News

Teen drivers are involved in more crashes than any other demographic, primarily due to poor decision making, Officer William Honomichl of the Tucson Police Department Traffic Division told a group of about 35 teens and parents on Nov. 1 at Congregation Or Chadash. “You’re Driving Me Nuts,” a driver’s… Read more »

Itamar Rabinovich

Political and social ideological conflicts among Arab nations have fostered continued instability in the Middle East. Israel’s 1948 founding as a Jewish state, and the only democracy in the region, forever changed the landscape and interaction among regional interests. The University of Arizona will host “Israel in the Changing… Read more »

The Jewish Community Foundation is seeking applications from nonprofit organizations in Southern Arizona for a grant from the JCF Israel Discovery Fund, made possible by the Shaol & Evelyn Pozez Endowment Fund and the Beren Family Scholarship Fund. The purpose of the JCF Israel Discovery Fund is to send… Read more »

The Tucson Jewish Community Center will return from a three-year hiatus at the JCC Maccabi Games, sending a delegation of teen athletes to the games that will be held July 24-29 in Columbus, Ohio. Over the past few years, the games conflicted with Tucson school schedules, although a few… Read more »

Tucson Hebrew Academy introduced its new brand identity to the community on Tuesday, Nov. 3, celebrating with morning coffee, cocoa and refreshments. THA is the only school in Tucson providing K-8 education that combines a strong secular program, integrated Jewish education, and a warm sense of community celebrating Jewish… Read more »

Beverly King Pollock

The Invisible Theatre will hold a reading of “Looking for Magic,” a semi-autobiographical play by Tucsonan Beverly King Pollock, on Tuesday, Dec. 1 at 8 p.m. in observance of World AIDS Day. Pollock and her husband, Mel, lost both of their sons to AIDS in the 1990s. In 1990,… Read more »

“Penina Levine Is a Potato Pancake” is one of the PJ Our Way selections for November.

The PJ Library program in Southern Arizona is expanding to include kids ages 9-11 with PJ Our Way. Offering free, age-appropriate monthly books with Jewish content, PJ Our Way puts kids in control of their book choices via a protected, regulated website, pjourway.org. Kids can also contribute book reviews,… Read more »

Hadassah Southern Arizona will hold a Chanukah party brunch on Dec. 6 at 10 a.m. at the Lodge on the Desert, 306 N. Alvernon Way. The Woman of the Year Award will be announced and Cathy Olswing, president of the Desert-Mountain Region of Hadassah, will install the following as… Read more »

Native Tucsonan Patricia Zarin, owner of Classy Sweets, owes both her entrepreneurial spirit and her strong Jewish identity to her parents, Bill and Roselyn Dumes. “I was bat mitzvahed at Anshei Israel,” she says, noting that this was in “the old shul” on Sixth Street, where she and her… Read more »

“When we train for mass casualty incidents, we know that the blood isn’t real and when the training is over, everyone is going to stand up and walk away. How does Israel deal with real mass casualty incidents that can happen every day?” That question by Tucson Fire Department… Read more »

  TEL AVIV (JTA) — It was 2 a.m. when Illana Attali’s friend’s screams woke her. Her friend had just heard about the series of coordinated terror attacks on Paris — a wave of violence that would kill at least 129 people on Friday. A Paris native who moved to Tel… Read more »

PARIS (JTA) — Babette and Sasha Bergman lead what many would consider a charmed life. Both Jewish high-tech professionals in their 30s — they met while working at Google’s European headquarters in Ireland — the Bergmans settled in this capital city shortly ahead of the birth of their now 4-year-old daughter, Daniella. On weekends, they enjoy entertaining friends in… Read more »

  PARIS (JTA) — They say not to take the bikes with the seat turned around. But I take the bike with the seat turned around. Before I know it, I am riding fiercely across town on Rue Saint-Lazare with a loose pedal. This can’t be good, I think… Read more »

  PARIS (JTA) — Watching the Belgian countryside fly by, I reflected on the previous time that I was aboard a high-speed train bound for Paris to cover a horrendous terrorist attack. It had been less than a year since France-born Islamists killed 17 people in Paris: 12 at… Read more »

SECAUCUS, N.J. (JTA) — Welch’s is coming to seder this year. For decades, America’s kosher grape juice market has been dominated by Kedem, whose sweet libations come in concord, blush, white, peach, diet and a variety of sparkling flavors. But with U.S. sales flat when it comes to non-kosher… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) – Jonathan Pollard, the American spy for Israel sentenced to life in prison in 1987, is due to be released on parole on Saturday, 30 years after his arrest. The former U.S. Navy analyst’s exit from a federal prison in Butner, North Carolina (where he reportedly befriended… Read more »

  WASHINGTON (JTA) — The series of terrorist attacks that killed at least 129 in Paris pose a couple of major challenges for the United States, Jewish officials and security experts said. The challenges: security threats from the the 200 or so Islamic State fighters who have returned to the United States, and… Read more »

(JTA) — Before Friday’s bloodbath at the Le Bataclan concert venue in Paris, this centrally located hall from the 19th century had received numerous threats over pro-Israel events hosted there. From at least 2006-2009, Le Bataclan was the venue for the annual fundraising gala of Migdal, the French Jewish nonprofit… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) – In the mind of Israel’s opposition leader, Labor Party chief Isaac Herzog, the array of threats in the Middle East these days present Israel with a historic opportunity. Yes, Palestinians are stabbing Israelis daily. Yes, Israel arguably has its most right-wing government since Benjamin Netanyahu’s… Read more »

AMSTERDAM (JTA) — To Israel and many of its supporters, the new European Union regulations requiring separate labeling for settlement goods are discriminatory measures reminiscent of Europe’s long history of institutionalized anti-Semitism. In a harshly-worded statement Wednesday, the Israeli Foreign Ministry said that by ignoring other territorial disputes around the world, the EU… Read more »