Amelia Saltsman Amelia Saltsman, chef, teacher and author of “The Seasonal Jewish Kitchen: A Fresh Take on Tradition,” will offer a cooking demonstration and tasting at the Tucson Jewish Community Center on Friday, March 11, from 2-4 p.m. Saltsman, whose first book was the “The Santa Monica Farmer’s Market Cookbook,” is… Read more »
Louis and Flora Barzelay photographed in Amsterdam, May 31, 1942. (Courtesy of Stans Barzelay)
AMSTERDAM (JTA) — Two months before they were deported from the Netherlands to Auschwitz, Louis Barzelay and Flora Snatager invited a few guests to their wedding in Amsterdam. Instead of the yellow star he was legally required to wear, Louis wore a white flower on his lapel as he… Read more »
President Barack Obama signing the Trade Facilitation and Enforcement Act of 2015 at an Oval Office ceremony, Feb. 24, 2016. (Shawn Thew-Pool/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The controversy over whether laws protecting Israel from boycotts should include West Bank settlements found its way into a presidential signing statement last week, but President Barack Obama’s decision to ignore a trade law’s requirement to oppose boycotts of Israeli settlements likely won’t settle the argument.… Read more »
Daniel Goldstein is counsel to the National Federation of the Blind. (Courtesy of Brown, Goldstein & Levy)
(JTA) — To many who know her story, Haben Girma is a hero. In 2013, this daughter of Eritrean immigrants became the first deaf-blind person to graduate from Harvard Law School. Two years later she was part of the legal team that helped score a major civil rights victory… Read more »
Muslim students at an anti-Israel protest at the University of California, Irvine in 2006. (Mark Boster/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) – Nearly half the states in the country are considering legislation aimed at countering the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, or BDS, movement. But critics say some bills are cause for concern, either because they seek to legitimize Israeli settlements or go so far in punishing boycott supporters they… Read more »
Marcie Sutland drew this illustration in 1966, highlighting the Tucson Jewish community’s annual fundraising campaign and its volunteer leaders. View the special 70th anniversary section here: Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29… Read more »
Tess Gerritsen When international best selling writer Tess Gerritsen writes a mystery, she is sometimes as surprised as her readers and the characters in her story at who did the dirty deed.… Read more »
(L-R): Rabbi Yehuda Ceitlin of Chabad Tucson, Sassy Reuven, Marlyne Freedman and Oshrat Barel, director of the Weintraub Israel Center. (Yvette Critchfield)
It was perhaps the most daring hostage rescue mission ever attempted: a middle-of-the-night raid on a Ugandan airport terminal to retrieve more than 100 hostages. This year marks the 40th anniversary of the Israel Defense Force’s historic raid on Entebbe, officially known as Operation Thunderbolt. On Jan. 24, veteran… Read more »
Jim Showers The Weintraub Israel Center will present “Thank G-d for Israel,” an event showcasing multifaith support for Israel, on Sunday, Feb. 28 at 2:30 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The keynote speaker will be Jim Showers, executive director of Friends of Israel, a worldwide Christian ministry founded in… Read more »
Rabbi Yaakov Kleiman will present “The DNA Connection — Modern Jews and the Ancient Hebrews” on Wednesday, Feb. 24 at noon at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. Kleiman is the director of the Center for Kohanim in Jerusalem and the author of “DNA & Tradition: The Genetic Link to… Read more »
Marcie Sutland drew this illustration in 1966, highlighting the Tucson Jewish community’s annual fundraising campaign and its volunteer leaders.
It was a combination of dry desert air and the Arizona Jewish Post that brought Marcie Sutland’s family to Tucson more than 60 years ago. “When we were deciding to come out West” in the late 1940s, “I wrote to the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and somehow I got… Read more »
The Falkow family in 1955, clockwise from left: Lynne, Bess, Cantor Maurice, Richard and Deena (Courtesy Congregation Anshei Israel)
During holiday musaf services at Congregation Anshei Israel, Jack, Alan and Ian Strauss ascend the bimah to recite the priestly blessing. As the son-in-law, grandson and great-grandson of the late Cantor Maurice Falkow carry on their patriarch’s legacy, they cover their heads with their prayer shawls, raise their arms… Read more »
Stuart Mellan Seventy years! My how the world has changed! While we are always trying to keep up with these changes, we remain very much rooted in our values and our mission. Underlying our Federation’s work is the adage that “community doesn’t just happen, it has to be created,” which begs… Read more »
(Chase Cohen/Tucson Jewish Community Center)
Tucked away in an upstairs corner of the Tucson Jewish Community Center sits a room that would make any kid’s eyes light up. That’s where a new, huge jungle gym lives. Donated by the Diamondbacks baseball team, the structure features tubes and slides and soft climbing stairs. An oversized,… Read more »
In the wake of a protest against a reception featuring an Israeli community group at a recent LGBTQ conference, there has been widespread controversy. We have read blog posts and articles, watched videos of the protest, and heard from friends and allies who were present at the demonstration. Yet, what was… Read more »
Volunteers working the phones at a suburban Las Vegas office of the Hillary Clinton campaign while watching a debate between Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders, Feb. 11, 2016. (Ron Kampeas)
LAS VEGAS (JTA) – Jewish voters in Nevada suffer the same affliction as anyone else ahead of caucuses in the presidential race: No one is quite sure how the damn system works. “A big part of what we do is to educate people about what a caucus is,” said… Read more »
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia speaks at Agudath Israel's
annual dinner at the New York Hilton, June 1, 2008. (Menachem Adelman)
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Justice Antonin Scalia was a larger-than-life presence on the Supreme Court, where he championed a conservative judicial approach for three decades. He was found dead on Saturday at a resort in West Texas at the age of 79. Scalia‘s outsize personality left an impression off the bench,… Read more »
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia addresses the Legal Services Corp.'s 40th anniversary conference luncheon in Washington, D.C., Sept. 15, 2014. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) — It’s a matter of dispute as to whether Antonin Scalia, who died Saturday, was the Supreme Court’s most conservative jurist. Some think Clarence Thomas deserves the title, while others say Samuel Alito may soon claim it. Scalia was, however, the conservative jurist likeliest to stir passions… Read more »
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia waits to be introduced to speak
at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., Oct. 2,
2012. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
(JTA) — With the sudden passing this weekend of Justice Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court is now split 4-4 between liberals and conservatives, throwing into doubt how the court will rule on a raft of cases — including several watched by Jewish organizations. Scalia, who was 79, is being… Read more »
From left, Nathan Lewin, Sima Soumekhian, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and Marc Zweben at the Char Bar in Washington, D.C., the kosher restaurant owned by Soumekhian and Zweben, May 2015. (Alyza Lewin)
WASHINGTON (JTA) – “When there was no Jewish justice on the Supreme Court,” Antonin “Nino”Scalia told me, “I considered myself the Jewish justice.” After Abe Fortas resigned in May 1969, there would be no Jewish justice on the court for nearly a quarter of a century, until President… Read more »
