Tagged FRONT

(JTA) – Since retiring from his post as national director of the Anti-Defamation League in 2015, Abraham Foxman has had plenty of opportunities to take on other projects in the Jewish world. Until now, he’s always said no. But now the 80-year-old is coming out of retirement with an… Read more »

(JTA) – For the rabbis and cantor of Congregation Beth Shalom in Northbrook, Illinois, the to-do list to prepare for the unprecedented online-only High Holidays season was long. In addition to transforming their usual services for over 3,000 people into an experience that congregants will find meaningful online, they… Read more »

All of us look forward to learning what’s happening in our Jewish community. For generations, the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona has proudly produced the Arizona Jewish Post. Over that time, some of us have preferred to read our news in print, while others of us read online. Nonetheless,… Read more »

The second annual combined Jewish Community Awards Celebration and Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona Annual Meeting will be held via Zoom on Tuesday, Sept. 15, 5-6:30 p.m. A Zoom invitation will be issued closer to the date. The event will include special recognition awards honoring lay or professional leaders from… Read more »

Rabbi Scott Saulson, Ph.D., joined Temple Emanu-El this month as interim rabbi. With an extensive background in pastoral counseling and mediation, Saulson specializes in helping congregations in transition. This is his eighth interim rabbi position. Along with fulfilling typical rabbinic duties for a year, such as officiating at services… Read more »

With all the chaos and uncertainty in the outside world in recent months, many people are looking for ways to stabilize their inner lives. Tucson-based authors Shari Gootter, MA, LPC, CRC, and Tejpal, MA, MBA, have written a book, “Way to Be: 40 Insights and Transformative Practices in the… Read more »

Judaism has always been a large part of Howard Schwartz’s life, but only after moving to Tucson did he truly fall into his role as a teacher of Jewish beliefs. The doctor turned rabbi uses his time post-retirement volunteering at different synagogues to give lectures on Judaism, and has… Read more »

For the past 16 years, hundreds of women have spent summer hours reading books selected by Esther Becker of the Women’s Academy of Jewish Studies in advance of her annual book brunch. Her selections have included novels, mysteries, biographies, essays, autobiographies, and prayer. Although the format will be different,… Read more »

Chelsea Gutierrez

An anti-Semitic sticker was posted downtown on Tucson’s Fourth Avenue recently, and more appeared on the University of Arizona campus. “The stickers appear to be the same type that surfaced here in Tucson approximately one year ago,” says Paul Patterson, Jewish community security director (see www.azjewishpost.com/2019/tucson-is-not-immune-to-hate-messaging-fliers-show). There also is the… Read more »

Amy Hirshberg Lederman

Since March of this year, we have been forced to reassess and restructure how we think about and interact with the world. From empty calendars and stockpiled closets to work, family, and social lives that resemble nothing we have ever known, we bear witness to living in a COVID-19… Read more »

synagogues and Jewish agencies offer an assortment of virtual engagement programs for long summer days spent sheltering from the heat and the coronavirus. The list below includes some items that have crossed our desks recently but it is by no means exhaustive; check with other local organizations for additional… Read more »

JERUSALEM — Orthopedic surgeons at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Center on Mount Scopus recently welcomed a newcomer to their team. She’s incredibly efficient, never needs a coffee break, doesn’t complain about the long hours and isn’t worried about catching COVID-19. That’s because she’s a robot. Called ROSA, short for Robotic… Read more »

BUENOS AIRES (JTA) — In the days before the 26th anniversary of the Buenos Aires AMIA Jewish center bombing that killed 85 in 1994, Argentina’s President Alberto Fernandez has conveyed to Jewish leaders his desire to end the decades-long legal case that followed the attack, which has been complicated… Read more »

(JTA) — A Jewish day camp in suburban Dallas has closed after at least two campers and two counselors tested positive for COVID-19. The closing of Gan Israel of Plano, Texas, on Tuesday night serves as a cautionary tale as schools look to reopen this fall. The camp, which… Read more »

This story originally appeared on Alma. Jaivet Ealom is the only known person to have ever escaped the notoriously brutal Australian-run refugee detention center on Manus Island. As a Rohingyan refugee fleeing Myanmar’s campaign of genocide, Jaivet found himself imprisoned on the remote island near Papua New Guinea for three… Read more »

(JTA) — If you want to pray with a minyan at Beth Sholom Congregation in Potomac, Maryland, the synagogue has a page on its website that guides you through the process. At the top is a helpful video in which the Orthodox synagogue’s two rabbis describe the procedures the… Read more »

MITZPE YERICHO, West Bank (JTA) — It’s been surreal watching from Israel as Americans discuss my future. I’ve gotten used to presidents spending years developing plans for my neighborhood and other towns in Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank — they mean well and I truly… Read more »

(JTA) — The municipal council of Moissac sometimes calls its placid French town overlooking the Tarn River, near Toulouse, “the city of the Righteous Among the Nations.” It’s a reference to how hundreds of locals during the Holocaust helped resistance activists rescue about 500 Jewish children — an occurrence that… Read more »

(JTA) — Former professional football player Geoff Schwartz wasn’t surprised when he heard about Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver DeSean Jackson’s anti-Semitic Instagram posts. “I just thought to myself it’s ignorance — someone who has no idea whatsoever what anti-Semitism is, why his quote could be hurtful to Jews, or… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israel could see a sharp increase in immigration over the next few years spurred on by the coronavirus crisis, two groups involved with arranging immigration to the country claim. The chairman of the Jewish Agency — a nonprofit focused on bolstering Israel-Diaspora ties and immigration to… Read more »