HEADLINES | 4
EDUCATION | 13
A DECADE OF SERVICE
OLAMI IN ISRAEL
After 10 years at the helm of ASU’s Hillel, Debbie Yunker Kail has ‘a lot more work to do’
Olami students met with Israeli leaders about campus antisemitism
JULY 26, 2024 | TAMUZ 20, 5784 | VOLUME 76, NUMBER 22
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Beth El makes Rabbi Mendy Deitsch goes to new push to help Washington, again the homeless SHANNON LEVITT | STAFF WRITER
SHANNON LEVITT | STAFF WRITER
J
ust after 9 a.m. on a July morning, the temperature already hovering at 100 degrees, Angela Gandolfo-Martinez and her husband, Julio Martinez, pulled into Cortez Park in Phoenix, their car filled with water bottles, pre-packaged and fresh food, new underwear, socks, toothbrushes, toothpaste and other personal hygiene items. About two dozen people, most of whom are wholly unhoused and surviving on the street, approached the couple who chatted with them while passing out vital supplies. Most of the items the couple gave out, about 80%, have been collected by Beth El Phoenix. For years, Beth El’s Social Action Committee (SAC) has held donation drives for Arizona Friends of the Homeless (AFOH). On March 1, the partnership got much closer when Beth El offered AFOH storage space for holding reams of donated goods and a “Dream Room” for organizing pickups. “We always worked with Arizona Friends of the Homeless because we knew that we could count on them to take the donated items and give them directly to the people on the street,” Barbara Lewkowitz, Beth El congregant and SAC member, told Jewish News. Gandolfo-Martinez and her husband are part of a dozen AFOH outreach teams that pick up food, water and sundries at Beth El and deliver them to individuals at various sites around the city. On Thursday, July 11, Gandolfo-Martinez asked each person which items he or she needed while Julio handed everyone who lined up a frozen Otter Pop, offering something of a respite from the heat, for at least a few minutes. The gratitude was palpable. “I thank them for the time and effort they take for coming and helping us out,” SEE HOMELESS, PAGE 2
R
abbi Mendy Deitsch, head of the Chabad of the East Valley, Pollack Chabad Center for Jewish Life in Chandler, might be the first rabbi to deliver a prayer to both the United States Senate and House of Representatives in the same year. At least that’s what a C-Span representative told him on Thursday, July 11, while the Chandler rabbi was on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., to offer a prayer before members of Congress. “He was 100% sure I was at least the first rabbi from Arizona to do so,” Deitsch told Jewish News with a laugh. Deitsch was in the nation’s capitol last week at the invitation of Congressman Greg Stanton (D-AZ-04). When Stanton’s office reached out to Deitsch, a little more than a month ago, he already knew a bit about what to expect. In January, Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema invited him to give the open- Pictured from left are Rep. Greg Stanton, Rabbi Chessy Deitsch, Speaker Mike Johnson, ing prayer in front of the U.S. Senate Rabbi Mendy Deitsch, Rabbi Levi Shemtov and House Chaplain Margaret Grun Kibben. COURTESY OF RABBI MENDY DEITSCH Chamber. Just as had happened seven months earlier, Stanton’s office offered him several dates to choose from and once he narrowed it down, the House’s chaplain’s office gave him the details of what was required. SEE RABBI, PAGE 3
Rural Chabad Rabbi Yaakov and Tiferes Cahnman take the lead in getting Chabad of Rural Arizona underway. See page 7. PHOTO COURTESY OF RABBI YAAKOV CAHNMAN
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