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Leni Reiss, longtime editor of Arizona Jewish weekly, dies at 84
(Jewish News of Greater Phoenix via JTA) — In a June 8 interview with Jewish News of Greater Phoenix for an article on the 75th anniversary of the Arizona weekly, Leni Reiss spoke candidly about her then nine-month battle with pancreatic cancer.
“I’m getting wonderful treatment and have wonderful doctors and I’m not letting myself be sad,” said Reiss, the former longtime editor of Jewish News. “I’m not bringing anybody down with me.”
She also expressed how “unbelievably wonderful” her family and friends had been since her diagnosis.
Reiss died on Sept. 6, after turning 84 on Aug. 25.
Between her work editing and writing for Jewish News and her lay leadership roles in a range of organizations — including Hadassah, the Jewish National Fund and the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix — Reiss was a fixture in the Phoenix Jewish community for six decades, noted for her outgoing personality, quick wit, creative ideas and flair, along with a wide network of friends and colleagues.
On the national level, for many years she directed Do The Right Thing, a mentoring program for college journalists that originated at the New York Jewish Week and was sponsored by the Jewish federation network. From 2005 to 2019, she was associate program director of The Conversation, a North American annual retreat for leaders and emerging leaders in Jewish life, sponsored by the New York Jewish Week.
She was also a member of the board of the Jewish Investigative Journalism Fund, sponsored by the Andrea and Charles Bronfman Foundation Philanthropies, in the 1980s and ’90s.
“Leni brought enthusiasm, compassion, curiosity and humor to her interactions with people,” said Gary Rosenblatt, the former editor and publisher of the New York Jewish Week. “She was as thoroughly professional in her journalism — reporting and editing — as she was thoroughly charming in her personal life.”
Over the years, Reiss was invited on more than a dozen press trips to Israel and traveled to Lebanon right after the 1982 war there. She told of how she and fellow journalists were on a road outside of Beirut where they had to watch where they walked because of landmines, and how she investigated a cave used by the Palestine Liberation Organization, where there was still ammunition lying on the ground. During that trip, she met professional colleagues whom she kept in touch with for decades.
Raised in New York, Reiss attended Ohio State University, where she got a degree in education and met her husband, Barry, who was from Newark, New Jersey. She joined him in Arizona (“under great duress,” she would say) in August 1961 with their six-month-old son, Mitchell.
Settling into her new home, she joined the Jewish Community Center and met other young mothers there. Reiss then joined Hadassah and became involved with the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix’s young leadership group.
“My Jewish life really took off and never stopped,” she said during a 2008 interview for the Arizona Jewish Historical Society’s Arizona Memory Project. “I credit the Jewish community here with a very full and wonderful family life.”
Reiss started at Jewish News in 1976, working as a columnist and staff writer under then-owners Pearl and Cecil Newmark. She was promoted to managing editor when the Newmarks’ daughter, Flo Eckstein and her husband, Paul, bought the paper in 1981. Reiss worked as managing editor until May 1994.
“I valued her friendship, energy, creativity, commitment to the Jewish community and devotion to getting the facts right in every story,” said Eckstein in an email to Jewish News. Under her leadership, wrote Eckstein, Jewish News won numerous reporting and editing awards from the American Jewish Press Association. “She and I nearly always participated in our association’s annual meetings to accept them in person,” she said.
Reiss was a winner of the Joseph Polakoff Award for Distinguished Service to Jewish Journalism, cited for her career at Jewish News and for chairing several of the AJPA’s editorial workshops.
Rae Janvey, a senior consultant to The Conversation who worked closely with Leni, noted: “The world has lost a warm, loving, generous and larger than life heart-full human being. It was a gift to partner with Leni in our group for all these years. She was a linchpin to the joy we all felt.”
When Reiss left Jewish News, she continued writing for various local and national publications as a freelancer. Locally, she also volunteered her time to Book Pals, a public school literacy program.
During her career, she interviewed prime ministers, politicians and was invited to the White House twice. The second time, President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama invited her to the White House Hanukkah party.
But her first White House visit was much more memorable.
Then-Vice President George H.W. Bush was getting ready to run for president and had just returned from a trip to the Middle East and wanted press coverage, so he invited a handful of journalists from Jewish newspapers across the country to the White House.
Her flight leaving Phoenix was six hours late and through a “series of misadventures,” she arrived in Philadelphia in the middle of the night to a closed terminal. At 6 a.m., when the ticket window opened, she got on a flight to Washington, D.C., without her luggage.
She called White House Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater and explained the situation. “I’m wearing jeans, sneakers and a Western shirt. I don’t want to in any way seem disrespectful, but I want to come to the White House,” she said.
Fitzwater told her to come, so she took a cab to the White House. When Bush entered the room, he asked, “Which one of you is the young woman from Phoenix?” Reiss said, “Oh, that would be me,” and stood up. He came over to her, and taking her hands in his, told her, “I’m so sorry for what you had to go through.”
