2018

Rabbi Jeffrey Kurtz-Lendner at the Chanukah ceremony in the Mississippi Governor’s Mansion, December 2016. Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson announced that Rabbi Jeffrey Kurtz-Lendner has requested not to have his contract, which ends in the summer of 2019, renewed. In a letter to the congregation, […]

Sam Baker of Scottsdale, Ariz. made his book debut in April, penning a story that was inspired from his childhood in Clarksdale, Miss. “It’s been fun writing” the book, “The Silly Adventures of Petunia and Herman the Worm,” he said. The 95-year-old author then added, […]

As the Torahs are paraded around the sanctuary at Birmingham’s Knesseth Israel on Simchat Torah this year, it will likely be the last time such a procession will be held in that building. The state’s only non-Chabad Orthodox congregation will be moving out of the […]

After 34 years on the pulpit of Gates of Prayer in Metairie, there are plenty of stories about Rabbi Robert Loewy. Many of those “shared experiences” were related at a gala weekend on May 11 and 12, celebrating Loewy’s retirement from the pulpit and “promotion” […]

Rabbi Eric Berk will become the new rabbi at Huntsville’s Temple B’nai Sholom. The Reform congregation made the announcement following a July 15 special meeting. Since 2009, Berk has been the rabbi at Skirball Hospice, a program of the Los Angeles Jewish Home for the […]

Joshua Bonadona (photo courtesy Hendrix College) It’s an age-old debate: Can Jews be regarded as a race? According to a ruling in the U.S. District Court’s Western District of Louisiana, when it comes to an employment discrimination case, the answer can be yes. U.S. Magistrate […]

Joe Walsh tweeted a photo of the Israel “award” he received as a ruse to get him to Washington for Sacha Baron Cohen’s new show. Former Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore is among those duped by British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, and is threatening legal […]

Thanks to the efforts of a Birmingham-area teacher, a town in Romania that was the birthplace of one of Birmingham’s Holocaust survivors now has a memorial to the town’s little-remembered Jewish community. Amy McDonald, a history teacher at Shades Valley High School, made a return […]

Three weeks after arriving in Birmingham, Bethany and Rabbi Stephen Slater have a bris for their newborn son, at Temple Beth-El on July 4. Slater, who just started as rabbi of the state’s largest Conservative congregation, did the procedure, assisted by Fran Ivker. (July 19 […]