Tagged FRONT

Started from seed, pomegranate bears fruit

Celebrating the Tucson Jewish Community Center’s pomegranate tree, now bearing fruit on its first anniversary, are Early Childhood Education students with (L-R): ECE teacher Kristina Li, Dale Green and Tammy Lewis from the J’s building services department, Lipowich, and Adi Olshansky, Weintraub Israel Center P2G school twinning coordinator. WIC is a joint project of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona and the J, dedicated to bringing the cultural richness of Israel to Tucson. (Debe Campbell/AJP)
May 31, 2019 /

The pomegranate, said to have 613 seeds corresponding to the 613 mitzvot (commandments) in the Torah, frequently is a symbol of Israel. It is one of the seven species of Israel listed in the Torah, along with wheat, barley, grapes, figs, olives, and dates. As part of building living… Read more »

#MeToo event encourages community-wide conversation

During an exercise at the Jewish community’s “From #MeToo to #WeToo” event May 21, audience members wrote reflections on banners marked “I Learned,” “I Feel,” and “I Commit to.” Colored stickers indicate “likes” from other attendees. (Maya S. Horowitz/JCF)
May 31, 2019 / Maya S. Horowitz, Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona

It is our collective responsibility as members of this community to examine the part that we play in these frameworks,” Graham Hoffman, president and CEO of the Jewish Community Foundation of Southern Arizona, told the audience at a recent community event addressing sexual harassment in the Jewish communal world.… Read more »

Cactus king that boosts landscaping takes centuries to mature

Once in about 50,000 plants, a saguaro grows an odd cristate crown. No one knows what causes this fascinating deformity. (Photo: National Park Service)
May 31, 2019 / Debe Campbell, AJP Assistant Editor

A sage survivor in the Sonoran desert, the stately saguaro cactus (Carnegiea gigantea) reigns over Tucson’s Southwestern landscape. The largest known cactus is symbolic of Arizona (the state flower) and iconic in classic Western films. Casting eerie, human-like shadows across the desert floor, they evoke images of solitude, expansive… Read more »

Israel is holding new elections. What comes next?

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the media after the Knesset voted to dissolve itself, May 30, 2019. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
May 30, 2019 / Marcy Oster, JTA

JERUSALEM (JTA) — The blame game started shortly after midnight Thursday morning. The Knesset’s vote to dissolve itself and hold a second national election in five months had hardly been posted on the chyrons of news networks in Israel and around the world when the major players in the… Read more »

For lactose intolerant Jews, Shavuot’s dairy diet is a test of intestinal fortitude

Many traditional Shavuot foods, like cheesecake, are hard for lactose-intolerant Jews to digest. (Pixabay)
May 30, 2019 / Sarah Gold, JTA

(JTA) — Many modern-day Jews aren’t all that familiar with Shavuot, which celebrates the day when the Israelites first received the Torah from God and falls seven weeks after Passover marked their Exodus from Egypt. Jews with some familiarity of Shavuot probably know the holiday as a day for… Read more »

These sweet cheese buns are perfect for Shavuot

(Rachel Ringler)
May 30, 2019 / Rachel Ringler, JTA

This story originally appeared on The Nosher. You’ve probably heard of cheesecake or blintzes as traditional foods to enjoy for the Jewish holiday of Shavuot, but get ready to fall in love with a cheese-filled carb treat you have never heard of: Bessarabian cheese buns. This family recipes come… Read more »

What is it like to be a female combat soldier in Israel? A photographer provides a unique look.

Two Artillery Corps fighters and instructors in Shivta, Israel (Debbie Zimelman)
May 30, 2019 / Josefin Dolsten, JTA

(JTA) — Women served as combat soldiers during Israel’s War of Independence, when the fledgling country needed all the fighters it could get. But following the 1948 war, it took half a century before they were allowed back in combat. Since the late 1990s, when some units started allowing… Read more »

Meet the Jewish lawyer representing clients at the country’s strictest immigration court

Marty Rosenbluth is the only private immigration lawyer in a small Georgia town near a large immigrant detention center. (Courtesy of Rosenbluth)
May 29, 2019 / Ben Sales, JTA

(JTA) — Most of the year, Marty Rosenbluth lives alone in a small house in Lumpkin, a Georgia town with 2,000 residents and one restaurant. It’s 500 miles away from his wife and community in North Carolina. Then he drives two miles down the road to a place even… Read more »

