Secretary of State John Kerry, right, delivering a Joint Statement with Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr Al-Thani in Washington, April 29, 2013. (U.S. State Department) WASHINGTON (JTA) — When it comes to the latest Arab peace initiative, two questions are circulating in Washington: Why Qatar? And why now? The three answers: Because Qatar is rich; it is scared; and why not? Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr Al Thani, the Qatari prime minister and… Read more »
Yosef Tiefenbrun, an apprentice tailor at Maurice Sedwell's and an ordained Orthodox rabbi, modeling an outfit he put together. (David Nyanzi) NEW YORK (JTA) — Yosel Tiefenbrun looked in the mirror and he liked what he saw. The 23-year-old Chabad rabbi and apprentice at Maurice Sedwell, a bespoke tailor’s shop on London’s Savile Row, was wearing a vintage double-breasted jacket with gold buttons, tasseled Barker shoes, a claret bow tie… Read more »
An Iron Dome anti-missile battery was moved near the Israeli border town of Haifa in the hours following a second airstrike on Syrian targets, May 5, 2013. (Avishag Yashuv/Flash90/JTA) TEL AVIV (JTA) – Twice in three days, Israeli warplanes entered Syrian airspace and fired on suspected weapons caches bound for Hezbollah — and nothing has happened in response. Some experts are predicting that will continue to be the case following airstrikes near Damascus on Friday and Sunday that are… Read more »
Lorraine Mackstaller, M.D. Lorraine Mackstaller, M.D., is devoted to educating the public, especially women, about heart disease. She will present “Knowledge is Power” at Hadassah Southern Arizona’s luncheon on Sunday, May 19, at noon at Skyline Country Club. Mackstaller is a clinical associate professor of medicine at the Arizona Health Sciences Center,… Read more »
Rabbi Jack Parisi Jack Parisi, an evangelical Christian pastor who became a rabbi, will speak as part of Chabad of Tucson’s 2013 lecture series on Sunday, May 19, at 7 p.m. at Congregation Young Israel. Parisi’s life-changing journey began when he and his wife, Sally, co-pastors of a church in the Bible… Read more »
Natan Sharansky, head of the Jewish Agency for Israel, is tasked with finding a solution to the growing battle over women’s prayer restrictions at the Western Wall. (Miriam Alster/Flash90/JTA) Following a court ruling in their favor, leaders of an organization pushing for women’s prayer rights at the Western Wall have withdrawn their endorsement of Natan Sharansky’s compromise proposal to expand the egalitarian section there. A Jerusalem District Court ruled last week that Women of the Wall members who… Read more »
More than 4,000 people attended the Israel 65 Festival on Sunday, April 21, enjoying food, games, the shuk marketplace, music and dance. Special guests included Dana Erlich, consul for public diplomacy, Consulate General of Israel, Los Angeles; U.S. Rep. Ron Barber; Tucson City Councilwoman Karen Ulich; and Mayor Jonathan… Read more »
People laying flowers at Umschlagplatz at the Warsaw Ghetto, the monument at the site from which Jews were deported to Treblinka. (Ruth Ellen Gruber) WARSAW, Poland (JTA) — In Warsaw, sirens wailed and church bells rang to mark the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, a valiant but failed revolt by Jewish fighters against the Nazi occupiers who already had deported hundreds of thousands of Jews to the Treblinka extermination camp. An… Read more »
Lisa Schroeder, the owner and chef of Mother's Bistro & Bar in Portland, Ore., dishes out advice along with her comfort food. (Alicia J. Rose Photography) PORTLAND, Ore. (JTA) — It’s brunch time at Mother’s Bistro & Bar and owner-chef Lisa Schroeder has a small crisis on her hands involving the accidental defenestration of a busboy. Moments earlier, a server had tripped and gone flying through one of the restaurant’s large picture windows. Shattered glass… Read more »
TEL AVIV (JTA) — To get married in Israel, Dima Motel had to bring his family photo album and two of his ancestors’ birth certificates to a rabbinical court. Then an investigator quizzed his mother in Yiddish. Israel’s Chief Rabbinate often asks Russian immigrants like Motel to prove that… Read more »
