Jonathan Elkhoury at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv
Jonathan Elkhoury represents multiple minority groups in Israel. He told his life story to a rapt group of students at the University of Arizona Hillel Foundation on Dec. 1. His father fought for the South Lebanese Army against the Palestine Liberation Organization and fled to Israel when the Israel… Read more »
The third annual Limmud AZ, a daylong smorgasbord of Jewish learning, will be held Sunday, Feb. 12 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Arizona State University Memorial Union Student Conference Center in Tempe. Limmud AZ will include dozens of workshops, discussions, art, music, performances and text-study sessions,… Read more »
The Women’s Philanthropy Advisory Council of the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona is seeking nominees for its ninth annual Bryna Zehngut Mitzvot Award, recognizing an outstanding Jewish teenage girl. The award was created to honor the memory of Zehngut, a community leader who died in 2005. Award nominees must… Read more »
Randy Odgen, right, who retired Dec. 5 from Mt. Lemmon Fire District, where he served as fire chief for six and a half years, helps battle a five-story apartment fire in Jerusalem on Nov. 29. All residents were evacuated safely and the fire was contained. Ogden, who retired from the Tucson Fire Department in June 2010 after 33 years of service, says of his Israel deployment, “I am privileged to end my career as I began it, running calls and hauling hoses as a firefighter.” (Arik Abouloff)
As soon as she heard about the hundreds of fires raging through Israel late last month, Marcela Donovan Hammond expected a call. Having just completed her Emergency Volunteer Project training in Israel in September the Nogales firefighter, arson investigator and mother of six was prepared to drop everything at… Read more »
Clockwise from left: Anthony Rosenthal, Betsy Wolfe, Tracie Thoms, Christian Borle, Andrew Rannells, Brandon Uranowitz and Stephanie J. Block performing in the musical "Falsettos." (Joan Marcus)
NEW YORK (JTA) — The opening number in the Broadway musical “Falsettos” — currently being revived on Broadway at the Walter Kerr Theatre — is called “Four Jews in a Room Bitching.” Featuring sample lyrics like “I’m neurotic, he’s neurotic, they’re neurotic, we’re neurotic. Bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch,” it… Read more »
THA fifth grade students Omer Ron, left, and Aiden Goldberg
Chen Shterenbach, a teacher at Tucson Hebrew Academy, recently held a Hebrew poetry contest for his students. The students had the liberty of choosing any topic. The judges were Rabbi Billy Lewkowicz and Windy Jones. Lewkowicz was the representative for THA’s Hebrew and Judaics department and Jones, THA’s middle school… Read more »
The Defender newsroom on Chicago's South Side in the late 1940s, with Audrey Weaver, the first woman city editor of any American newspaper, in the center. (Courtesy of Abbott Sengstacke Family Papers)
CHICAGO (JTA) — Forged at the dawn of the 20th century as both peoples arrived in northern cities, the political coalition between African-Americans and Jewish Americans has endured through defeat as well as victory. Jews and African-Americans were Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s two most enthusiastic constituencies, as they have… Read more »
Author and behavioral scientist Jon Levy gets out of his comfort zone in Antarctica. (Courtesy of Jon Levy)
(JTA) — To give you an idea of how uncool Jon Levy was as a kid, know this: His first kiss was in first grade, when he was a student at the Abraham Joshua Heschel School on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. His second kiss? Well, that happened during his freshman… Read more »
Michelle Blumenberg and Richard Green at the University of Arizona Hillel Foundation. High Holiday leader For 35 years, Richard Green led the Conservative service for the first day of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur at the University of Arizona Hillel Foundation. A student rabbi from the Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles conducted the Reform service. Growing up in Omaha, Green… Read more »
The U.S. Postal Service has released a new Hanukkah Forever stamp. The first-day-of-issue stamp dedication ceremony took place Nov. 1 at Temple Beth El of Boca Raton in Florida. The holiday begins this year at sundown on Dec. 24. “The Hanukkah stamp we’re dedicating today honors a religious observance… Read more »
‘Gates of Tsfat,” 36” x 28” photograph, by Lynn Rae Lowe
For more than two decades, Lynn Rae Lowe, an awarding-winning local artist, has strived to empower people through her symbolic work. “Ancient symbols give us access into the collective unconscious, and through that we can raise up ourselves,” says Lowe. And the arts can help communities make sense of… Read more »
As Arizona Theatre Company celebrates its 50th anniversary with its largest production ever, “Fiddler on the Roof,” two Jewish University of Arizona seniors are making their ATC debuts in the iconic musical, under the direction of ATC artistic director David Ira Goldstein. For Shira Elena Maas (Rivka) and Taylor… Read more »
Stoneware menorah by Julie Szerina Stein.
Visitors to the Park Place Mall will be able to see a collection of menorahs through Dec. 31. The mall contacted the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona last year to ensure that there would be Hanukkah decorations amongst the Christmas decorations displayed at the mall during the winter holiday… Read more »
(Eric Auchard/Flickr, CC BY 2.0)
(JTA) — Newsflash: “A rabbi under the huppah may boost Jewish engagement in intermarried homes,” according to a study released this past month by the Brandeis University Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies. That’s welcome new data but no news for us, two New York-area rabbis trained at the Jewish… Read more »
On “Younger,” Maggie (Debi Mazar), left, hosts a Shabbat dinner for her love interest, Malkie (Sally Pressman), and her friends. (Courtesy of TV Land)
(JTA) — TV Land’s “Younger” is a fun sitcom about Liza (Sutton Foster), a recently divorced 40-year-old mother who passes herself off as 26 after having a tough time landing a job in the publishing industry. The show — created by Darren Star, of “Sex and the City” and “Beverly Hills,… Read more »
Fire in the community of Talmon, Binyamin (Hillel Maeir/TPS)
Police Commissioner Roni Alsheikh said Thursday that “several” individuals have been arrested on suspicion that they were involved in arson attacks over the past several days, and Shin Bet (Israel Security Officials) said the agency is investigating the possibility that several of the fires were actual terror attacks, nationalistically motivated.… Read more »
(JTA) — The upset victory by Donald Trump in the 2016 elections stunned a Jewish activist and leadership class that is at times as divided as the electorate at large. JTA asked some of those leaders to describe their concerns and expectations in a series of brief essays, “Worst… Read more »
(Pixabay Commons)
LOS ANGELES (JTA) — It was just a few weeks ago, on the night of Nov. 8, that my family had all anxiously exchanged text messages as we watched the election results trickle in. State by state, my Hillary-loving family saw our hopes slipping away — and now, too… Read more »
A man examining a comic book for sale at the inaugural Jewish Comic Con, held at Congregation Kol Israel, a Brooklyn synagogue, Nov. 13, 2016. (Ben Sales)
NEW YORK (JTA) — After Brett Parker’s great-grandfather fled the pogroms in Europe and came to the United States, he opened a drug store where he sold comic books. Each week he would give his grandson, Parker’s father, five comic books to take home. Growing up during the early… Read more »
A scene from 'A Children's Song'
The Tucson International Jewish Film Festival will hold a FAST (First Annual Short Topics) & Fun! evening to announce the schedule for the festival on Wednesday, Dec. 7 at 7 p.m. at the Tucson Jewish Community Center. The festival, which will run from Jan. 12-22, will feature more than… Read more »
