In Honor of Stella Levi! Auguri, Mazal Tov, saludozos para muchos anyos, con salud ~Dr. Joe Halio, Distinguished ASF Board Member
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Special Announcements
Join us this Sunday, 21 May at 12:00PM EST for an ASF Institute of Jewish Experience Global Event
UNITY THROUGH DIVERSITY
Just a few days left... activate your Pass or Tickets to the 25th NY Sephardic Jewish Film Festival Online!
✡️“Disquiet Among Tunisian Jews Over President’s Response to Deadly Synagogue Attack”
By Ben Cohen, The Algemeiner
Tunisian President Kais Saied, National Security Council Meeting
(Photo courtesy of Reuters/Tunisian Presidency Handout/Algemeiner)
In the wake of the murderous terrorist attack at the El Ghriba Synagogue on the island of Djerba, there were concerns about President Kais Saied’s refusal to call out antisemitism or to offer his condolences to Tunisian Jewry. According to ASF Executive Director Jason Guberman, the response has been a mistake: “While the investigation is ongoing, one would expect, especially given Al Qaeda’s prior terrorist attack on the… Synagogue, that the Tunisian government would do everything in its power to reassure the community and the world by condemning antisemitism, expressing condolences and committing additional security forces.” Instead, Tunisia continues “signal[ing] to Islamist extremists that Tunisia is not only a good source for recruits, but increasingly a target for conquest.”
See follow-up articles:
- “Invoking Palestinian Plight, Tunisian President Again Denies Antisemitic Nature of Attack on Synagogue”
- “Meeting With Chief Rabbi Following Synagogue Atrocity, Tunisian President Again Emphasizes ‘Palestinian Tragedy’”
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Feature: Installing ‘The Genesis Series: The Seventh Day’ by Ghiora Aharoni at the ASF’s 25th New York Sephardic Jewish Film Festival✨🏛
“We’re delighted to have on exhibition ‘The Genesis Series: The Seventh Day’ and a selection of three works from the installation, ‘Let Me Hear Your Voice,’ at the American Sephardi Federation in New York… The sculptures evoke ruminations on humankind’s interconnected cultural narratives and gender mores that transcend the boundaries of both time and geography.” ~Ghiora Aharoni Studio.
Ghiora Aharoni, a world-renowned Israeli-born Yemenite artist and designer, received the 1st ASF “Pomegranate Award for Art, Design, and Architecture” at Opening Night of the 25th NY Sephardic Jewish Film Festival on 8 May. His pieces are held in remarkable collections worldwide, including The Pompidou Center, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and The Vatican. Genesis VI is part of “Ghiora Aharoni – Selected Works for The Pomegranate Award Installation,” an exclusive exhibition of Aharoni’s work that was on display in the Center for Jewish History’s Paul S. And Sylvia Steinberg Great Hall throughout the ASF’s Festival.
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📖“Medieval Jewish thinker Maimonides wrote in Romance language – research”
By The Jerusalem Post
Traditional portrait of the RAMBAM with signature
(Image courtesy of the Jewish Encyclopedia)
The legend of the RAMBAM continues to grow more than eight hundred years after the passing of Judaism’s “Great Eagle,” the Sephardic polymath, jurist, philosopher, writer, physician, and communal leader, Moses ben Maimon. What’s new in Maimonides’ already astounding biography? Until recently it was believed that Maimonides wrote in Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic. However, based on a very old scrap of paper from Cairo’s famed Genizah, José Martínez Delgado, a visiting researcher at the University of Cambridge, has demonstrated that the RAMBAM also wrote in the local Romance alphabet. Amir Ashur of Tel Aviv University confirmed Delgado’s finding. Why was Maimonides writing in a local Romance alphabet that features proto-Spanish and Italian elements and includes terms for “colors, foods, scents and actions?” Speculates Delgado, “‘He was a physician, with students, so perhaps he was gathering the terms for a medical or educational reason, or testing himself on his vocabulary!’”
The ASF recommends at trip to the Yeshiva University Museum’s newly opened
THE GOLDEN PATH: MAIMONIDES ACROSS EIGHT CENTURIES featuring Highlights from the Hartman Family Collection of Manuscripts and Rare Books, now on view at The Center for Jewish History.
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🤝“How an Old-New Ideology Alienates Immigrant Jews”
By David Bernstein, Jason Guberman and Elina Kaplan, The Jewish Journal
“We Are” (Photo courtesy of Getty Images/Jewish Journal)
Three American Jewish leaders—David Bernstein (Founder, Jewish Institute for Liberal Values), Elina Kaplan (President, Alliance for Constructive Ethnic Studies), and Jason Guberman (American Sephardi Federation)—argue that “efforts to make the Jewish community more inclusive of Jewish diversity have been used to smuggle in an illiberal ideology….” While agreeing that “Jews have always been much more diverse than the dominant American Jewish culture has reflected and given voice to,” the deeper answer doesn’t lie in adopting racial essentialism and fitting Jews into categories completely foreign to the Jewish tradition. Rather, being inclusive “requires an open mind to varied perspectives on addressing our challenges, a welcoming attitude, and a commitment to Klal Yisrael—the entirety of the Jewish people—in all its diversity and beauty.”
