Rabbi Uri Topolowsky and his family, seen here during a recent trip to Jerusalem, have left New Orleans and relocated to surburban Maryland. (Courtesy Uri Topolosky) (JTA) — It didn’t take long after Rabbi Uri Topolosky moved to New Orleans in 2007 for the moderate Orthodox rabbi to win plaudits for helping the city’s Jewish community heal following Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The congregation Topolosky was hired to lead, Beth Israel, had seen its building… Read more »
Members of ZAKA rescuing a Torah from Congregation Beth Israel after Hurricane Katrina hit, August 2005. (Courtesy ZAKA) (JTA) — Seven years ago an iconic picture for many Jews of the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina was of men waist deep in a flooded synagogue carrying Torahs to safety. On Sunday, in a celebration of physical and spiritual unity, the Torahs of that congregation were carried into… Read more »
One of the "lions" at the International Lion of Judah conference helps a young New Orleans reader during the event's community service literacy project. (Bernie Saul for Jewish Federations of North America) NEW ORLEANS, La. (JTA) — Just down the road from where the General Assembly of the Jewish Federations of North America had concluded a day earlier, more than a thousand of the federation system’s most generous women found a philanthropic sanctuary of their own. At the Hilton Hotel here,… Read more »
