LOS ANGELES (JTA) — If the Pilgrims are lighting menorahs and the Maccabees are chasing turkeys, it must be Thanksgivukkah, as some have come to call the confluence of Thanksgiving and Hanukkah that will happen this year on Nov. 28. It’s a rare event, one that won’t occur again… Read more »
Neshama Carlebach and Josh Nelson performing at the United Synagogue centennial in Baltimore. (Mike Diamond Photography) BALTIMORE (JTA) — It will be years before it’s clear whether or not this week’s conference of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism was a success. To be sure, the centennial gathering in Baltimore by nearly all accounts was a far more dynamic and well-attended biennial than those of… Read more »
Pattie Feder, Tucson Padres business/merchandise manager, with the team’s mascot, the “Swinging Friar” The last first pitch Tucson Padres general manager Mike Feder, “Mr. Baseball” to many in our city, was in the news throughout the summer, yet we heard little of the proverbial “woman behind the man,” his wife, Pattie Feder. It was fitting that Pattie was invited to throw out… Read more »
Annie Stein (left) and Iris Sapovits with dolls donated to Hadassah University Hospital-Ein Kerem. Over the past few months, many Tucsonans traveled from the climes of Southern Arizona to similar ones in Israel. Here is a sampling of their varied sojourns: From April 13 to May 13, Iris Sapovits, co-president of Hadassah Southern Arizona, and Annie Stein, Hadassah’s Israel, Zionist and International Affairs… Read more »
LOS ANGELES (Jewish Journal) — I started building my sukkah in December. To those of you who are sukkah DIYers, you know how ridiculous this sounds. A sukkah is the ritual hut that Jews build each year on the holiday of Sukkot, which begins this year on the evening… Read more »
Michaela Davenport at the Birkenau concentration camp in Poland. (Courtesy Michaela Davenport) Walking through the famous gate “arbeit macht frei” at Auschwitz, I felt sick to my stomach. I’d seen that gate, with its infamous Nazi inscription, “work makes you free,” in history textbooks, photos and movies, but seeing it… Read more »
Isaac Lobel NEW YORK (JTA) — For my Bar Mitzvah, my parents got me a laptop. For what I searched for on it, they got me a shrink. CyberSitter informed my computer-savvy parents that their son was searching gay porn. On the ride to my first therapy session, I stuck my… Read more »
Miriam “Mimi” Furst, age 4, with her father, Irving Boruchow Crack! Boom! The sound of big fat pebbles pounding the roof and rattling windows. Maybe it’s the Nazis coming to get us! That afternoon my brother Stan and I saw a war movie at a theatre near our home in the Bronx, N.Y. We watched as mighty John Wayne,… Read more »
LOS ANGELES (JTA) — As the new Superman movie “Man of Steel” flies to an opening on Father’s Day weekend, we earthbound Jewish men have the superhero’s creators — Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Jewish teenagers from Cleveland — to thank for setting such a super high bar. Especially… Read more »
Sue Ross with her grandson Aiden Glesinger at the Green Tie Gala.
Happy 65th Birthday, Israel! Israel was not created in order to disappear — Israel will endure and flourish. It is the child of hope and the home of the brave. —John F. Kennedy Tucson celebrated Yom Ha’atzmaut, Israeli Independence Day, with extra flair this year. Besides highlighting Israel’s innovations… Read more »
Guy Gelbart It is time to say shalom, the Hebrew word for hello, goodbye and peace. We came in peace, we go in peace. How does one summarize three years? Do you list all the events you created or took part in? Do you make a list of achievements? What was… Read more »
(L-R) Michelle Goodman, Ital Ironstone and Jessica Setton (of Phoenix) at the BBYO International Convention Area BBYO teens at D.C. convention Michelle Goodman, 16, a junior at St. Gregory College Preparatory School, and Ital Ironstone, 18, a senior at City High School, attended BBYO’s International Convention in Washington, D.C., from Feb. 14-18. BBYO comprises AZA (Aleph Zadik Aleph) and BBG (B’nai B’rith Girls). Joining… Read more »
As a child of Holocaust survivors, I have always managed to avoid visiting Germany. Part of my parents’ legacy was never to visit the country, with its dark past — not even to own any products in our home that were made in Germany. Despite my reluctance to visit… Read more »
Wendy Wiener Like any longstanding havurah, or Jewish friendship group, my neighborhood has celebrated the cycle of Jewish holidays together for 20 years. We laugh, bake, eat and recount tales of past holiday celebrations. There’s no worrying about whether the house is clean or how many people are coming, when the… Read more »
Guy Gelbart During the recent Passover holiday, we celebrated the ending of our slavery and becoming a free people. After fleeing Egypt, we were liberated but not yet free. Even after receiving the Torah at Mount Sinai, we were not yet free. It took more than 40 years, a full generation,… Read more »
(L-R) Nancy Mellan, Diane Weintraub, Israeli artist Tzameret Zamir, Stuart Mellan and Ron Weintraub at Zamir’s mosaic of peace project on the anti-sniper wall at Netiv Ha’asara. The mosaic will spell the world ‘shalom.’ At my age (closing in on 60), I often tell myself, in a reassuring tone, that “age is just a state of mind.” Now that the State of Israel is turning a ripe old 65, I wonder, what is Israel’s state of mind? And how do we, American Jews,… Read more »
BERLIN (JTA) — I was 23 when I first met my cousin Gilbert Michlin. He was sitting at a brasserie near his office in Paris wearing a dark suit with a folded handkerchief poking out of the breast pocket. His short, dark hair was perfectly combed. He said, in… Read more »
Stumbling stones honoring Jill Ranucci's great-grandparents, Rudolf and Laura Lowenthal, who died in the Sobibor death camp. (Courtesy Jill Ranucci) In October, I attended a Stolpersteine (stumbling stones) ceremony in Magdeburg, in the former East Germany, to honor my great-grandparents, Rudolph and Laura Lowenthal, who died in the Holocaust. My sister and two cousins, the other surviving family members, accompanied me. The first Stolpersteine were created by German artist… Read more »
Guy Gelbart Is Judaism a religion or is it not? This is the question I posted on my Facebook page, Tucson Shaliach Guy Gelbart, with the intention of creating a thought-provoking discussion. I shared a link to a YouTube video of a talk by my friend Avraham Infeld, president of the… Read more »
Sarah and Leonard Schultz ride an elephant bareback in the water at Luang Prabang, Laos. Travel odyssey Around the world in almost 80 days. From Aug. 19 to Nov. 2, Sarah and Leonard Schultz boarded 15 flights to 10 countries in 76 days. Booked online through AirTreks, the couple traveled from west to east, taking only carry-on luggage, and chronicling their journey with an… Read more »