Perhaps her favorite story was about her off-the-cuff interview with Sammy Davis Jr. on board a flight to Israel during the Lebanon War. En route to entertain the Israeli troops, he came down from the first-class upper deck of the plane, and Leni introduced herself and convinced him to sit and talk with her for a few minutes. Soon, a crowd of passengers gathered around them, taking pictures. At that point, Leni turned and commented to the star: “Don’t worry, Sammy, this happens to me wherever I go.”
Reiss is survived by her husband, Barry; children Mitchell (Elissa) Reiss and Andrean Maron (Scott Weiss); grandchildren Jasmine, Ethan, Brooke, Isaac and Jory Weiss and Matana, Eden and Shai Maron.
A version of this article appeared in Jewish News of Greater Phoenix.
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The post Leni Reiss, longtime editor of Arizona Jewish weekly, dies at 84 appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Syria’s Sharaa Says Talks With Israel Could Yield Results ‘In Coming Days’
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa speaks at the opening ceremony of the 62nd Damascus International Fair, the first edition held since the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, in Damascus, Syria, Aug. 27, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi
Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa said on Wednesday that ongoing negotiations with Israel to reach a security pact could lead to results “in the coming days.”
He told reporters in Damascus the security pact was a “necessity” and that it would need to respect Syria’s airspace and territorial unity and be monitored by the United Nations.
Syria and Israel are in talks to reach an agreement that Damascus hopes will secure a halt to Israeli airstrikes and the withdrawal of Israeli troops who have pushed into southern Syria.
Reuters reported this week that Washington was pressuring Syria to reach a deal before world leaders gather next week for the UN General Assembly in New York.
But Sharaa, in a briefing with journalists including Reuters ahead of his expected trip to New York to attend the meeting, denied the US was putting any pressure on Syria and said instead that it was playing a mediating role.
He said Israel had carried out more than 1,000 strikes on Syria and conducted more than 400 ground incursions since Dec. 8, when the rebel offensive he led toppled former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.
Sharaa said Israel’s actions were contradicting the stated American policy of a stable and unified Syria, which he said was “very dangerous.”
He said Damascus was seeking a deal similar to a 1974 disengagement agreement between Israel and Syria that created a demilitarized zone between the two countries.
He said Syria sought the withdrawal of Israeli troops but that Israel wanted to remain at strategic locations it seized after Dec. 8, including Mount Hermon. Israeli ministers have publicly said Israel intends to keep control of the sites.
He said if the security pact succeeds, other agreements could be reached. He did not provide details, but said a peace agreement or normalization deal like the US-mediated Abraham Accords, under which several Muslim-majority countries agreed to normalize diplomatic ties with Israel, was not currently on the table.
He also said it was too early to discuss the fate of the Golan Heights because it was “a big deal.”
Reuters reported this week that Israel had ruled out handing back the zone, which Donald Trump unilaterally recognized as Israeli during his first term as US president.
“It’s a difficult case – you have negotiations between a Damascene and a Jew,” Sharaa told reporters, smiling.
SECURITY PACT DERAILED IN JULY
Sharaa also said Syria and Israel had been just “four to five days” away from reaching the basis of a security pact in July, but that developments in the southern province of Sweida had derailed those discussions.
Syrian troops were deployed to Sweida in July to quell fighting between Druze armed factions and Bedouin fighters. But the violence worsened, with Syrian forces accused of execution-style killings and Israel striking southern Syria, the defense ministry in Damascus and near the presidential palace.
Sharaa on Wednesday described the strikes near the presidential palace as “not a message, but a declaration of war,” and said Syria had still refrained from responding militarily to preserve the negotiations.
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Anti-Israel Activists Gear Up to ‘Flood’ UN General Assembly
US Capitol Police and NYPD officers clash with anti-Israel demonstrators, on the day Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a joint meeting of Congress, on Capitol Hill, in Washington, DC, July 24, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
Anti-Israel groups are planning a wave of raucous protests in New York City during the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) over the next several days, prompting concerns that the demonstrations could descend into antisemitic rhetoric and intimidation.
A coalition of anti-Israel activists is organizing the protests in and around UN headquarters to coincide with speeches from Middle Eastern leaders and appearances by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The demonstrations are expected to draw large crowds and feature prominent pro-Palestinian voices, some of whom have been criticized for trafficking in antisemitic tropes, in addition to calling for the destruction of Israe.
Organizers of the demonstrations have promoted the coordinated events on social media as an opportunity to pressure world leaders to hold Israel accountable for its military campaign against Hamas in Gaza, with some messaging framed in sharply hostile terms.
On Sunday, for example, activists shouted at Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon.
“Zionism is terrorism. All you guys are terrorists committing ethnic cleansing and genocide in Gaza and Palestine. Shame on you, Zionist animals,” they shouted.
BREAKING: PRO-PALESTINE PROTESTORS CONFRONT “ISRAELI” AMBASSADOR DANNY DANON AT THE UNITED NATIONS
1/5 pic.twitter.com/4G1VYEMGzV
— Within Our Lifetime (@WOLPalestine) September 14, 2025
The Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM), warned on its website that the scale and tone of the planned demonstrations risk crossing the line from political protest into hate speech, arguing that anti-Israel activists are attempting to hijack the UN gathering to spread antisemitism and delegitimize the Jewish state’s right to exist.
