News

(JTA) — A federal complaint has been filed against Columbia University accusing the school of anti-Semitic discrimination. It is the first case filed since President Donald Trump’s executive order on combating anti-Semitism, which grants Jewish students the same protections as other minority groups. The complaint requests a formal investigation… Read more »

(JTA) — Rosalee Glass, a Holocaust survivor recognized by President Donald Trump during the White House Hanukkah party, has died following injuries sustained during travel to Washington, D.C. Glass died in Los Angeles on Dec. 14 of a blood clot to her heart. She was three weeks shy of… Read more »

(JTA) — Jewelers in New York City have created the world’s most valuable dreidel, according to Guinness World Records. The custom-designed piece created by Estate Diamond Jewelry is valued at $70,000. It includes the diamond-encrusted Hebrew letters nun, gimmel, hay and shin, and a 4.2-carat diamond on its tip.… Read more »

(JTA) — Richard Alpert, the spiritual seeker better known as Baba Ram Dass who first came to prominence as a confederate of the controversial LSD proponent Timothy Leary, has died. Albert, who was raised in a Jewish family in suburban Boston, died at his home in Maui on Sunday.… Read more »

MANAUS, Brazil (JTA) — A large menorah at a McDonald’s branch has become the only Hanukkah symbol in the streets of Brazil’s largest city in the Amazon region. In a first, the 7-foot-tall, nine-branched candelabrum made of iron in the front yard of the Jewish-owned fast-food restaurant has become… Read more »

(JTA) — A member of an Ann Arbor synagogue has filed a federal lawsuit against anti-Israel protesters and the Michigan city over weekly demonstrations that have been held since 2003. Marvin Gerber, a member of the Beth Israel Congregation, filed an 85-page complaint last week in U.S. District Court,… Read more »

(JTA) — All day Monday, volunteers trickled in and out of the Mary McLeod Bethune Life Center in Jersey City’s Greenville neighborhood, lining up boxes upon boxes of pretzel challah, soup mix, hummus, turkey and chocolate. Trucks backed up to the community center to unload pallets of food and… Read more »

After finishing her acclaimed first anthology, “The Sacred Table: Creating a Jewish Food Ethic” (CCAR Press, 2011), Rabbi Mary Zamore realized that over time, in much of her teaching about food, “I was speaking more about the intersection of food and money.” “I was talking about SNAP — food… Read more »

Stuart Mellan, who has been president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona since December 1995, will retire at the end of May. At that time, Graham Hoffman, who joined the Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona in September 2018 as president and CEO, will take on… Read more »

It was a “hung jury” at a free public forum Temple Emanu-El hosted Dec. 4. The forum explored the death penalty in what event organizer, moderator, and former attorney Bob Schwartz called “the start of a much bigger conversation” he hopes will continue. The “Forum on the Death Penalty… Read more »

Stuart Tobin, 85, was called to the Torah to celebrate his second bar mitzvah last month at Beth Shalom Temple Center in Green Valley, surrounded by family and friends. The custom of a second bar mitzvah ceremony, which has grown in popularity, is based on Psalm 90:10, which says… Read more »

Over its 15-year history, the Jewish-Latino Teen Coalition has changed the lives of 176 teens from Southern Arizona’s Jewish and Latino communities. The nationally recognized youth leadership program fosters political advocacy and cultural awareness in both the Tucson community and the nation. The group will celebrate its 15th anniversary… Read more »

Sienna Miller and Paul Rudd in a scene from ‘The Catcher Was a Spy’ (Courtesy Tucson International Jewish Film Festival)

The 2020 Tucson International Jewish Film Festival will live up to its global billing, with 20 films that will transport viewers from the United States to Austria, Canada, Cuba, Denmark, England, Ethiopia, France, Germany, Ghana, Israel, Mexico, and Poland. The Tucson Jewish Community Center is the venue for most… Read more »

Sandy Cardin, who recently stepped down after 25 years as president of the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation, where he remains a senior advisor, visited Tucson Dec. 3 to speak at the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona’s lead gifts dinner. Earlier that day, at a lunch meeting at… Read more »

William Flesch

Hollywood has been known as the “dream factory” since at least the 1930s, when, with the coming of sound, movie makers figured out how to create worlds as realistic and unrealistic as dreams. When we dream or when we watch a movie, we go into another world.  What makes… Read more »

The Gerd & Inge Strauss Manor on Pantano is one of two B’nai Brith affordable housing communities for seniors in Arizona. Both are in Tucson, the other being the better-known Covenant House. Managed by Biltmore Properties, the communities come under B’nai B’rith’s advocacy umbrella as the largest national Jewish… Read more »

Maxwell Greenberg

Maxwell Ezra Greenberg will be the inaugural scholar-in-residence at the Jewish History Museum, beginning in January. “Greenberg’s work, which focuses on Jewish encounters and intersections with what he calls Latinidad, has drawn him to Southern Arizona, the Jewish History Museum, and the Bloom Southwest Jewish Archives at the University… Read more »

Hila Plitmann

The Tucson Desert Song Festival celebrates ‘The American Voice’ in its eighth annual fest, Jan. 15-Feb. 16. This year marks the first in TDSF’s series of composer commissions. Israeli soprano Hila Plitmann will premiere “Songs of Love and Loss,” commissioned for this festival and written by American composer Richard… Read more »

Jewish Family & Children’s Service is a program site for Pima Council on Aging’s Senior Companion Program. Senior companion volunteers age 55 and older help homebound and isolated older adults continue living independently in their homes by providing companionship, transportation, and caregiver respite. “The need for volunteers is outrageously… Read more »

The Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Young Women’s Cabinet will host its eighth annual mah jongg fest this year on Wednesday, Jan. 8. “Mahj, Margaritas & Mitzvahs” welcomes players of all levels, from first-timers to experts. The evening will include a margarita bar and heavy hors d’oeuvres. The event… Read more »