published children’s author, fulfilling a decades-long goal. The Sept. 1 release of “Rifka Takes a Bow” capped a lifetime of creative endeavors for the nonagenarian great-grandmother . “I am so happy about the book, so happy,” Ro­senberg Perlov told JTA… Read more »