News

Geneva – Dr. Raz Somech is one of the main figures in the deeply moving documentary “Precious Life,” which was nominated for an Academy Award in 2011 and serves as a powerful image of hope in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In 2008, a four month-old baby from Gaza, Mohammed Abu… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Though the death last weekend of John Demjanjuk brought a close to the seemingly never-ending quest for justice in the case of a man long accused of being a Nazi war criminal, it also brought a premature end to the legal battle over his legacy. Though Demjanjuk,… Read more »

Ozar Hatorah, a Jewish school in Toulouse, France, was the site of a shooting Monday that killed four people. (Ozar Hatorah)

PARIS (JTA) — When Arie Bensemhoun, a Jewish community leader in Toulouse, woke up Tuesday morning, he thought for a moment that the horrific shooting of three children and a rabbi at a local Jewish school might have been just a bad dream. “Then the reality hit and I… Read more »

South Carolina Rep. Alan Clemmons with a group of Israeli soldiers at Masada during his visit to Israel, November 2011. (Alan Clemmons via Twitter)

NEW YORK (JTA) — The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a hotly debated issue — but not in the Florida Legislature. Both houses of the state’s Legislature voted unanimously in February to stake out a bold position on the issue — but it’s not entirely clear what, exactly, Florida lawmakers were… Read more »

Sol Factor, who was given up by a mother who was in a displaced persons' camp, is looking for information about his family tree. (Courtesy Sol Factor)

The “Seeking Kin” column aims to help reunite long-lost friends and relatives. BALTIMORE (JTA) — Sol Factor recalls a happy childhood in circa-1950s Boston suburbia with his physician-father Joseph, teacher-mother Bernice and younger sister Rachel. His first life, as Meier Pollak — born in 1946 near a displaced persons’… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is waiting and watching when it comes to Iran — although for how long, no one knows. Analysts and Jewish organizational officials who speak with Israeli and U.S. government say Netanyahu came away from his meeting last week with President Obama… Read more »

(N.Y. Jewish Week) — The recent celebration of Purim offers an appropriate moment to recall a man known for a time as “America’s Haman.” That Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s story ended very differently than the story of Haman in the Book of Esther reminds us how America itself is… Read more »

A volley of rockets fired from the Gaza Strip was intercepted by the Iron Dome system near the Israeli town of Ashdod area on Sunday morning March 11, 2012. (Flash90/JTA)

JERUSALEM (JTA) –  As southern Israel was barraged by rockets for a fourth straight day, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was hitting back “strongly and decisively,” and its Iron Dome anti-missile defense system was intercepting many of the rockets coming from the Gaza Strip. “The IDF is continuing… Read more »

Rebecca Katz

Jonathan and Marcia Katz are creating the Rebecca Katz Youth Library at Temple Emanu-El in honor of their daughter, who died two years ago at age 22. A dedication and grand opening will take place in late April. “The inspiration for this library comes from Rebecca’s passion for literature,… Read more »

Anne Lowe

Hadassah: The Women’s Zionist Organization of America is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year. As part of the celebration, the national organization is printing a commemorative book due out this spring, “Thin Threads: Real Stories of Hadassah Life Changing Moments.” Hadassah Southern Arizona Co-President Anne Lowe was one of… Read more »

Lisa Robins as author Sherri Mandel in ‘The Blessing of a Broken Heart’

The Phoenix-based Arizona Jewish Theatre Company will present “The Blessing of a Broken Heart,” based on the award- winning book by Sherri Mandel, from March 22 to April 1. Adapted by Todd Salovey, the play depicts a young American mother who moves her family from suburban Maryland to Israel… Read more »

“Food Stamped — A Documentary” will be shown at the Tucson Jewish Community Center on Thursday, March 15 at 7 p.m. The film humorously chronicles a couple who are trying to maintain a healthy, balanced diet while on a food stamp budget. The documentary is part of the Jewish… Read more »

State Sens. Steve Gallardo and Robert Meza, both of Phoenix, walked out of an Arizona Senate hearing March 1 to protest a presentation by Glenn Spencer, a border activist who the Anti-Defamation League calls “an anti-Hispanic, anti-Semitic bigot.” Sen. Sylvia Allen invited Spencer to speak to the Arizona Senate… Read more »

Rabbi Michael Morgan

When Rabbi Michael Morgan, Ph.D., comes to Tucson as Temple Emanu-El’s Bilgray scholar, be ready for some lively intellectual discussion. Morgan, a distinguished scholar in post-Holocaust philosophy and the author of 16 books, will be a scholar-in-residence at Temple Emanu-El March 22 to 24, with his first talk at… Read more »

Stuart Mellan

  The Jewish community will celebrate a longtime leader lat­er this month at “All That Jazz,” a party honoring and starring Stuart Mellan, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona for almost 18 years. “Stuart’s been so terrific,” says Donald Diamond, who initiated the event after… Read more »

New Jersey native hopes to sled for Israel at Olympics (Ken Childs)

Meet Bradley Chalupski, Israel’s best hope for a medal on the bobsled track at the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, in 2014. Chalupski is an unlikely Israeli athlete. For one thing, he competes in skeleton, a sport that’s virtually unknown in Israel — not to mention the rest of… Read more »

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama meet in the White House Oval Office to talk about Iran and other issues, March 5, 2012. (Ron Kampeas)

President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agree, at least in principle: Keep the talk on what to do about Iran behind closed doors. But once they’re behind those doors, they can’t agree — and they can’t seem to resist bringing their disagreements into the open. Within hours… Read more »

Elaina Espinosa (center) hikes in the Judean desert with her host, Inbal Fortus (left), and Inbal’s younger sister, Noga, in November 2011.

  A tree was planted in Israel recently to honor Elaina Espinosa’s great-grandmother. Espinosa isn’t Jewish — neither was her great-grandmother — but she is one of six Tucson high school students who went to Israel in November as youth ambassadors for the Tucson chapter of the America-Israel Friendship… Read more »

(L-R) Gerda Weissman Klein, Diane Eckstein and John Eckstein, with the Eckstein's dog, Kipp, at a ‘Citizenship Counts’ assembly at Mansfeld Middle School in Tucson on Feb. 14. (Sheila Wilensky)

U.S. citizenship matters, especially for Holocaust survivor Gerda Weissmann Klein. On Feb. 14, the 87-year-old humanitarian told hundreds of eighth graders at Tucson’s Mansfeld Middle School why she founded Citizenship Counts, a national non-partisan, nonprofit organization based in Phoenix. Phoenix attorney Paul Eckstein offered tidbits of Arizona history to… Read more »

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama meet in the White House Oval Office to talk about Iran and other issues, March 5, 2012. (Ron Kampeas)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may not have bridged their differences on how to deal with Iran, but each managed to give the other a measure of reassurance. In his speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Obama held his ground, declining… Read more »