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Birkenau (Auschwitz II) How 72,000 Greek Jews Perished
By Albert Menache, M.D.
Memoirs of An Eyewitness; NUMBER 124454
This is the story of the destruction of the Balkan Sephardic Jewish Community by the Nazis in WWII. Written by the President of the Jewish Community of Salonica, Greece, it is the earliest published account by a survivor. Written while still in the concentration camp on smuggled paper, it has been out of print since the first edition appeared in 1947.
This new edition has been updated with historical documents, photographs, and notes on the restoration of Jewish life in Greece after the war.
Watch Dr. Joe Halio speak about “Dr. Albert Menache & The Holocaust in Salonika”
The Jews of the Middle East and North Africa: The Impact of World War II
By Professor Reva Spector Simon
Incorporating published and archival material, this volume fills an important gap in the history of the Jewish experience during World War II, describing how the war affected Jews living along the southern rim of the Mediterranean and the Levant, from Morocco to Iran.
Surviving the Nazi slaughter did not mean that Jews living in the Middle East and North Africa were unaffected by the war: there was constant anti-Semitic propaganda and general economic deprivation; communities were bombed; and Jews suffered because of the anti-Semitic Vichy regulations that left them unemployed, homeless, and subject to forced labor and deportation to labor camps.
Covering the entire Middle East and North Africa region, this book on World War II is a key resource for students, scholars, and general readers interested in Jewish history, World War II, and Middle East history.
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Upcoming Events or Opportunities
ASF’s Institute of Jewish Experience presents:
UNITY THROUGH DIVERSITY
2023|5783
Global Event
Presented in celebration of Jewish American Heritage Month
Dancers, singers, communal and global leaders, chefs, and more will provide a virtual taste of the celebration of Jewish diversity.
This year, Unity Through Diversity is shining a spotlight on the binding force of Shabbat. Whether it’s chulent, hamin, kubbanneh, oriza, salmorejo, hraimeh, or any other festive meal you make, shabbat holds a special place in the Jewish world.
Create a watch party, partner with us, or take it all in from home and share in this rich program of Jewish Unity Through Diversity.
Sunday, 21 May
9:00 AM PDT, 12:00 PM EDT, 5:00 PM GMT
6:00 PM CET, 7:00 PM Israel Time
Sign-up Now!
First Hour:
Jewish American Heritage Month
Dr. Misha Galperin | President and CEO, Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History
William Daroff | CEO, Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations
Yinam Cohen | Counsul General of Israel in Chicago
Malcolm Hoenlein | Executive Vice Chairman, Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations
Jason Guberman | Executive Director, American Sephardi Federation
Rabbi Marc Angel | Rabbi Emeritus, Congregation Shearith Israel; Founder & Director, Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals
Jackie Barzvi | Founder, Mizrahi Dance Archives
Sephardi House Fellows, American Sephardi Federation with Ruben Shimonov
Rabbi Dr. Yehonatan Elazar-De Mota, anthropologist and musician
Jewish Language Project, Hebrew Union College
OneTable, Shabbat Together
Dr. Galeet Dardashti, vocalist and composer
Rabbi Yosef Zarnighian | Rabbi, Mikveh Israel, Philadelphia
Rabbi Moshe Tessone | Yeshiva University
Second Hour:
Global Jewish Heritage
Amichai Chikli | Minister of Diaspora Affairs and Social Equality, Israel
Yaakov Hagoel | Chairperson of the World Zionist Organization
Dr. Hélène Jawhara Piñer | Chef and Scholar, France
Hazzan Daniel Benlolo | Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue of Montreal
Rabbanit Oshra Koren | Founder, Matan HaSharon, Israel
Osnat Sharabi Braidman | Choreographer, Israel
Levana Zamir | Historian - Union des Juifs d'Egypte en Israel
Nicole Borger | IMJ Brasil
Matti Seri | Actor, Presenter, Singer, and Author, Israel
To become a sponsor and/or share your watch party information
info@instituteofjewishexperience.org
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Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue and Museum presents:
Greek Jewish Festival
Sunday, 21 May 12:00-6:00PM EST
(280 Broome Street, Lower East Side, NYC)
Join the Greek Jewish Festival as we celebrate the unique Romaniote and Sephardic heritage of the Jews of Greece!
Experience a feast for the senses including authentic kosher Greek foods and homemade Greek pastries, traditional Greek dancing and live Greek and Sephardic music, an outdoor marketplace full of vendors, arts and educational activities for kids, Sephardic cooking demonstrations, and much more!
The ASF is once again proud to be a Festival Sponsor.
Learn more at www.GreekJewishFestival.com
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ASF Broome & Allen & ADL Collaborative for Change Fellow Isaac de Castro presents:
Entre Diasporas: Telling the Latin-American Jewish story. Contando la historia judía latinoamericana
Tell your story. Cuenta tu historia.
We’re looking for first-generation Latino Jews in the United States who immigrated because of political and social turmoil. Jews of Sephardic descent from Colombia, Cuba, and Venezuela that now reside in the Miami area will be given priority, but others are welcome to apply as well.
Fill out this form to be considered as an interviewee for this project. After you’ve submitted, we will be in touch promptly to set up a preliminary phone call.
Click here for more information.