News

Jacob Ostreicher’s wife laments: ‘They will never let him go’

Jacob Ostreicher is despondent, his wife says, after spending nearly two years under house arrest in Bolivia. (Courtesy Miriam Unger)

(Washington Jewish Week) — Jacob Ostreicher, a haredi Orthodox father of five who remains under house arrest in Bolivia, does not believe he will ever be free and often unplugs his home phone because he is too depressed to speak with his family, according to his wife, Miriam Ungar.… Read more »

Anna Greenberg, ‘valiant warrior,’ loses battle with cancer

Anna Greenberg at her brother Isaac's wedding in February 2012.

Anna Cela Greenberg, 28, lost her courageous battle with cancer on Tuesday, May 28, 2013. She died as she had lived – surrounded by the love and support of her family and innumerable friends. In the last few days before her death, friends who visited her at Carondelet St.… Read more »

Law cited in Fox News furor has AIPAC history

Fox News correspondent James Rosen, shown here interviewing Secretary of State John Kerry on March 5, 2013, was subject to a subpoena based on the same statute in the espionage act used to indict two former AIPAC staffers in 2005. (U.S. State Department)

WASHINGTON (JTA) – With its talk of signal books, sketches and photographic negatives, the Espionage Act suggests a period long ago consigned to Cold War-era thrillers. In fact, the law is even older, first drafted in 1917, at a time when secret orders were conveyed by telegraph and semaphore… Read more »

Germany commits to additional $800 million for home care for Holocaust survivors

German officials laying a wreath at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem as Claims Conference officials look on, May 2103.

NEW YORK (JTA) – The German government agreed to significantly expand its funding of home care for infirm Holocaust survivors and relax eligibility criteria for restitution programs to include Jews who spent time in so-called open ghettos. The agreement, reached after negotiations in Israel with the Claims Conference, will… Read more »

In Senegalese bush, Bani Israel tribe claims Jewish heritage

Dougoutigo Fadiga outside the Bani Israel clinic near the Senegalese village's sacred tree, May 2013. (Cnaan Liphshiz)

BANI ISRAEL, Senegal (JTA) — He will welcome you into his earthen-floor home, introduce you to his three wives, and let you sample their cooking. But Dougoutigo Fadiga does not want foreigners to come near the sacred tree of his village deep in the Senegalese bush. “The tree is… Read more »

As European soccer racism festers, British pros coach Israelis in tolerance

Adam Green with fellow British fans of the English soccer club Chelsea on their way to a match in Amsterdam, May 15, 2013. (Cnaan Liphshiz/JTA)

(JTA) — Itzik Shanan and Abbas Suan watched last week as 100,000 English soccer fans sang along to a live performance by a multiracial quartet at London’s Wembley Stadium. Shanan, who started a campaign to eliminate racism from Israeli soccer, and Suan, a well-known Arab-Israeli player, were in Britain… Read more »

Top Claims Conference officials carried out own botched probe of 2001 fraud

A previously unknown document obtained by JTA shows that concern in 2001 about fraud at the Claims Conference reached the highest levels of the organization. (Claims Conference)

NEW YORK (JTA) — The Claims Conference in recent days has blamed a now-dead regional director for bungling an early warning in 2001 about a massive fraud scheme that wasn’t halted until 2009. But a document obtained by JTA shows top conference officials were sufficiently concerned by the allegations… Read more »

Pressing Poland on restitution poses dilemma for U.S., Jewish groups

President Barack Obama and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk speaking at a news conference in Warsaw, Poland, May 2011. (Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Poland is a stalwart American ally in Europe, a bulwark against an increasingly belligerent Russia and, with the recent opening of a major new Warsaw museum, is enjoying a flush of accolades for its belated embrace of its Jewish roots. But there’s a thorn in the… Read more »

To haredim, Knesset member Rabbi Dov Lipman now a turncoat

Dov Lipman, an American-born haredi Orthodox Knesset member for the centrist Yesh Atid party, speaking on the Knesset floor, March 2013. (Miriam Alster/Flash90/JTA)

TEL AVIV (JTA) — Dov Lipman has staked his budding political career on his reputation as a moderate haredi Orthodox leader, someone uniquely positioned to broker compromise between Israel’s increasingly polarized secular and religious communities. The problem is that Israel’s haredi leaders say he’s not actually haredi. Once seen… Read more »

