Rabbi Harold Kushner Making good on a desire expressed in 2014 to visit Tucson more often, Rabbi Harold Kushner will discuss his new book, “Nine Essential Things I’ve Learned About Life,” at a Temple Emanu-El event on Saturday, Feb. 13 at 6:30 p.m. A congregational rabbi for 50 years, Kushner is the… Read more »
The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Women’s Philanthropy will hold two events early next month. First up is a new event, “Taste with a Twist,” on Wednesday, Feb. 10 at 7 p.m. in the new multi-purpose room at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. Participants will sample mini martinis and… Read more »
The Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona is now accepting applications for the 2016 Goldman Family Israel Scholarship. The deadline for submissions is 5 p.m. on Wednesday, March 9. The Elliot S. Goldman Family Israel Scholarship Fund and the Goldman Family Israel Scholarship Fund (endowment funds held at JCF)… Read more »
Cantor Janece Cohen, left, and Rabbi Thomas Louchheim carry Torah scrolls to Congregation Or Chadash’s new property on Dec. 12, 2004. Founded in 1995, Or Chadash had been known as the “wandering congregation” before it purchased the property on Alvernon Way. (Max Ellentuck)
Congregation Or Chadash held its first Hebrew school classes 20 years ago around Rabbi Thomas Louchheim’s family dining room table. Little more than four wooden legs and a table top were needed to gather together Tucson area students and start planting the seeds of Jewish education. Membership has swelled… Read more »
Anti-abortion activists rally against federal funding for Planned Parenthood in Washington, D.C., July 28, 2015. (Olivier Douliery/Getty Images)
NEW YORK (JTA) — Forty-three years ago this week, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its landmark decision in Roe v. Wade protecting a woman’s right to abortion. Since the 2010 elections, a wave of state laws has aimed at restricting that right, closing clinics and harassing medical providers. No… Read more »
Pope Francis, left, greeting the chief rabbi of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni, during a papal visit to the city’s synagogue, Jan. 17, 2016. (Franco Origlia/Getty Images)
(JTA) – When Pope Francis crossed the Tiber River to visit the Great Synagogue of Rome on Sunday, he became the third pontiff to do so. But his 1.5-mile journey to the towering Tempio Maggiore showed that what was once unthinkable is now the norm. “According to the juridical… Read more »
The husband and children of Dafna Meir grieve at her funeral in Jerusalem the day after her stabbing death in the West Bank, Jan. 18, 2016. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash 90)
(JTA) — A day after witnessing her mother’s brutal murder, Dafna Meir’s teenage daughter spoke before hundreds who had come to mourn her. Dafna Meir, 38, a mother of six, was stabbed to death on Sunday near the entrance of her West Bank home. “It’s hard for me to think… Read more »
SodaStream’s West Bank factory was relocated to the Negev following international criticism. (Nati Shohat/Flash90)
WASHINGTON (JTA) – The collapse of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process a year ago has led to an accelerating war of words over Israeli settlements, with Israel accusing its growing chorus of foreign critics of prejudging the final terms of a peace deal at best – and anti-Semitism at worst.… Read more »
Israeli President Reuven Rivlin speaks at the 2016 Institute for National Security Studies conference Jan. 18. (Kobi Richter/TPS)
Ramat Aviv (TPS) – Israeli President Reuven Rivlin addressed the significant level of support for Islamic extremism among many Arabs in Israel and discussed various ways to solve the problem at the ninth annual international conference of the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) on Monday evening. “The Islamic… Read more »
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders deliverS a speech on financial reform in New York, Jan. 5, 2016. (Andrew Burton/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON (JTA) – Talk of a Bernie Sanders presidency has suddenly become a lot more serious. Recent polling shows the independent Vermont senator and Democratic presidential hopeful dramatically improving his prospects in the first two primary states against front-runner Hillary Clinton. Two polls out last week — by the Des… Read more »
Tucsonan Lisa Goldberg’s connections to Camp Ramah in Ojai, Calif., run deep. She’s been a Ramahnik since she first attended camp when she was 8 years old, having “inherited” Ramah from her mother, Mimi Dinin Sisk, who was one of the first campers at the California location, and her… Read more »
As thousands continued to flee civil war in Syria, the Tucson Board of Rabbis sent a letter to Gov. Doug Ducey last month asking him to reverse his stand on barring refugees from entering Arizona. Citing the attacks in Paris on Nov. 13 by terrorists from the Islamic State,… Read more »
Eliot Barron, a volunteer, makes a call at the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona’s Super Extraordinary Sunday on Jan. 25, 2015.
The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona will hold its Super Extraordinary Sunday fundraiser and Mitzvah Day on Sunday, Jan. 31, 8:30 a.m.-6:30 p.m., at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The event will include a phone-a-thon with volunteers seeking donations to the Federation’s 2016 Community Campaign to support humanitarian and… Read more »
Sassy Reuven Veteran Israel Defense Forces elite Red Beret paratrooper Sassy Reuven will share his role in the famed hostage-rescue mission code-named “Operation Thunderbolt” when Chabad Tucson and the Weintraub Israel Center commemorate the 40th anniversary of Operation Entebbe on Sunday, Jan. 24 at 7 p.m. Reuven and 100 commandos flew… Read more »
Lisa Belkin Lisa Belkin, a former New York Times reporter and author of “Show Me a Hero,” the basis for the HBO miniseries, will speak at the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona- Northwest on Sunday, Jan. 17 at 3 p.m. Belkin is senior national correspondent for Yahoo News, covering American social… Read more »
The Women’s Philanthropy Advisory Council of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona is seeking nominees for its 10th annual Bryna Zehngut Mitzvot Award. The award, honoring the late Bryna Zehngut, recognizes the outstanding achievements of a Jewish teenage girl in Tucson. Nominees must be current high school juniors or… Read more »
Congregation Anshei Israel’s Esther B. Feldman Preschool/Kindergarten will hold a casino night fundraiser on Saturday, Jan. 23. The adults-only evening will begin at 7:30 p.m. and include casino gambling (for fun and entertainment), hors d’oeuvres and dessert, a cash bar, live music and dancing, and a raffle. Among the… Read more »
The Coalition for Jewish Education of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona is accepting applications for scholarships to Jewish overnight summer camps for the summer of 2016. The need-based scholarship assistance is funded by the Mo and Frances Beren Family Scholarship Fund at the Jewish Community Foundation of Southern… Read more »
Or Chadash religious school students and teacher’s aide Seth Brown spell “Or Chadash” in Hebrew with their bodies during a Jewish yoga elective.
After an intensive process that began more than two years ago, the Congregation Or Chadash Religious School has won accreditation from the Association of Reform Jewish Educators. It is the only school in Arizona, and one of the smallest congregations nationwide, to currently hold that distinction. Rina Liebeskind, director… Read more »
Bryan Davis This past year, 2015, has been an historic year for an institution whose focus is the preservation of history. In December 2014 the Jewish History Museum received a lead gift that propelled our organization and our community into a yearlong effort to transform the Jewish History Museum campus. On… Read more »
