News

(JTA) — Eric Pleskow, who escaped the Nazis to become a film executive whose movies won the Academy Award for best picture seven times, has died. He was 95. Pleskow was the president of the United Artists studio when it took home the best picture Oscars for “One Flew… Read more »

(JTA) — Emily Austen, a reporter who was fired by Fox Sports in Florida for derogatory comments about Jews and minorities, has been hired by the evangelical Christian Liberty University. Fox dismissed Austen in 2016 as a sideline reporter for the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team and the Orlando… Read more »

(JTA) — A Jewish death row inmate in Texas who says his judge was anti-Semitic has appealed to the Supreme Court. Randy Halprin is set to be executed on Oct. 10. He was part of the “Texas 7” group of prisoners who escaped from a prison in the state… Read more »

(JTA) — Hannah Senesh may seem an unlikely motivation for Japanese-born artist Julie Robertson. But the 35-year-old Christian artist, who just spent four days painting a 30-by-40-foot mural of the late Jewish poet, learned about Senesh earlier this year and was struck by her bravery. A national hero in… Read more »

LAS VEGAS (JTA) — Congregation Ner Tamid is located a half an hour drive away from the Las Vegas Strip, where each luxury hotel seems more extravagant than the next and even on a Sunday morning people can be found crowding around blackjack tables and sitting in front of… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — When Ceen Gabbai argued with her first-grade teacher about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, she didn’t realize how big of a risk she was taking. The year was 2000 and students across the world held strong opinions about the Second Intifada, an outbreak of violence that claimed… Read more »

BRUSSELS (JTA) — At a parade here in March, revelers danced to a song about Jewish greed while standing on a float shaped like an Orthodox Jewish man with a rat on his shoulder holding money. In August, an op-ed in a major Belgian newspaper called Jews in Israel… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Donald Trump accused Rep. Adam Schiff, the Jewish Democrat who chairs the House Intelligence Committee, of treason and called for his arrest. “Shifty Schiff” is a “lowlife,” Trump told reporters on Wednesday. “He should resign from office in disgrace and frankly they should look at… Read more »

Children will be able to release their sins the really old-fashioned way by sending them away with a goat at Temple Emanu-El’s Yom Kippur morning family service, Wednesday, Oct. 9 at 8:30 a.m. During Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, repentance is achieved by prayer, repentance, and fasting, but… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Avigdor Liberman, who prevented Netanyahu from forming a coalition government following elections in April, will meet to discuss a unity government. The meeting, confirmed by Liberman in a social media post, is scheduled for Thursday morning in Jerusalem. Liberman said even… Read more »

(JTA) — The pre-indictment hearings in one of three separate corruption cases involving Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commenced on Wednesday. Lawyers for Netanyahu appeared at the hearings in Jerusalem without their client, who was scheduled to participate in talks in an effort to to build a governing coalition.… Read more »

The Jewish New Year is a time for reflection and commitment toward a more just world. The six Holocaust survivors we feature in this issue are a few among the approximately 75 survivors currently living in Southern Arizona, most of whom were children or teens when the war broke… Read more »

Tucson’s Jewish History Museum and Holocaust History Center will launch a migrant justice initiative in conjunction with its new annual exhibition, “Asylum Seeking at the U.S.-Mexico Border,” which opens in the Allen and Marianne Langer Contemporary Human Rights Gallery on Oct. 24. As with past annual exhibits, programming, and… Read more »

The town of Yurburg, Lithuania, dedicated a new Synagogue Square Memorial on July 19. Tucson genealogist and author Joel Alpert and his wife, Nancy Lefkowitz along with 10 of his relatives from Israel, Canada, and the United States, represented the descendants of emigres from the once-thriving Jewish community. “It… Read more »

A 23-member delegation from 12 states recently completed a fact-finding mission trip to the Arizona-Mexico border, conducted by the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, which is the national network hub of 125 Jewish Community Relations Councils around the country and 17 national Jewish agencies. The Jewish History Museum hosted… Read more »

Professional storyteller Jordan Wiley-Hill joined Tucson’s Fox Theatre Foundation about a year ago to expand its youth programming known as Kids In the Theatre. Filling the new position of youth arts and culture program associate, he brings an extensive repertoire of performance art, education, and program development. Local community… Read more »

On Friday, Sept. 13, 12 children and their families joined Rabbi Batsheva Appel of Temple Emanu-El and PJ Library at the Ruth & Irving Olson Center for Jewish Life for the Northwest Family Shabbat Shabang. The rabbi led a service full of songs, prayers, and storytelling while teaching the… Read more »

Congregation Or Chadash, Temple Emanu-El and the University of Arizona Hillel Foundation are participating in this year’s Pack-a-Thon on Sunday, Oct. 27, 2-4 p.m. at the Muslim Community Center, 5100 N. Kevy Place. This is a multi-faith program involving these Jewish organizations, churches and the Muslim community of Tucson… Read more »

Southern Arizona’s Jewish Artist Group seeks new members for its monthly meetings, says group coordinator Carol Sack, the Jewish Tucson concierge. The informal meetings offer an opportunity for artists who often work alone to network and connect with other area artists. The free meetings include coffee and noshes. The… Read more »

For more than 70 years, the Hebrew Free Loan Association of Tucson was “an autonomous mom and pop operation,” quietly going about its good work of providing interest-free financial assistance to thousands of Tucsonans, says board president Phil Bregman. In fact, Bregman has called it “the best-kept secret in… Read more »