Local

The Jewish History Museum has begun cataloging and archiving artifacts in its permanent collection, thanks to partial funding from the Arizona Humanities Council. Photographs of many of the artifacts may be viewed on the museumís website, jewishhistorymuseum.org (click on the artifacts tab). Among the artifacts are over 40,000 paper… Read more »

The Weintraub Israel Center is seeking host families for two Israelis who will serve as camp counselors at the Tucson Jewish Community Center this summer. Daniel Saban, 21, completed his military service with the Israeli Air Force. He is fluent in English and Spanish, enjoys horseback riding, jazz dance… Read more »

Tucsonan Bill Kugelman and teens from the Western region of the United States lead the March of the Living from Auschwitz to Birkenau in Poland on April 19. (Courtesy CJE)

Holocaust survivor Bill Kugelman has been to Birkenau before, once on a previous March of the Living trip in 2006, and as a prisoner of the Nazis. From 1939 to 1945, Kugelman, 88, spent three and a half years in concentration camps, including Birkenau, and two and a half… Read more »

Kristopher Carson “KC” Rosburg and Carol Galper, assistant dean for medical student education at the University of Arizona College of Medicine, with the letter announcing his award from the Dr. Sam Goldfein Memorial Fund

The Dr. Sam Goldfein Memorial Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation will honor Kristopher Carson “KC” Rosburg with its second annual award of $2,500. Rosburg is a graduating senior at the University of Arizona College of Medicine who will become a pediatrician. He will do his residency at St.… Read more »

David Graizbord, associate professor of Judaic studies at the University of Arizona, will be the guest speaker at the Tucson Jewish Genealogy and Oral History Group meeting on Sunday, May 13. Graizbord will discuss how Sephardic Jews from the “golden age” of medieval Spanish Jewry, through the Inquisition, to… Read more »

Handmaker Jewish Services for the Aging is partnering with Youth Volunteer Corps, a program of Volunteer Southern Arizona, to create an intergenerational program for youth. Participants will engage with the elderly at Handmaker at quarterly events that they will help plan. Handmaker Youth Leadership Team participants who complete the… Read more »

Pima County Supervisor Ray Carroll

Cooperation was on the agenda at the annual legislative breakfast that took place at the Tucson Jewish Community Center on April 20. Republican and Democratic Pima County supervisors and Tucson City Council members started out by voicing opposition to the proposed Rosemont Mine, drawing repeated applause from the audience… Read more »

Tucsonan Paul Rubin with journals written by his mother, Roz Kaufmann, and a copy of his compilation, “In Her Own Words: A Life Well Lived” (Photo: Brenda Stosberg-Rubin)

Imagine Paul Rubin’s surprise when he found a suitcase full of journals penned by his mother, Roz Kaufmann, dating back to 1944. Kaufmann was 79 and suffered from dementia when her son found the journals in 2004. She died two years later at age 81. “All of a sudden… Read more »

Micha Bar-Am

Congregation Anshei Israel’s 10th annual observance of Yom Yerushalayim — celebrating the 45th anniversary of the reunification of Jerusalem — will feature an exhibition of 10 works by Micha Bar-Am, a renowned Israeli photojournalist. Bar-Am, who is best known for his coverage of the Six-Day War in 1967, has… Read more »

Rabbi Miri Fleiming

The Secular Humanist Jewish Circle will sponsor a lecture, “Torah as Mythology,” by Rabbi Miri Fleming, Ph.D., on Saturday, May 19, from 2-4:30 p.m. at the Dusenberry-River Library, 5605 E. River Road (at Craycroft). Fleming will address the question of what the Torah, or five books of Moses, is… Read more »

Abraham Verghese, M.D.

In this age of high-tech medicine compassion can often be neglected, but the annual Cindy Wool Memorial Seminar helps provide a remedy for healthcare professionals in Tucson. The third seminar and dinner on humanism in medicine, held March 28 at the Marriott University Park Hotel, sought to support physicians… Read more »

Interfaith Community Services will host a conference, “Faith Communities and Mental Illness: Tools for Response and Care,” on Friday, April 27, from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. at St. Philips in the Hills Episcopal Church. Created in response to the Jan. 8, 2011 shooting tragedy in Tucson, this “first… Read more »

Alon Velan

Alon Velan, an Israeli reporter and editor at the Israel Broad­casting Authority, wasn’t sure what to expect on his leave of absence in Tucson. Here for a year with his wife, Hadas, who has a postdoctoral fellowship in psychology at the University of Arizona, and their two young children,… Read more »

University of Arizona freshman Molly Katz Simon, right, with University of Texas at Austin student Tracy Frydberg, in Jerusalem. (Jeni Willenzik)

University of Arizona freshman Molly Katz Simon was the only Arizonan selected to participate in Hasbara Fellowships’ activism training program in Israel over winter break. One of 80 American students who spent more than two weeks traveling through Israel, meeting with leaders in business, politics, religion and social activism,… Read more »

Israeli flags fly from the balcony of the Tucson Jewish Community Center at last year’s Israel Festival. (Marty Johnston, TJCC)

The Weintraub Israel Center will be taking the Israel 64 Festival to the next level, literally and figuratively. Guy Gelbart, Israel Center director and community shaliach (emissary from Israel), explains that this year’s festival, which will be held May 6 from 1 to 6 p.m., will use both floors… Read more »

Carol Karsch, who is retiring after 23 years as executive director of the Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona, with her husband, Dan, at the Foundation’s 20th Anniversary Celebration of the Endowment Book of Life on Feb. 7. (Martha Lochert)

Carol Karsch has wanted to live in Israel since she was 10 years old, when she began learning about the Jewish state at a synagogue in the small town of Norristown, Pa. Now Karsch, who will step down next month after 23 years at the helm of the Jewish… Read more »

The cover of artist Stan Lebovic’s book reads “Black is a Color, by a survivor’s son.” But in his search for meaning in the aftermath of the Holocaust, “I don’t focus on the negativity,” Lebovic promises. Instead, he finds hope and inspiration in the resilience of the Jewish people.… Read more »

Members of the Jewish community are invited to attend “Think Tank 2020” on Wednesday, May 2, from 5:15 to 6:45 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The event, convened by the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona, will launch a strategic planning process to explore issues of importance to… Read more »

Marilyn Einstein

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona will hold its annual meeting and awards celebration on Thurs­day, May 10 at 7 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. “Feddys,” the custom metal and glass awards designed by Lynne Rae Lowe for the Federation, and other awards will be given to… Read more »

Adam Rubin

Adam Rubin, Ph.D., a rabbinic student from the Ziegler School of Rabbinical Studies in Los Angeles, will lead services at Congregation Bet Shalom during the weekend of May 4-6. Rubin will lead Friday evening services at 6 p.m., which will be followed by a dinner, and will participate in… Read more »