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NEW READ
I WANT TO BUY A HOUSE, NOW WHAT?
Blindness foundation research director, Dr. Arielle Silverman, reflects on years of activism
Tips for first-time home buyers
MAY 20, 2022 | IYAR 19, 5782 | VOLUME 74, NUMBER 19
Foundation and Federation now known as the Center for Jewish Philanthropy of Greater Phoenix MALA BLOMQUIST | MANAGING EDITOR
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n the spring of 2021, the Jewish Community Foundation of Greater Phoenix and the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix announced plans to integrate the two organizations into a single operating entity, now called the Center for Jewish Philanthropy of Greater Phoenix (CJP). There was much work going on behind the scenes prior to, and since, that announcement in 2021. “After multiple conversations among the Federation and Foundation boards, we formed a working committee of members from both boards and a few community lay leaders,” said Jonathan Hoffer, who led the task force on the project and has served on the two organizations’ boards. “At the conclusion of the process, there was unanimous support to bring both organizations together.” The organizations then consulted with communities across the country where the Foundation and Federation had integrated. The CJP most closely modeled themselves after JewishColumbus in Columbus, Ohio. The CJP hired the same consultant, David Kaplan, used in Ohio and implemented the same legal structure. While the Federation and Foundation will still exist for legal purposes, the CJP was created as a management organization to support the work on behalf of these two legacy organizations. SEE CJP, PAGE 2 “I don’t want this new
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Program explores culture, history of Bukharian Jews LEISAH WOLDOFF
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n the early 1990s, a few Jewish Bukharian families moved to Phoenix from New York in search of affordable housing and a warmer climate. Today, Phoenix has the largest Bukharian Jewish community in North America outside of New York. What led to this growth and why did so many Jewish families from Central Asia decide to make Phoenix their home? This question inspired Daniel Stein Kokin, Ph.D., to organize “From Samarkand to the Valley of the Sun: The History and Culture of the Bukharan Jews,” which drew more than 200 people to Beth El Congregation in Phoenix on May 1 to learn about the history and culture of Bukharian Jews. The program, presented by Beth El and Arizona State University Jewish Studies, began with a lecture by cultural anthropologist Alanna Cooper, Ph.D., the Abba Hillel Silver Chair in Jewish Studies at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland and author of “Bukharan Jews and the Dynamics of Global Judaism.” She presented a brief history of Bukharian Jews, who come from the city of Bukhara,
Ensemble Shashmaqam, a New York-based group, performs music from their native Uzbekistan and Tadzhikistan. COURTESY OF STUART MECKLER
Uzbekistan and the Central Asian countries of Tajikistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan that surround it. In 1989, just before the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the majority of the world’s Bukharian Jews — around 50,000 — lived in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, Cooper said. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the majority of Bukharian Jews immigrated en masse to the United States and Israel. Today, less than 200 SEE BUKHARIAN, PAGE 3
Got milk? Shavuot is coming Celebrate the holiday with an elegant dairy dinner. See page 17. ISTOCK / GETTY IMAGES PLUS / JUANMONINO
KEEP YOUR EYE ON jewishaz.com
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Israeli police rush funeral-goers, nearly toppling the coffin of Al Jazeera journalist