Sophie Stern planned to be a dancer when she was 8 years old.
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When Gov. Katie Hobbs was inaugurated in January, it was the first time in more than a decade for a Democrat to have the top job in Arizona. Although the Republicans still have the majority in both legislative chambers, her election reshuffled the political calculus in the state.
At Scottsdale’s Harkins Theatres Shea 14 next month, Jewish movie lovers will have the chance to hear directly from first-time filmmaker Marvin Samel, the director and creator of one of the Greater Phoenix Jewish Film Festival’s (GPJFF) three featured films.
One hundred and seventy-one retired rabbis gathered in Phoenix for the National Association of Retired Reform Rabbis’ (NAORRR) annual conference Jan. 5-9, but they weren’t there to reminisce about the good old days — at least, they weren’t only reminiscing.
Before they even met and married, Rabbi Levi Minsky and his wife, Chaya, shared one all-encompassing life ambition: They both wanted to run their own Chabad center one day.
Douglas Emhoff, the Second Gentleman of the United States, made a brief visit to the offices of Hillel Jewish Student Center at Arizona State University to speak directly to college students about antisemitism on Thursday, Jan. 18.
Dozens of hands shot up last Tuesday night the moment Rabbi Dr. Shmuly Yanklowitz opened the floor to audience questions. In person and on Zoom, roughly 100 people attended Valley Beit Midrash’s (VBM) panel “Can the Phoenix/Scottsdale Community be United?”
For a second year, the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Phoenix (JCRC) put out a call to collect winter coats for newly arrived refugees in Arizona. And just as they did last year, Jewish communities in the state and across the country stepped up to answer that call by deliverin…
Comic Keith Barany doesn’t tell dirty jokes or pick at people’s insecurities to get a laugh. That’s one reason he’s a popular comedy choice for country clubs, corporate events and Jewish community centers. He tells funny stories from his life, but in a way that gives them a universal appeal.
On the second day of a 10-day November trip to Israel, Pastor Terry E. Mackey of Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church in Phoenix, stepped into the Jordan River to baptize his flock.
Every Monday, Pnina Levine wakes up early to volunteer for the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in Phoenix, helping refugees who have newly arrived in the country and are hoping to be granted asylum. She loves her time there so much she calls Monday her “fun day.”
Long before Rabbi Emily Segal stepped foot in Phoenix’s Temple Chai, before she even became a rabbi, there existed a hint of the path she would walk.
Anyone with a TikTok account might have seen a recent video by Congregation Beth Israel Cantor Seth Ettinger on the final night of Chanukah 2022. Dressed in his by-now-famous, Chanukah-themed blue suit and wearing a large hat shaped like a Chanukah menorah with all nine candles ablaze, Ettin…
Glenn M. Feldman received a lifetime achievement award in 2022 from the Native American Bar Association of Arizona, whose mission is to assist in the development of Indian attorneys and improve the practice of Indian law in the state.
Over the course of a 29-year career as an OB-GYN, one horrific delivery still haunts Dr. Tracy Contant.
Zillah al-Kahiya is already bringing a sense of humor to her work with the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Phoenix (JCRC) as its latest communications and public diplomacy fellow.
The East Valley Jewish Community Center (EVJCC) in Chandler opened its Early Learning Center (ELC) in 1971 and currently has children anywhere from 6 weeks to 5 years enrolled. Next year, it will add a kindergarten class for the 2023-24 school year.
Rabbi Efraim and Bracha Leviyev moved to Greater Phoenix from New York seven years ago because they saw a great opportunity to assist the youth of the nation’s second-largest Bukharian Jewish community.
Allie Bones, the Jewish woman who is stepping into Arizona’s second most powerful job as the governor’s chief of staff, never thought that she would have to concern herself with the Arizona-Mexico border, school vouchers or the dangerously low level of the Colorado River — at least not as an…
"Shabbat Challah" by slgckgc is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
After a serious accident sent Aleeza Kaplan to recuperate in her parents’ house in San Diego, she felt completely isolated, far from her home and friends in Phoenix.
More than 1,000 women gathered in Greater Phoenix Dec. 11-13, for the Jewish Federations of North America’s (JFNA) Lion of Judah conference, which celebrated its 50th anniversary of the Jewish women’s philanthropic movement started by the late Norma Kipnis-Wilson and Toby Friedland in Miami,…
Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego declared Dec. 11 National Council of Jewish Women Arizona Day as she spoke to the group’s first in-person gathering since March 1, 2020, the month the COVID-19 pandemic entered daily discourse.
Erika Neuberg, independent chair for the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission (AIRC), spent 2021 working with two Democrats and two Republicans to create new congressional and legislative maps to reflect data from the 2020 U.S. Census.