The Yitzhak Rabin Center in Tel Aviv, a museum dedicated to the memory and lifework of the slain Israeli prime minister. (Courtesy Rabin Center) TEL AVIV (JTA) — The museum dedicated to the memory of Yitzhak Rabin raises nearly half its money from labor leaders. It’s just not the labor you think. Members of U.S. labor unions raised $1.4 million for the Yitzhak Rabin Center in Tel Aviv last year, 45 percent of… Read more »
Svoboda supporters attending a party rally in western Ukraine, 2012. (Svoboda.org.ua) KIEV, Ukraine (JTA) — Marching in formation, six young men in dark jackets approach an anti-government rally in Cherkasy, a city some 125 miles southeast of Kiev. At the appointed moment, they remove their windbreakers to reveal white T-shirts emblazoned with the words “Beat the kikes.” Their jackets carry… Read more »
Rabbi David Lazar, left, showing a Torah scroll to Swedish government minister Stefan Attefall at the Great Synagogue of Stockholm, November 2011. (Regeringskansliet, The government of Sweden) (JTA) — Having grown up in a devoutly Christian home, Irene Lopez would probably not be raising her daughter Jewish if not for David Lazar, the charismatic rabbi of the Great Synagogue of Stockholm. Lopez and her Jewish husband, Samuel Sjoblom, are among the Swedes who were drawn to… Read more »
Gene Sperling, the chairman of President Obama's Council of Economic Advisors, speaking at the Reform movement's Consultation on Conscience, April 23, 2013. (Courtesy Religious Action Center) WASHINGTON (JTA) — In the battle to end the across-the-board budget cuts known as sequestration, it’s all hands on deck. Increasingly for the Obama administration, which is deadlocked over the budget with the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, that means reaching out to Jews. In conference calls and in appearances… Read more »
Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the chairwoman of the Republican Conference in the U.S. House of Representatives, at the center of a Jewish leaders roundtable in Washington, April 12, 2013. (Courtesy House Republican Conference) WASHINGTON (JTA) — He had them until abortion. U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) was addressing the Reform movement’s Consultation on Conscience conference about his passion, human rights and success in creating mechanisms to combat human trafficking and shine a light on global anti-Semitism. The crowd gathered in a large… Read more »
Avraham Rivkind, the chief of surgery at Hadassah Medical Center in jerusalem, has pioneered several medical techniques, including several that helped save victims of the Boston Marathon. attacks. (Hadassah Medical Center) TEL AVIV (JTA) — Minutes after a terrorist attack killed three at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, doctors and nurses at the city’s hospitals faced a harrowing scene — severed limbs, burned bodies, shrapnel buried in skin. For Boston doctors, the challenge presented by last week’s bombing… Read more »
From the creation of the world’s first hybrid cucumber in the 1950s to the building of particle collectors for Switzerland’s Large Hadron Collider, which led to the 2012 discovery of the Higgs Bosun or “God Particle”(a subatomic particle that accounts for the existence of matter and diversity in the… Read more »
In January, separated from my American Jewish Press Association group while touring Old Jaffa, I had little choice but to walk five miles back to our Tel Aviv hotel. For me, it was a happy opportunity to stroll along the Tel Aviv promenade by the Mediterranean Sea. I passed… Read more »
Michael Lavigne Michael Lavigne, winner of the 2007 Sami Rohr Choice Award for emerging Jewish writers for his first novel, “Not Me,” will speak about his new novel, “The Wanting,” on Sunday, May 5, from 3:30 to 5 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The free event is cosponsored by… Read more »
The Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona will hold a breakfast and panel discussion on “The Future of Higher Education in Arizona: Is the Current Model Sustainable?” on Friday, April 26, from 7:30 to 10 a.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The program… Read more »