Outside the UN last week, masked protesters belonging to the activist group INDECLINE kicked a realistic replica of Netanyahu’s decapitated head as though it were a soccer ball.
US activist group plays soccer with Bibi’s mock decapitated HEAD right outside NYC UN HQ
Peep shot at 00:40
Footage posted by INDECLINE collective just as UN General Assembly about to kick off
‘Following the game, ball was donated to Palestinian Genocide Museum’ pic.twitter.com/TQ84sgZhKr
— RT (@RT_com) September 9, 2025
Within Our Lifetime (WOL), a radical anti-Israel activist group, has vowed to “flood” the UNGA on behalf of the pro-Palestine movement.
WOL, one of the most prolific anti-Israel activist groups, came under immense fire after it organized a protest against an exhibition to honor the victims of the Oct. 7 massacre at the Nova Music Festival in southern Israel. During the event, the group chanted “resistance is justified when people are occupied!” and “Israel, go to hell!”
“We will be there to confront them with the truth: Their silence and inaction enable genocide. The world cannot continue as if Gaza does not exist,” WOL said of its planned demonstrations in New York. “This is the time to make our voices impossible to ignore. Come to New York by any means necessary, to stand, to march, to demand the UN act and end the siege.”
Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM), two other anti-Israel organizations that have helped organize widespread demonstrations against the Jewish state during the war in Gaza, also announced they are planning a march from Times Square to the UN headquarters on Friday.
“The time is now for each and every UN member state to uphold their duty under international law: sanction Israel and end the genocide,” the groups said in a statement.
JVP, an organization that purports to fight for “Palestinian liberation,” has positioned itself as a staunch adversary of the Jewish state. The group argued in a 2021 booklet that Jews should not write Hebrew liturgy because hearing the language would be “deeply traumatizing” to Palestinians. JVP has repeatedly defended the Oct. 7 massacre of roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel by Hamas as a justified “resistance.” Chapters of the organization have urged other self-described “progressives” to throw their support behind Hamas and other terrorist groups against Israel
Similarly, PYM, another radical anti-Israel group, has repeatedly defended terrorism and violence against the Jewish state. PYM has organized many anti-Israel protests in the two years following the Oct. 7 attacks in the Jewish state. Recently, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) called for a federal investigation into the organization after Aisha Nizar, one of the group’s leaders, urged supporters to sabotage the US supply chain for the F-35 fighter jet, one of the most advanced US military assets and a critical component of Israel’s defense.
The UN General Assembly has historically been a flashpoint for heated debate over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Previous gatherings have seen dueling demonstrations outside the Manhattan venue, with pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups both seeking to influence the international spotlight.
While warning about the demonstrations, CAM noted it recently launched a new mobile app, Report It, that allows users worldwide to quickly and securely report antisemitic incidents in real time.
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Nina Davidson Presses Universities to Back Words With Action as Jewish Students Return to Campus Amid Antisemitism Crisis
Nina Davidson on The Algemeiner’s ‘J100’ podcast. Photo: Screenshot
Philanthropist Nina Davidson, who served on the board of Barnard College, has called on universities to pair tough rhetoric on combatting antisemitism with enforcement as Jewish students returned to campuses for the new academic year.
“Years ago, The Algemeiner had published a list ranking the most antisemitic colleges in the country. And number one was Columbia,” Davidson recalled on a recent episode of The Algemeiner‘s “J100” podcast. “As a board member and as someone who was representing the institution, it really upset me … At the board meeting, I brought it up and I said, ‘What are we going to do about this?’”
Host David Cohen, chief executive officer of The Algemeiner, explained he had revisited Davidson’s remarks while she was being honored for her work at The Algemeiner‘s 8th annual J100 gala, held in October 2021, noting their continued relevance.
“It could have been the same speech in 2025,” he said, underscoring how longstanding concerns about campus antisemitism, while having intensified in the aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, are not new.
Davidson argued that universities already possess the tools to protect students – codes of conduct, time-place-manner rules, and consequences for threats or targeted harassment – but too often fail to apply them evenly. “Statements are not enough,” she said, arguing that institutions need to enforce their rules and set a precedent that there will be consequences for individuals who refuse to follow them.
She also said that stakeholders – alumni, parents, and donors – are reassessing their relationships with schools that, in their view, have not safeguarded Jewish students. While supportive of open debate, Davidson distinguished between protest and intimidation, calling for leadership that protects expression while ensuring campus safety.
The episode surveyed specific pressure points that administrators will face this fall: repeat anti-Israel encampments, disruptions of Jewish programming, and the challenge of distinguishing political speech from conduct that violates university rules. “Unless schools draw those lines now,” Davidson warned, “they’ll be scrambling once the next crisis hits.”
Cohen closed by framing the discussion as a test of institutional credibility, asking whether universities will “turn policy into protection” in real time. Davidson agreed, pointing to students who “need to know the rules aren’t just on paper.”
The full conversation is available on The Algemeiner’s “J100” podcast.