SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — At the 2010 American Jewish Press Association annual meeting here last week, CJN staff reporter Paul Lungen won a Simon Rockower Award for excellence in news reporting for newspapers over 15,000 circulation and all magazine/websites.

Lungen won for his story “Israeli rabbi rejects Toronto conversion”
(Feb. 9, 2009), about an Israeli rabbinic court’s ruling that the
conversion 29 years ago of Yossi Fackenheim, son of renowned Holocaust
survivor and philosopher Emile Fackenheim, was no longer valid.

In the booklet outlining the winning entries, Lungen’s article is described as following: A fascinating look at a court decision that readers surely found
compelling. The story did an excellent job explaining the legal and
cultural issues surrounding the case of a Toronto-born man who was
converted to Judaism as an infant, but who an Israeli judge deemed no
longer Jewish because he was not observant enough. Is there anyone who
could read this story and not have an opinion? More so, the story was
very well written, laying out the facts in a clear way with good
analysis of the surrounding issues.