Volume 51, Issue 9

The 27-year tradition of “white box tzedakah” benefits the residents of RJHC. Sisterhood has raised $52,285 for 2008, said Treasurer Virginia Russell.  read more »

This new secular year of 2009 marks the golden anniversary of the founding of the Jewish Review.  read more »

We respect and trust our leaders to act in the best interest of the community. In Portland’s Jewish community this respect and trust has served us well over many years.  read more »

The Jerusalem Post discusses the aftermath of the Dec. 28 air-force attack in Gaza, as reflected in the international press  read more »

On the day before Israel acted, Hamas fired 80 rockets. These followed the 170 rockets that Hamas had fired into southern Israel earlier that week.  read more »

HANUKAH BASH—From left, Roseanne Lurie,Puspha Sinnayah and Bat-Ami Frankel make sure their cups are equally full before racing to empty them by drinking through a licorice stick as part of Hanukah hi-jinks at the Portland Kollel’s Women’s Hanukah Bash  read more »

Neveh Shalom Babies is a newly expanded group at Congregation Neveh Shalom for all families with at least one child age 2 and younger.  read more »

Oregon Community Warehouse recently picked up a large donation of furniture from the Rose Schnitzer Tower (formerly Clay Tower in downtown Portland) after the facility completed refurnishing some common areas.  read more »

Repair the world while you travel with Jewish organizations  read more »

Lauren Botney, 53, is just one of many Portlanders who have found a new, healthier lifestyle at the Mittleman Jewish Community Center.  read more »

Morning, noon or after work—the “J” offers members and day pass users free fitness classes ranging from ai-chi to zumba.  read more »

Health care professionals will hear about “Fighting for Justice in the War on Terror from Portland to Peshawar” at the next gathering of The Maimonides Society of the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland.  read more »

Long an active member and officer in Hadassah, a women’s Zionist organization that actively supports organ donation, Peggy Elefant, 58, of Corvallis, now needs an organ donation herself.  read more »

“If you accept brain death, you should be an organ donor,” Rabbi Dr. Avraham Steinberg said after a medical ethics lecture that lured more than 100 people out in the midst of Portland’s worst snowstorm in 40 years.  read more »

“Yes We Can! Unlearning Discrimination in Oregon,” a combination of new materials and existing exhibits, opens at the Oregon Jewish Museum Jan. 19, Martin Luther King Day, with an opening reception from 2 to 4 p.m.  read more »

While the stock market fluctuates wildly, and people all over the country are finding ways to cut back, the children of Congregation Beth Israel are reaching out to help others in the community.  read more »

Three Level 5 Mittleman Jewish Community Center girls gymnasts, Rachael Diamond, 10, Elayna Caron, 11, Melissa Diamond, 12, and their coach Melissa Burgess, competed at the Jewish Gymnastics Invitational meet  read more »

The Mitzvah Mobiles made them famous—Ryder vans with blaring klezmer music and posters like Mitzvah on the Spot for People on the Go. “Are you Jewish?” bearded men inside asked passersby. “How about wrapping Tefillin or learning to light Shabbat candles?”  read more »

Browsing old Jewish Reviews sets the scene for Portland 1984. Like the article about Israel’s 36th Independence Day Celebration, or the ad for Policar’s Passover specials. Or, the Sunday program sponsored by the MJCC “to find out what the future is in computers.”  read more »

With the country’s economic crisis sweeping over local Jewish organizations and individuals, Congregation Neveh Shalom has scheduled a free community-wide event on how individuals and organizations can cope in hard times.  read more »

After nearly 12 years with the Portland Jewish Academy, Head of School Patricia Schwartz will be leaving PJA at the end of the school year because her family may be moving out of state.  read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA)—In the first sign of a post-election struggle to set the American Jewish community’s Middle East agenda, a quartet of liberal pro-Israel groups is criticizing Jerusalem’s decision to launch retaliatory attacks against Gaza.  read more »

“For us it (the economic crisis) means a change in lifestyle for sure, but many people are loosing their whole lives so this is no time to be selfish,”  read more »

The Jewish Review is looking for contributing editors.