Human remains, skeletal and naked, are among the first images of “Auschwitz Virtual Live Tour.” Russians captured the gruesome scenes as they liberated Auschwitz, the largest of six Nazi death camps, in January 1945. Jerzy Wójcik, the tour’s creator and only guide, begins with them precisely…
One hundred and forty Jews, Christians and Muslims will sit down together next month to discuss human dignity and how it is exemplified in the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament and the Quran for “Peoples of the Book,” the third in a series of interfaith events. This will be the first time Jews…
The Red Rocks Music Festival has been bringing chamber music to concerts in Sedona and Phoenix for more than two decades. The festival’s mission “is to educate, engage and challenge audiences through a collaboration of leading Arizona artists with world-acclaimed musicians.”
Letty Cottin Pogrebin, journalist, social activist, Emmy winner and author of 12 books, will be giving this year’s Hammerman Family Lecture, hosted by Valley Beit Midrash (VBM), a global center for learning and action.
Marina Awerbuch, program director for the Bureau of Jewish Education of Greater Phoenix (BJE), takes her two kids to see ZooLights at the Phoenix Zoo every December. She always thought it would be a great place to celebrate Chanukah, the festival of lights, but organizing and paying for it w…
Residents of Greater Phoenix will likely remember Mark Sklar as a real estate developer who helped shape the city’s growth, or as a philanthropist who gave generously of his time and money to Jewish and secular causes.
Shira Shecter knew she would only go to a college with a Hillel on campus. It was her biggest dealbreaker. She regularly attends her synagogue outside of Seattle and wouldn’t risk losing her connection to Jewish community — no matter where she ended up.
Fitness is one of Ruth Dryjanski’s priorities in life. It’s so essential, in fact, that she schedules all of her appointments, even those for radiation therapy, around her fitness classes. A few months ago, she was diagnosed with breast cancer but it didn’t dissuade her from fitness — quite …
When Nancy Eisenberg began her career in 1977, there were relatively few women doing research in developmental psychology. Throughout her 44-year career, she’s watched women increase in number until they reached parity and even a majority of professionals in the field.
Roughly one year after her death, Janet Arnold Rees, former senior concierge and creative aging coordinator for Jewish Family & Children’s Service (JFCS), founder of Arizona Jewish Theatre Company (AJTC) and devoted friend to Greater Phoenix’s Jewish community, was honored by U.S. Rep. G…
Salamone Rossi composed modern dances, sonatas and Italian love songs for the entertainment of Francesco IV Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua, Italy, in the early 17th century. Rossi’s music was well-known and well-loved. Several of his 313 compositions were so popular they had to be reprinted.
One very big, red and yellow bus, emblazoned with the words “Let’s Be Better Humans,” is parked outside of Arizona Jews for Justice’s (AJJ) Phoenix office, and it might be just the thing to help the organization get to the next level of its humanitarian work.
BJ Borris came to Phoenix’s Temple Chai on Oct. 29 prepared to dance.
From the moment people walk in the doors of the Valley of the Sun Jewish Community Center (The J) on Saturday, Dec. 3, they will be met by an eclectic coterie of entertainment. Scattered throughout the building, attendees will find an electric violinist, aerialists hanging from the ceiling, …
Jews in every community across the country are being pummeled daily by news of antisemitism in politics, in pop culture and in recent memory — Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life massacre just marked its fourth anniversary on Oct. 27.
Sybil Yastrow, teacher, advocate for public education and philanthropist, died Wednesday, Oct. 26, at home in Scottsdale. She was 86 years old.
On Nov. 2, the Tax & Legal Seminar, Arizona’s premier estate-planning event, will take place at the Arizona Biltmore. After attending virtually the last two years, the state’s CPAs, estate planning attorneys, financial planners and many more will meet in person once again.
When Tony Zinman, founder of Tucson Jews for Justice, first learned about Andrew Torba, he immediately started worrying what effect he would have in Arizona.
Thursdays at the Arizona Kosher Pantry (AKP) are always bustling.
Rabbi Bonnie Sharfman’s voice was soft and restrained as she called together a gathering of interfaith clergy at Desert Horizon Park in Scottsdale on Friday, Oct. 7, at 9:30 a.m. The longer she spoke, however, the louder and more assertive her voice became.
Movies were always going to be part of David Ethan Shapiro’s future.
Central Avenue in Downtown Phoenix is still relatively calm at 10 a.m. on a Wednesday and Eduard Zavurov, owner of Downtown Barber Shop, takes advantage of the quiet to spotlight a collage of family pictures on the wall as he preps for his first customer.
Running, tripping over dead bodies and an overwhelming sense of fear are the things that Marion Weinzweig remembers most from her childhood in Poland. She was one of only a few family members to survive the Holocaust.
On Sept. 13, the U.S. Census Bureau held a press briefing to spotlight some good news amid an otherwise uneasy economic climate. One of our nation’s stubbornly bad indicators just got a little better.
Pomegranate fruits Jewish tradition
Rabbis across Greater Phoenix, like rabbis the world over, are sitting down right about now to put their thoughts to paper as they prepare to address their congregants for High Holidays.
