News

I grew up in Israel, where everyone sings and dances,” says Rina Paz, who created the Israel Center’s “Learn to Sing in Hebrew” class/choir in 2008 with the help of Moshe Babel-Pour, who recently left Tucson after serving for four years as the center’s director. The group, which meets… Read more »

Koby Shochat wears the tallit his father wore at his Bar Mitzvah. Koby’s mitzvah project involved donations of used tallitot.

One of the explicit and implicit tenets of Judaism is that we are supposed to live our lives doing mitzvot, literally translated as “commandments” but informally known as “good deeds.” In addition to the usual whirlwind of activity associated with B’nai Mitzvah preparation, such as learning Torah, attending services,… Read more »

B’nai Tzedek Tucson, a teen philanthropy program, will hold its annual kickoff event on Sunday, Aug. 29, at 1 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The program allows teens to create endowment funds in their own names by contributing $180 (subsidized participation available), to which $320 will be… Read more »

Local Jewish residents over the age of 80 are once again invited to the Handmaker “Celebrating Tucson’s Oldest Jewish Residents” luncheon on Tuesday, Sept. 7 at 11:30 a.m. “The event is an opportunity for this select group of seniors to see old friends, meet new ones, enjoy an interesting… Read more »

A Secular Humanist Jewish Circle has formed in Tucson. The group will hold its first event, an observance of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, on Saturday, Sept. 11. Secular Humanist Judaism “places emphasis on human beings having the innate ability to make moral and ethical decisions based on evidence… Read more »

Hebrew High, a program of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona’s Coalition for Jewish Education, will hold its orientation on Tuesday, Aug. 24 at Congregation Anshei Israel. Orientation for incoming students and parents will begin at 6 p.m., with an opportunity to meet teachers, enjoy pizza and ice cream,… Read more »

As the Jewish community comes together to celebrate the holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona is coordinating Project Isaiah, an annual effort to address hunger in our community. JCRC is working with local synagogues and Jewish… Read more »

This dress, worn at the Arizona Statehood celebration on Feb. 4, 1912, is part of the Jewish History Museum’s Centennial Exhibit.

The Jewish History Museum’s Centennial Exhibit is on display now through Dec. 23, celebrating 100 years since the building — originally the Stone Avenue Temple, the first home of Temple Emanu-El — was built. Saved from the wrecking ball in 1998, the building has been restored and is now… Read more »

Tucsonan Fran Katz, right, and Kim Rosenberg of Portland, Ore., haul rubble during a Jewish Federations of North America fact-finding mission to Haiti.

Tucsonan Fran Katz joined a national Jewish Federation of North America fact-finding tour to Haiti, from July 5 to 7, to see firsthand how American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee funds have aided Haitians since the January earthquake, which killed an estimated 200,000 people and displaced more than 1.2 million.… Read more »

Ella Starobinska [Sheila Wilensky/AJP]

Ella Starobinska is an enthusiastic 20-year-old college student at the University of Arizona, but her path to the Tucson campus took a different route than most. On March 1, 2005, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society brought Starobinska and her parents from Kiev, Ukraine, to Tucson to join her brother,… Read more »

(If you know Jewish Tucsonans who interned in Washington this summer, contact us at 319-1112.) WASHINGTON (Forward) — They flocked to Washington during the summer months, driven by their desire to get a taste of politics and maybe gain some points in the networking game after they graduate from… Read more »

Conservative blogger Andrew Schlafly says Albert Einstein's scientific theories are bad science and part of a "liberal conspiracy." (JTA graphic/Library of Congress)

BALTIMORE (JTA) — More than a half-century ago, the Nazis dismissed Albert Einstein’s groundbreaking theories as “Jewish science”; in recent years Holocaust revisionists have taken up the anti-Einstein cause. Now, the legendary physicist is facing a new wave of attacks — this time from conservative bloggers who say that… Read more »

Larry Lokey has pledged to give away all of his $700 million, with the next $60 million going to Israel. (Photo courtesy The Giving Pledge)

NEW YORK (JTA) — The philanthropic world got a happy jolt when 40 members of the world’s wealthy elite — including 13 Jews — announced that they would give away more than half their money before they died. The participating philanthropists were responding to a challenge issued earlier this… Read more »

A YouTube video of a family singing and dancing at Auschwitz has received more than half a million hits and mixed reaction. Australian artist Jane Korman filmed her 89-year-old father Adolek Kohn, a former inmate at Auschwitz, and her three children dancing outside the infamous death camp in Poland,… Read more »

A graphic novel version of Anne Frank’s biography was released in the Netherlands. The 160-page book, launched July 9, uses text and illustrations to tell Anne’s story and make connections between her life and historical events during the period. According to Anne Frank House Museum spokeswoman Annemarie Bekker, the… Read more »

Katharine Henderson, president of the Theological Seminary of the Presbyterian Church USA)

U.S. Jews and Presbyterians say they have salvaged a fragile unity of purpose from an assembly that was poised to create a rift between the two faiths. The outcome of last month’s General Assembly in Minneapolis of the Presbyterian Church (USA) was remarkable in that all sides in the… Read more »

The Foundation for Cardiovascular Health, a 501(c) (3) nonprofit organization, will offer two free presentations next month on reversing coronary artery disease. The first was on Sunday, Aug. 8, 1:30-3:30 p.m., at the Northwest YMCA Pima County Community Center, 7770 N. Shannon Road, and the second will be on… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — If Haim Shani has his way, the titans of Wall Street will start moving more of their business to Dizengoff Street. Shani, the director general of Israel’s Finance Ministry, was in New York late last month on a mission to promote Israel as a center… Read more »

Plans for a mosque at the site of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks have generated controversy. (Creative Commons/Special KRB)

Plans for a mosque at the site of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks have generated controversy. WASHINGTON (JTA) – More often than not, Jewish and Muslim groups come down on the same side of battles over religious liberties. Jewish organizations often file amicus briefs supporting Muslim religious rights in… Read more »

Applications for the 2010 Cohon Award are being accepted through Sept. 1. The $25,000 prize will be awarded by the Rabbi Samuel S. and A. Irma Cohon Memorial Foundation for “accomplishments that benefit  Klal Yisroel — the entire Jewish people,” recognizing achievements in the fields of Jewish unity, education… Read more »