Tagged HEADLINES

Congregation Anshei Israel has commissioned the creation of a new Torah as part of a yearlong celebration of its 83rd anniversary, or “Second Bar Mitzvah.” A kick-off event, the “Mitzvah 613 Torah Fair” on Sunday, Dec. 16, will allow participants to fulfill the 613th commandment by sharing with others… Read more »

Temple Emanu-El is offering a new program for interfaith families, “Stepping Stones to a Jewish Family.” Stepping Stones is designed to introduce interfaith families to Judaism and Jewish rituals, synagogue life and community participation in a relaxed, informal way. Temple Emanu-El is partnering with the Tucson Hebrew Academy on… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — The recent conflict in Gaza and Israel casts a vivid spotlight on the need to strengthen relations between Jews and Muslims in countries around the world. It is crucial if we are to avoid importing the violence that has rocked the Holy Land to our… Read more »

Moshe Bahta, director of the Ibim Absorption Center, briefing his staff, Nov. 18, 2012. (Adam Soclof)

IBIM, Israel (JTA) – The explosion occurred close enough to Stesyahu Alema to shake his apartment, where he sat with his wife and two of his five children. But he didn’t flinch. None of them did. “There are a lot of people with me, so I don’t need to… Read more »

Micah Halpern

It doesn’t matter who the president is when it comes to U.S. policy toward Israel. When political pundit Micah D. Halpern made that statement in his talk, “Making Sense of the Middle East: A Post-Election Analysis,” at a Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona leadership campaign summit on Nov. 8,… Read more »

Israeli author Adina Bar-El, left, with Tucsonan Bill Kugelman (Phyllis Braun/AJP)

Adina Bar-El, Ph.D., a children’s book author from Hof Ashkelon, Israel, came to Tucson last week to talk about the power of stories — and ended up discovering tales of her own family’s past. On Friday, Nov. 9, Tucsonan Bill Kugelman attended Bar-El’s Heartbeat of Israel breakfast talk at… Read more »

A new Arizona state tax credit allows taxpayers to double their donations to the Jewish Education Tax Credit Organization, JETCO — without costing them a penny. Earlier this year, the Arizona legislature passed SB1047 to give children enrolled in public schools the opportunity to switch to private schools by… Read more »

Ever since terrorists based in Gaza started firing missiles into Israel several years ago, the residents of Kiryat Malachi have been worried.  Over the years, missiles have fallen around the town but have landed in open areas just outside of the municipal borders.  All of that changed this morning… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) is no closer to having a minyan. The majority leader will remain the sole Jewish member of his party’s caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives. In a generally rough night for Republicans, the party’s top Jewish congressional prospects all went… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — A week after Sandy swept into the New York area with fierce winds, driving rain and a high tide for the history books, the nation’s largest Jewish community was still picking up the pieces. JTA gathered stories from around the storm zone about Sandy’s destruction,… Read more »

Members of HaNoar Ha'Oved V'HaLomed, a left-wing youth group, attending the rally in memory of the slain Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in Tel Aviv, Oct. 27, 2012. (Roni Schutzer/Flash90/JTA)

TEL AVIV (JTA) — About a year before Guy Ben-Simon was born, his parents attended the Tel Aviv rally where Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated. It was a night of shock and sadness, they recalled for him while he was growing up. They had called all of their friends, telling… Read more »

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi addressing the U.N. General Assembly, Sept. 26, 2012. (UN Photo/Marco Castro)

WASHINGTON (JTA) – Jewish groups looking for signals from Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi regarding his views were appalled when one finally came — in the form of a nod and what appeared to be a muttered “amen” to an imam’s call for God to “deal harshly” with the Jews.… Read more »

With the rise of medical technology as well as the number of educated women who can support a family themselves, more single Jewish women are opting to have children on their own. (Courtesy Single Mothers by Choice)

NEW YORK (JTA) — When Emily Wolper broke her engagement six years ago, she promised herself that if the time came when she felt ready to have a child and she was still single, she’d have one on her own. Now 37, Wolper, a college admissions consultant in Morristown,… Read more »

Elie Berrebi, director of the Jewish Consistory of Marseille, at the city's Great Synagogue, Oct. 14, 2012. (Cnaan Liphshiz)

MARSEILLE, France (JTA) — At a time when Jewish institutions across France resemble military fortresses for their security, entering the great synagogue and main Jewish center of this picturesque city on the Mediterranean coast is as easy as pushing open the front door. The only obstacles on a recent… Read more »

Bar-Ilan University historian Ariel Toaff being served a double-roasted goose and baked onion salad by a "medieval" waitress in Bevagna, Italy. (Ruth Ellen Gruber)

BEVAGNA, Italy (JTA) — In a medieval tavern in 21st century Italy, waitresses in archaic costumes served a tepid, chalk-white substance the texture of oatmeal to tables filled with slightly skeptical diners. Sweet yet salty, and flavored with a mix of unexpectedly tangy spices, it turned out to be… Read more »

Israeli police arresting Anat Hoffman after she said the Shema Israel prayer at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, Oct. 16, 2012. (Women of the Wall)

TEL AVIV (JTA) — Last week’s episode was hardly the first time Israeli police stopped activist Anat Hoffman while she was leading a women’s prayer service at the Western Wall in violation of Israeli law. But this time, police actually arrested Hoffman — a first, she says — and… Read more »

Asmaa al-Ghoul, a Palestinian journalist, is trying to advance civil and human rights in Gaza by protesting Hamas policies. (Courtesy International Women's Media Foundation)

TEL AVIV (JTA) — She can’t stay out of trouble there, but Asmaa al-Ghoul always comes back to Gaza. A secular, feminist Palestinian journalist, al-Ghoul, 30, has been harassed by Hamas. She’s also been beaten and arrested by Hamas police for protesting its Islamist policies and suppression of human… Read more »

Can you imagine Israel without a free, independent, vociferous and diverse media? Can you imagine Israel without Maariv and Haaretz? Without biting commentary, investigative reporting and an open, cacophonous marketplace of views and ideas? Such an Israel terrifies me, and it should alarm you, too. It is not the… Read more »

Liberal pundits have coined a new saw: Sheldon Adelson and the newspaper he owns, Israel Hayom, are primarily responsible for the collapse of many Israeli media outlets, and this endangers Israeli democracy. The assertion is wrong on both the business and ideological levels. The imminent failures of Maariv and… Read more »

A projection of what Rambam Hospital’s underground hospital will look like once it is completed. (Rambam Hospital, Haifa)

When missiles rained down on northern Israel from Lebanon six years ago, surgeons at Rambam Hospital in Haifa worked, terrified, on the building’s eighth floor. That summer, missiles had struck fewer than 20 yards away, endangering the staff and patients of northern Israel’s largest hospital and the central facility… Read more »