Making sense of the Claims Conference brouhaha

NEW YORK (JTA) – Who knew what, and when? Those are the questions critics are asking following the disclosure that the Claims Conference received an anonymous letter in 2001 identifying several fraudulent Holocaust-era restitution claims — nearly a decade before the organization halted a massive fraud scheme. By 2009,… Read more »

Partnerships help JFCS expand behavioral health care services

Shira Ledman

“Eileen” is struggling. Once an independent business woman, she now finds herself isolated and depressed due to age-related macular degeneration and limited mobility. Her isolation is ironic, since her three grown children have moved back in with her. But as each of these adult children has either a mental… Read more »

‘Conundrum kids’ intrigue, bring joy to neuropsychologist

Renee Gutman, Ph.D., has a thriving practice as a pediatric and adolescent neuropsychologist in Tucson, but her family’s relocation from Mamaroneck, N.Y., wasn’t for professional reasons. Their 2004 move depended on finding the right Orthodox shul for her grieving father. When Gutman’s mother lay dying in her arms, her… Read more »

THA tidbits: Author visit, Jewish history blend

Gwen Harvey, author of ‘Esperanza Means Hope,’ with Tucson Hebrew Academy fourth graders Breanna Yalen and Jonah Parnaby, holding their painting inspired by characters in the book. (Sheila Wilensky/AJP)

What could be more exciting for fourth graders than to read a book and have the author visit their classroom? On April 26, Gwen Harvey, former director of education at the Arizona Historical Society and the author of “Esperanza Means Hope,” visited Tucson Hebrew Academy. “They’re so excited,” said… Read more »

Local planners aim to reduce barriers to Jewish engagement

How do you break into the circle? A concierge service to help people navigate the Jewish community is one of several new initiatives to come out of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona’s strategic planning process. (Allegro Photography, http://allegrophotography.com)

Looking for a way to jump into a Jewish community “can be a very lonely place,” says Liz Kanter Groskind, a member of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona strategic planning steering committee. That’s why a “concierge” service to help people at various stages of life find Jewish community… Read more »

PR star going strong despite two brain tumors

Marian Salzman

May is Brain Tumor Awareness Month. After having two brain tumors removed in the last four years, Tucsonan Marian Salzman, 53, is celebrating being alive. And she’s not just alive, she’s vibrant, creative and has a prominent role in the world of public relations and newscrafting. Salzman, the CEO… Read more »

Tucson student earns Hillel medical school scholarship

Rachel Baumann

Rachel Baumann, a University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson student, has won the Shandel Medical Endowment Scholarship from the University of Arizona Hillel Foundation. The merit-based, $20,000 biennial scholarship is awarded to Jewish second-year medical students attending the UA College of Medicine in either Tucson or Phoenix.… Read more »

P.A. health minister makes landmark visit to Hadassah hospital

Palestinian Authority Minister of Health Dr. Hani Abdeen visits 8-year-old Sarah Ghanem, from the village of Durah near Hebron, while she is treated at Hadassah Hospital’s pediatric oncology-hematology department in Jerusalem on Sunday, May 5. (Courtesy Hadassah)

Palestinian Authority Minister of Health Dr. Hani Abdeen visited Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem on May 5. The hospital said Abdeen was the first P.A. health minister to visit the facility. Abdeen, accompanied by other senior officials from the Palestinian Authority, met some of the dozens of Palestinian physicians who… Read more »

Amid rising Islamism in Africa, Israel-Senegal ties are still flourishing

Ilan Fluss from Mashav, the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s aid agency, helps to implement an advanced irrigation system in Senegal in 2011. (Israel21c)

Struggling to be heard over a flock of bleating sheep, Israel’s ambassador to Senegal invites a crowd of impoverished Muslims to help themselves to about 100 sacrificial animals that the embassy corralled at a dusty community center here. The October distribution, held as French troops battled Islamists in neighboring… Read more »

Gelbart family farewell planned

(L-R) Guy, Carmel, Arbel, Clil, Hadar and Inbal Gelbart

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona and Tucson Jewish Community Center will host a farewell party for community shaliach (Israeli emissary) and Israel Center Director Guy Gelbart and family on Wednesday, May 22, from 5 to 7 p.m. at the JCC. The family friendly event will include a light… Read more »