HEADLINES | 4
SPECIAL PULLOUT | B1
PODCAST SERIES
SENIOR LIFESTYLE
Rabbi Michael Beyo hosts new podcast
Seniors reflect on reading, Hadassah and difficult conversations
MAY 7, 2021 | IYAR 25, 5781 | VOLUME 73, NUMBER 18
Neo-Nazis rallied in Phoenix, largely ignored NICOLE RAZ | STAFF WRITER
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bout a dozen neo-Nazis gathered in Phoenix April 17. It was a relatively uneventful 30 minutes of a few people marching around Eastlake Park and yelling racial slurs. “Given how precarious this situation could have been, this represents quite a victory against hate,” said Paul Rockower, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Phoenix. Community leaders say the group came looking to spread its message, but the rally instead showed a community unified against hate. The JCRC formed a coalition with 26 other groups — including the African American Christian Clergy Coalition, the Chinese American Citizens Alliance, the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Arizona, the Valley Interfaith Project and the Phoenix Holocaust Association — to deny the neo-Nazis their goals of attention and amplification, Rockower said. “The community was unified in its efforts to lower the temperature around the rally, and keep community partners away, as to avoid friction and escalation,” he said. Prior to the rally, JCRC and other groups worked to discourage counterprotests or engagement with the marchers. For example, JCRC hosted a webinar on April 14 with Cure Violence Global and Arizona State University’s Public Safety Innovation Lab to encourage members of the news media to cover the rally, if warranted, in a way that wouldn’t escalate or amplify extremist messages. Ed McGuire, director of ASU’s Public Safety Innovation Lab and a professor of criminology and criminal justice, said it is important to encourage counterprotesters to SEE NEO-NAZIS, PAGE 2
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Jewish community ‘on the ground’ with humanitarian support for asylum seekers NICOLE RAZ | STAFF WRITER
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s the number of asylum seekers at Arizona’s southern border increases, so too does the number of buses dropping off migrants at International Rescue Committee community shelters in Phoenix. Every day this year, between 75 and 150 asylum seekers have arrived in the Phoenix area, according to Stanford Prescott, community engagement coordinator for IRC in Arizona. These arrivals have already gone through some initial processing with federal immigration officials and have been granted the opportunity to have their case heard before a judge. But they are on their own while they wait. Often, they don’t even know where they are when they get off the bus, Prescott said, and must find a way to travel to friends or family while they await a court hearing. Inside community shelters, volunteers of the IRC and its partners offer warm meals, medical attention and assistance while asylum seekers await the next part of their journey. There is no federal funding for their support, but there are a handful of Jewish organizations working to fill the gap for those in the state. Arizona Jews for Justice is one. “I think the cool thing about Jews is that we’re boldly there,” said Eddie Chavez Calderon, campaign director at AJJ. “We’re not afraid to be on the ground.” He stressed the importance of seeing the situation at the border as “a humanitarian issue. We have to move and shift the dynamic away from thinking that this SEE IMMIGRATION, PAGE 3 is a political issue,” he said. When
Eddie Chavez Calderon, campaign director at Arizona Jews for Justice, left, with AJJ organizer Talia Hoffer and Congregation Beth Israel Associate Rabbi Sara Mason-Barkin and her kids after they dropped off donated items for asylum seekers on April 16. PHOTO COURTESY OF RABBI SARA MASON-BARKIN
Talking about the challenge of infertility Alexa and Ian Sachs welcome twins after a long journey through infertility. To read more, go to p. 11. PHOTO COURTESY OF ALEXA AND IAN SACHS
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