As a young attorney, Linda Hirshman, realized that fighting for the disenfranchised was her calling. “I wanted to do something that was hard, so if you accomplished it, it would be an honor,” says Hirshman, now a political pundit and author. “And there was no honor in making powerful… Read more »
The Tucson Festival of Books returns to the University of Arizona campus March 11 and 12. Now in its ninth year, the festival is the third largest in the country, with more than 300 authors and millions of visitors attending each year. While Jewish authors have always been among… Read more »
Randall Balmer The Arizona Center for Judaic Studies will present a free President’s Day lecture, “Religion and the 2016 Election: Historical Context and Unusual Alliances,” with professor and author Randall Balmer on Feb. 20 at 7 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. Religion played an unusual and unexpected role in… Read more »
Elliot Glicksman The Steven M. Gootter Foundation will present its annual Philanthropic Award to Elliot Glicksman at the 12th annual Gootter Gala on Friday, March 3 at the Westin La Paloma Resort & Spa. Glicksman, a lawyer in Tucson, “has supported the Gootter Foundation since its inception 12 years ago. As… Read more »
Hadassah Southern Arizona women and men will once again perform the mitzvah of tikkun olam, repairing the world, by cleaning the roadways around the Tucson Jewish Community Center, on Sunday, March 5, from 8-10 am. This event will mark the 20th year that chapter members have participated in the… Read more »
The Fox Tucson Theatre will present a concert by Michael Feinstein, the two-time Emmy and five-time Grammy Award-nominated entertainer dubbed “The Ambassador of the Great American Songbook,” on Thursday, Feb. 23 at 7:30 p.m. Born and raised in Columbus, Ohio, where he started playing piano by ear as a… Read more »
The Tucson Jewish Community Center will present a book signing by local artist and author Lisa Kotz Mishler of her new book, “Zalman Ber’s Story: The True Story of the Man the Nazis Could Not Kill,” as told to her by her father, Sol Kotz, on Sunday, Feb. 26… Read more »
Rabbi Richard Address How should we be thinking about and preparing for the likelihood that we will live longer lives than our ancestors? Rabbi Richard F. Address, D.Min., founder of the Jewish Sacred Aging project, will discuss new ways to approach life’s “third age” as this year’s Albert T. Bilgray scholar-in-residence. Address… Read more »
Jerry Sonenblick (David J. Del Grande/AJP)
At 85 years old, Jerry Sonenblick, a former attorney and local author, still wants to max out on life. “I believe to retire completely is to stagnate,” says Sonenblick. “They say in order to keep your mind going you must engage in something new. For me it’s writing, that’s… Read more »
WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Donald Trump shouted down two reporters who asked him about rising anti-Semitism in America and said he “hates” being called an anti-Semite, although neither reporter called him one. Trump, fielding questions at a contentious news conference Thursday about the multiple scandals and mishaps afflicting his… Read more »
Mismanagement of common prescriptions and over the counter medications can lead to dangerous complications, including dizziness, falls and loss of appetite. Accidental poisoning deaths from medications are on the rise and older adults are more vulnerable to addiction and death from pain medications. The Tucson Jewish Community Center, the… Read more »
Rabbi Zalman Levertov Break out the schnapps! This year, Chabad of Arizona celebrates 40 years of serving the state’s diverse Jewish population with a gala dinner at Embassy Suites by Hilton Scottsdale Resort on Feb. 26. Rabbi Zalman Levertov, regional director of Chabad of Arizona, says the celebration marks four decades of… Read more »
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, left, and President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House, Feb. 15, 2017. (Andrew Harrer/Pool/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) – One state. Flexibility. Two states. Hold back on settlements. Stop Iran. When President Donald Trump met Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: What a press conference! But wait. In the Age of Trump, every post-event analysis requires a double take. Not so much “did he mean what… Read more »
Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch at a news conference on Capitol Hill, Feb, 1, 2017. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) – On June 27, 2013, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1oth Circuit, based in Denver, handed down a decision that would make history a year later when it was upheld by the Supreme Court: Closely held corporations have the same religious freedom rights as… Read more »
Rabbi Rick Jacobs, the Union for Reform Judaism president, speaks at the movement's biennial conference in Orlando, Fla., Nov. 7, 2015. (URJ)
NEW YORK (JTA) — Reform Jewish leaders largely oppose President Donald Trump’s policies — and they haven’t been shy about saying so since his election. They’ve marched in the streets by the thousands. They’ve protested at airports. And last week, some were arrested in front of a Trump hotel… Read more »
Donald Trump, then a candidate for president, meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York, Sept. 25, 2016. (Kobi Gideon/Israeli Government Press Office)
WASHINGTON (JTA) – Benjamin Netanyahu is going to stride in through the White House front door. Donald Trump is not going to grimace while Netanyahu lectures. The talk in Washington this week, at least in Israel-obsessive circles, is about how the Bibi-Donald bromance, taking center stage Feb. 15 at… Read more »
About 700 people attended a New York City rally in support of refugees organized by HIAS, Feb. 12, 2017. (Josefin Dolsten)
NEW YORK (JTA) — Over 100 years ago, Barnett Levine was greeted by the New York skyline and the Statue of Liberty as he arrived in the United States, having fled anti-Semitism and pogroms in his native Poland. On Sunday, his grandson saw those very same sights when he… Read more »
Asylum seekers protesting at the Holot detention center in the southern Negev Desert of Israel, Feb. 17, 2014. (Ilia Yefimovich/Getty Images)
TEL AVIV (JTA) – Defending his executive order directing the construction of a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, President Donald Trump pointed to Israel as a model, saying “a wall protects.” With another swipe of his pen two days later, on Jan. 27, Trump enacted a… Read more »
French independent presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron speaking to the media in Berlin, Jan. 10, 2017. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
(JTA) — With old favorites knocked out of France’s presidential race and the far-right National Front party making worrisome gains, many Jews are joining fellow voters in supporting Emmanuel Macron, the 39-year-old independent politician and surprising front-runner. A banker who is 18 years younger than the average age of… Read more »
Updated 2.14: Proceeds from the bake sale will go to the Syrian American Medical Society Foundation’s efforts to help Syrian children. Find out more about their work at https://foundation.sams-usa.net/?home=true. The students of the Arizona Center for Judaic Studies modern Hebrew program will be hosting a bake sale to the benefit of… Read more »
