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Spirituality at heart of Congregation Or Chadash Israel trip

The Congregation Or Chadash group at the Mount of Olives June 21. Front row (L-R): Alex Putnam, Jacob Louchheim, Alan Kalmikoff; second row: Joan Morris, Marcia Louchheim, Marcia Katz, Pam Drell, Ashley David, David Hazan, Rabbi Thomas Louchheim, Arlene Kutoroff; third row: Elliot Framan, Andrea Davis, Daniel Louchheim, Grace Kolack, Soozie Hazan, Benny Louchheim, Katie Louchheim, Evan Adelstein, Renee Adelstein, Keith Trantow (Courtesy Congregation Or Chadash)
August 10, 2017 / Korene Charnofsky Cohen, Special to the AJP

Friday, close to sunset in Jerusalem, a siren sounds heralding the start of the Sabbath. The Muslim call to prayer and Christian church bells echo across the city. Rabbi Thomas Louchheim, his wife, Marcia, and members of their family, along with members of Congregation Or Chadash, were awed by… Read more »

How volunteering becomes a way in for millennials distanced from the Jewish community

Repair the World volunteers assist with food preparation at Masbia Soup Kitchen in Brooklyn. (Alli Lesovoy)
August 8, 2017 / Josefin Dolsten, JTA

NEW YORK (JTA) — As a college student, Jake Max assumed he would work in banking or consulting after graduation. That was the path favored by many of his classmates. But after experiencing the 2016 presidential campaign his senior year at Emory University, Max was spurred to action and… Read more »

Trump is thinking of breaking the Iran deal. Here’s how he could do it.

Donald Trump speaks with journalists at a rally against the Iran nuclear deal at the U.S. Capitol, Sept. 9, 2015. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
August 2, 2017 / Ron Kampeas, JTA

  WASHINGTON (JTA) — Campaigning last year for the presidency, Donald Trump said the Iran nuclear agreement was the “worst deal” he had ever seen. It was never exactly clear, however, what he intended to do about it: Appearing at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s policy conference in… Read more »

Jared Kushner on Israeli-Palestinian peace: ‘There may be no solution’

Jared Kushner speaks at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next door to the White House, June 19, 2017. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
August 2, 2017 / Ben Sales, JTA

  NEW YORK (JTA) — If Jared Kushner is the only person who can deliver Middle East peace — as his father-in-law Donald Trump said — he comes off as a reluctant savior. In a speech delivered Monday to a group of congressional interns and leaked to the media, Kushner expounded… Read more »

Wheelchair-bound Bedouin man is Israel’s newest doctor of physics

Ramadan Abu-Ragila receives a doctoral degree at Ben-Gurion University (Ran Dahan/TPS)
July 31, 2017 / Gili Eliyahu Adler/TPS

Among the graduates receiving their doctoral degrees at Ben Gurion University of the Negev on June 28, one stood out above the rest. Ramadan Abu-Ragila, 34, has muscular dystrophy, a disease that causes progressive weakness and loss of muscle mass, is wheelchair bound and relies on an oxygen machine… Read more »

A Jewish professor taught at a Catholic school in a Muslim country. Here’s what happened.

Gary Wasserman, left, strolls through a corridor on the Georgetown campus in Qatar with his students in 2012. (Georgetown University-Qatar)
July 31, 2017 / Ron Kampeas, JTA

  WASHINGTON (JTA) — Near the end of his first year teaching American studies at the Georgetown University campus in Qatar, Gary Wasserman introduced a dozen Israelis to a dozen undergraduates from across the Middle East. Then he left the room so the students could have an unfiltered discussion.… Read more »

Why more Israelis are moving to the US

Children wave Israeli and American flags at the Celebrate Israel parade in New York City, June 4, 2017. (Perry Bindelglass)
July 31, 2017 / Ben Sales, JTA

  NEW YORK (JTA) — Six years ago, the Israeli government released a series of controversial ads to show its expatriates that they would never feel at home in the United States. But last year, Israeli Cabinet members lined up to address a Washington, D.C., conference celebrating Israeli-American identity.… Read more »

Uganda’s Jews are down to one meal a day because of East Africa’s famine

Gershom Sizomu, religious leader of the Abayudaya, in 2003. (Ken Hively/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
July 31, 2017 / Ben Sales, JTA

(JTA) — Uganda’s 2,000 Jews have long maintained a modest existence. They live in the east of the country in a hilly, rural area that lacks paved roads, consistent electricity and freely running water. But this year, the situation for Uganda’s Jewish community, called the Abayudaya, has worsened. Twenty million people… Read more »

OP-ED Jews once fought — and died — for voting rights. Here’s why some are still at it.

Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party supporters demonstrate for voting rights outside the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, N.J. Some hold signs with portraits of slain civil rights workers Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner. (Warren K. Leffler/Wikimedia Commons)
July 28, 2017 / Andrew Silow-Carroll, JTA

  NEW YORK (JTA) — Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner are about the closest American Jews have to secular saints. The two Jewish civil rights workers traveled south for the Freedom Summer campaign of 1964, joining the African-American activist James Chaney in canvassing black churches. All three were kidnapped and murdered by… Read more »

OP-ED America’s only nuclear-qualified, Navy veteran, transgender rabbi is not happy with the president’s tweets

Rona Matlow served in the Navy for 22 years before leaving to become what she calls "the only nuclear-qualified, transgender rabbi." (Photos courtesy of Maslow)
July 28, 2017 / Anna Selman, JTA

WASHINGTON, D.C. (JTA) — On Wednesday, in our offices near this city’s Dupont Circle, the staff at Jewish War Veterans of the U.S.A. were opening the mail when a request came in from a veteran asking that we change her first name on our records from Jaron to Rona. “I… Read more »

Israeli Arab transgender beauty queen opens up about her story

Talleen Abu Hana visited Washington, D.C., to speak about her experience being a transgender woman in Israel. (Ron Kampeas)
July 28, 2017 / Giovanna Paz, JTA

  WASHINGTON, D.C. (JTA) — Last month, the Israeli Embassy marked LGBT Pride Month with a reception for Jewish and Israeli activists and leaders. About 100 people attended the event, which featured an address by Talleen Abu Hana, an Arab Christian from Nazareth who won the first Miss Trans Israel… Read more »

American Jews vs. American Muslims: How do they compare?

Muslims at a prayer service celebrating Eid-al-Fitr in Stamford, Conn., June 25, 2017. (John Moore/Getty Images)
July 26, 2017 / Ben Sales, JTA

  NEW YORK (JTA) — Since it came out in 2013, the “Pew study” — a landmark survey of American Jewish demographics, beliefs and practices — has been at the center of American Jewish scrutiny and handwringing. Now it’s American Muslims’ turn. On Wednesday, the Pew Research Center released a… Read more »

Why Jews from Libya are worried about the fate of the country’s Jewish artifacts

A hotel can be seen behind the abandoned Dar Bishi synagogue in Tripoli, Libya, Sept. 28, 2011. (Joseph Eid/AFP/Getty Images)
July 24, 2017 / Josefin Dolsten

  (JTA) — Gina Waldman was forced to flee her native Libya in 1967 as anti-Jewish mobs took to the streets of Tripoli, burning down her father’s warehouse. Waldman, like thousands of other Libyan Jews who left the country amid public and state-sponsored anti-Semitism in the 20th century, was… Read more »

OP-ED The US anti-BDS bill may be bad, but not as bad as some critics say

Demonstrators outside the offices of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo protesting his executive order calling for New York companies to divest from organizations that support the BDS movement, June 9, 2016. (Erik McGregor/Pacific Press/LightRocket/Getty Images)
July 24, 2017 / David Schraub, JTA

  BERKELEY, Calif. (JTA) — A bill being weighed in Congress that would target boycotts of Israel and its settlements is sparking widespread outrage, especially after investigative journalist Glenn Greenwald claimed it “criminalizes free speech.”  The post relied on a letter from the ACLU expressing First Amendment concerns over the Israel Anti-Boycott Act.… Read more »

Why this poster of a Jewish man and a Muslim woman kissing caused a scandal in Europe

A poster in the Dutch city of Rotterdam encouraging free choice of romantic partners, May 25, 2017. (Courtesy of Femme for Freedom)
July 24, 2017 / Cnaan Liphshiz, JTA

  AMSTERDAM (JTA) — In a country where sex toys are displayed in shop windows and television commercials often feature nudity, a picture of a clothed, heterosexual couple kissing may not seem like the stuff of scandal. But precisely such an image — part of a poster campaign celebrating… Read more »

Chechnya’s Jewish community doesn’t exist — but it’s angry at Israel

Mosei Yunayev speaking at the International Islamic Mission Forum in Makhachkala, Russia, March 22, 2017. (Courtesy of the International Islamic Mission)
July 24, 2017 / Cnaan Liphshiz, JTA

  (JTA) — While Russia’s mainstream Jewish leaders in Moscow firmly backed Israel’s actions in clashes this week with Palestinians at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, the small Jewish community of Chechnya broke ranks with them and boldly condemned the Jewish state’s “provocations” against Muslims in the holy city. At least that was… Read more »

Tucson J to host citizenship ceremony
July 24, 2017 /

 The Tucson Jewish Community Center (the Tucson J) will be the host of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services naturalization ceremony on Wednesday, July 26 at 10 a.m. in the Tucson J’s Ballroom. One hundred new U.S. citizens will participate in the naturalization ceremony and originate from the… Read more »