News

It’s usually college students who undertake the challenges of studying abroad, but ever since she was in fifth grade Haya Gibly was determined to go to high school in Israel. Haya, 14, recently started attending Mosenson high school in Israel, an opportunity she found through the Naale program. The… Read more »

A staggering 83 percent of more than 400,000 prisoners released in 2005 across 30 states were arrested at least once in the nine years following their release, according to a U. S. Department of Justice study released in 2018. Today many groups are talking about and researching justice reform.… Read more »

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona and its Northwest Division recently announced the expansion of its Oro Valley facility to larger premises. Due to increased participation in the many programs at the Northwest’s Ruth & Irving Olson Center for Jewish Life, this summer the center will move to 180… Read more »

Herbert Cohn, chair of the Catalina Council Jewish Committee on Scouting, is attempting to create a more inclusive environment by reminding all in the local scouting community of the intention by Lord Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the world scouting movement, that it should embrace all faiths. Cohn has been… Read more »

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona’s board governance committee has recommended the following slate of officers for the 2019-20 program year: Deborah Oseran, chair of the board; Jeff Artzi, vice chair; Ben Silverman, treasurer/secretary; Shelly Silverman, immediate past chair. Also nominated are Elena Boskoff, Avi Erbst and Scott Sheftel… Read more »

Anne Lowe, left, and Elizabeth L. Fox

Anne Lowe of Tucson and Elizabeth L. Fox of Boulder, Colorado, will present their recently published books at Hadassah Southern Arizona’s brunch on Sunday, May 5. In “A Touch of Torah,” Lowe shares reflections on being Jewish as she tries to grasp the intricacies of Torah. Inspired by the… Read more »

Editor’s note: The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona convenes a community-wide security meeting yearly with members of local law enforcement and representatives of synagogues and Jewish community organizations. JFSA, in conjunction with the Jewish Community Roundtable and the Tucson Jewish Community Center, recently hired a part-time Jewish community security… Read more »

Orit Bashkin

In the 1950s, 123,000 Iraqi Jews arrived in Israel. Harsh conditions and a shared background united them. Orit Bashkin, Ph.D., a University of Chicago associate professor of modern Middle Eastern history, will highlight this era in the Arizona Center for Judaic Studies’ 2019 Jeffrey Plevan Memorial Lecture, “Israeli Babylonians:… Read more »

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Women’s Philanthropy will hold “Sharing Our Stories,” an evening of exploring individual and shared histories, on Monday, April 29, 5-7 p.m. on the patio of the Jewish History Museum. JFSA Senior Vice President Fran Katz and Young Women’s Cabinet Coordinator Danielle Larcom will… Read more »

Tucson now has a functioning eruv, Congregation Chofetz Chayim announced April 11 via email. An eruv is a symbolic wire boundary that follows the guidelines of Jewish law for creating a demarcation of private space that allows for carrying objects on Shabbat and other Jewish holy days. The creation… Read more »

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Men’s Night Out on Tuesday, April 9, drew a crowd of 130 men to the Sculpture Garden of the Tucson Jewish Community Center for a relaxed evening that included whiskey tasting, food trucks, and the presentation of the 2019 MENtor award to Gary… Read more »

A $12,000 donation will fund computers for additional classrooms at Homer Davis Elementary School. Jody Gross presented a check, on behalf of the 12 grandchildren who are part of the Maizlish Family Foundation, to the school’s principal, Lyle Dunbar, at the 10th anniversary celebration of “Making a Difference Every… Read more »

Eleven members of the Jewish Latino Teen Coalition, a program founded by the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Jewish Community Relations Council and the Office of U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva, visited Washington, D.C., March 31-April 5 to lobby lawmakers on immigration reform. In addition to meeting with a dozen… Read more »

Members of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Jewish Community Relations Council volunteered March 21 at Tucson Interfaith HIV/Aids Network’s Poz Café, along with other faith-based organizations. The café serves a monthly catered meal to those living with HIV. Organizations supply the food, cooked by the TIHAN chef with… Read more »

BUDAPEST (JTA) – Architecture and built heritage can be powerful symbols. Notre-Dame de Paris is one of the most famous and familiar buildings in the world, visited by an astonishing 30,000 people a day, or 13 million people a year. It is embedded in global collective consciousness and immortalized around the… Read more »

(JTA) — Two Jewish billionaires have pledged a total of $122 million toward the restoration of Paris’ Notre Dame cathedral, which was ravaged in a fire. Lily Safra, a Brazilian philanthropist, said she would give $22 million to fund the restoration efforts of the iconic church, which was badly… Read more »

(JTA) — The Trump administration’s Middle East peace plan will be unveiled in June, White House special adviser Jared Kushner said. Kushner, one of the main authors of the plan, told a group of about 100 ambassadors in Washington, D.C., that the plan will be made public after a… Read more »

(JTA) — Two professional soccer teams — one in England and one in the United States — will send a joint delegation to the March of the Living. The Chelsea Football Club and New England Revolution announced Wednesday in a statement to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that they will… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — President Reuven Rivlin has officially tasked Benjamin Netanyahu, the current prime minister, with forming Israel’s next government. Rivlin met Wednesday evening with Netanyahu at the president’s residence in Jerusalem hours after receiving the official results of last week’s national elections. Party leaders representing 65 of the 120… Read more »

(JTA) — A Jewish Florida state representative called one of his constituents a “Judenrat” on Facebook. The constituent, also Jewish, says the lawmaker should apologize for describing him with a term that refers to Jews who collaborated with the Nazis during the Holocaust. Randy Fine, a Republican who represents… Read more »