Contributing editors will contribute one or two articles each month in a topic area in which they have demonstrated some expertise.  read more »

No Jewish organizations in the greater Portland area have reported any financial impact resulting from the Bernard L. Madoff scandal.  read more »

The snow storm that swept over the Pacific Northwest the week before Hanukah and continued for most of the eight-day festival of lights, canceled or delayed numerous events—including the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland’s Super Sunday phonathon—and caused the collapse of the Sportsplex “bubble” at the Mittleman Jewish Community Center.  read more »

The in-depth census phase of the four-phase demographic study of the greater Portland area’s Jewish community commissioned by the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland is set to begin in the middle of this month.  read more »

Alan E. Klugman is the executive vice president of the Jewish Federation of Palm Springs and Desert Area in California.  read more »

ASHKELON, Israel (JTA)—“Come on, come on! Get in!” they shout, just before the heavy metal door slams shut on the small bedroom made of reinforced concrete that serves as the family’s bomb shelter.  read more »

Portland Mayor-elect Sam Adams presented the Youth Spirit of Portland Award to George Wolff, 17, a senior at Wilson High School and graduate of Portland Jewish Academy.  read more »

Jewish Celebration Night at the Rose Quarter—More than 400 people bought Hanukah promotion tickets for the Portland Trail Blazer’s Dec.23 game against the Denver Nuggets, which the Blazers won 101-92.  read more »

SDEROT, Israel (JTA) -- American Jewish leaders on a solidarity visit to this besieged southern Israel city learned quickly what life was like under fire. On Sunday, when a Code Red alert was sounded, they were rushed into a protected room.  read more »

"After yesterday, I was two seconds away from not coming. You never know what can happen," Deborah said on her way Sunday, Jan. 3, toward the Israeli Embassy, where nearly 4,000 people gathered to sing Israeli songs and defend Israel's military offensive in the Gaza Strip.  read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — In the second week of the war in Gaza, with Israeli ground troops poised to intensify their actions against Hamas militants, weapons' stores and rocket-launching sites, diplomatic efforts to end the fighting gathered pace.  read more »

KARNEI SHOMRON, West Bank (JTA)—At least 35 rockets shot from Gaza pounded southern Israel as Israel prepared to transfer humanitarian aid to the Palestinians on the second day of its ground operation against Hamas.  read more »

KARNEI SHOMRON, West Bank (JTA) -- Two days into Israel's operation in the Gaza Strip, Arab media outlets began reporting that captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit had been wounded in an Israeli air strike.  read more »

ASHKELON and TEL AVIV, Israel (JTA) — In Tel Aviv, the lunch crowd suns itself at bustling sidewalk cafes. But in Ashkelon the playgrounds are deserted, municipal buses run without passengers and stores are shuttered with no customers to even see the notes taped on the doors of "We'll be back soon."  read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA)-- Democrats, increasingly antsy about President-elect Barack Obama's refusal to weigh in on the Gaza war, are looking for ways to keep Republicans and other Obama critics from making an issue of his silence.  read more »

NEW YORK (NEXTBOOK) – In a telling moment in Joel Gilbert’s new documentary “Inside Bob Dylan’s Jesus Years,” an interviewee says that when Dylan became a born-again Christian, in two short years he went from being an American Jewish hero to the “greatest apostate of the twentieth century.”  read more »

Rabbi Aryeh Hirschfield, beloved rabbi of  P'nai Or in Portland, OR, drowned on Tuesday, January 6, in Mexico.  read more »

Twenty young adults from Oregon and Washington spent Dec. 15-25 on a free 10-day trip to Israel.  read more »

At least the tumbling economy has one local beneficiary—Jewish college students in Portland will have access to a Chabad Student Center across the street from Reed College.  read more »