First openly gay Orthodox rabbi ordained in Jerusalem

Newly ordained Rabbi Daniel Atwood is congratulated by Rabbi Daniel Landes at the Jerusalem Theater on May 26, 2019. (Sam Sokol)
May 28, 2019 / Sam Sokol, JTA

JERUSALEM (JTA) — A gay rabbinical student denied ordination by a liberal seminary in New York was welcomed into the rabbinate in Jerusalem, breaking a longstanding taboo against homosexuality in the Orthodox community. Daniel Landes, a prominent American-Israeli rabbi, granted semichah, Hebrew for ordination, to Daniel Atwood alongside a… Read more »

A Jewish woman makes a stand at one of Alabama’s last abortion clinics

An anti-abortion sign is placed outside of the Reproductive Health Services building in Montgomery, Ala., where Diane Weil volunteers, May 20, 2019. (Seth Herald/AFP/Getty Images)
May 23, 2019 / Josefin Dolsten, JTA

(JTA) — Early on Friday mornings, Diane Weil leaves her house in Montgomery, Alabama, with an umbrella. The 64-year-old registered nurse doesn’t need it to shield her from the rain. Instead she uses it to block patients from protesters who come to the health clinic where she has been… Read more »

Museum’s scholar-in-residence seeks interview subjects
May 23, 2019 /
Maxwell Greenberg

The Jewish History Museum/Holocaust History Center will welcome its first scholar-in-residence, Maxwell Greenberg of the University of California, Los Angeles, later this month. Greenberg, a doctoral candidate in UCLA’s Cesar E. Chavez Department of Chicano/a Studies, will discuss his research in the museum’s final gallery chat for the season,… Read more »

This woman organized a Passover seder for 9 senators at 30,000 feet over Vietnam

Jill Cooper Udall leads a seder aboard a U.S. military aircraft 30,000 feet over Vietnam, April 19, 2019. (Courtesy of Cooper Udall)
May 22, 2019 / Ron Kampeas, JTA

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The Air National Guard pilot gave Jill Cooper Udall the all-clear: There were storm warnings, but she had 10 turbulence-free minutes to get through her seder. Cooper Udall, who is married to Tom Udall, a Democrat and the senior senator from New Mexico, waved the 25… Read more »

Why so many Jews love the band Phish

Phish performs on "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon," Oct. 10, 2016. The band members are, from left: Page McConnell on keyboard, Trey Anastasio on guitar, Jon Fishman (barely pictured) on drums and Mike Gordon on bass. (Andrew Lipovsky/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank)
May 22, 2019 / Gabe Friedman, JTA

(JTA) — Gary Stein remembers the first time someone played a Phish song for him in high school. It was “Divided Sky,” an intricate 11-minute tune that shows off the group’s diverse jam rock chops. Stein, who’s now a 30-year-old history doctoral student living in Los Angeles, quickly became… Read more »

How Debra Katz became one of the nation’s top #MeToo lawyers

Debra Katz, left, looks on as Christine Blasey Ford testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sept. 27, 2018. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
May 22, 2019 / Josefin Dolsten, JTA

(JTA) — Fighting for the underdog has been a passion for Debra Katz for as long as she can remember. Years before she would go on to win awards for her work as a civil rights attorney and represent Christine Blasey Ford in one of the nation’s most high-profile… Read more »

Father’s Day Council Tucson to honor Federation’s Mellan

Nancy and Stuart Mellan and their blended family at their 1992 wedding. (Photo courtesy Nancy Mellan)
May 17, 2019 / Phyllis Braun, AJP Executive Editor

The Father’s Day Council Tucson is holding its 25th Annual Fathers of Year Awards Gala next month, and the Jewish Federation’s Stuart Mellan is among the honorees. Mellan, JFSA president and CEO, is one of seven men who will be celebrated on June 1 for their success in combining… Read more »

Native Tucsonan produces soulful entertainment through documentary, film

Filmmaker Judy Ben-Asher and her Truthseeker alter-ego, Jude. (Photo courtesy Judy Ben-Asher)
May 17, 2019 / Debe Campbell, AJP Assistant Editor

Documentaries, feature films, and animation in production by native Tucsonan Judy Ben-Asher’s Starry Sky Films focus on her discoveries about health and wellness. “These are all passion projects with the cohesive thread to uplift and educate, resolve misinformation, and find answers,” she says. The “Truthseeker®” documentary film follows Ben-Asher’s… Read more »