On this tragic anniversary, 100 Days since the Hamas-led atrocities of 7 October, the ASF extends our love, prayers, and support to our sisters and brothers in Israel. Am Yisrael Hai!
Click here to dedicate a future issue in honor or memory of a loved one
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The Sephardi World Weekly is made possible by Daniel Yifrach, Rachel Sally, Professor Rifka Cook, Maria Gabriela Borrego Medina, Rachel Amar, Deborah Arellano, & ASF VP Gwen Zuares!
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🎥“Star of ‘Fauda’ Netflix series badly injured during combat in Gaza”
By Lauren Izso, Tim Lister, Ido Soen, and Jessie Yeung, CNN
Left to Right: Yaakov Zada Daniel, Idan Amedi, Lucy Ayoub, Lior Raz, Doron Ben-David, and Rona-Lee Shim’on, 6 March 2022
(Photo courtesy of Rafi Daluya/Times of Israel)
Idan Amedi, one of the stars of the Netflix series Fauda (his character is Sagi Tzur) and a popular singer on Israel’s Mizrahi music scene, was seriously injured in fighting in the Gaza Strip. Amedi immediately volunteered for reserve duty following Hamas’ barbaric attack on Oct. 7th, and in an interview with Israel’s Channel 12 he recently detailed his unit’s particular mission:
It’s crazy, what they [Hamas] built here… The operation here is on a very central [Hamas tunnel] route. We found kilometers of tunnels here, weaponry, even special weaponry. We’ve been busy the past two days trying to destroy it.
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🎶“Idan Amedi’s songs provide a soundtrack to the war”
By Hannah Brown, The Jerusalem Post
Idan Amedi Concert, Caesarea, Israel, June 2019
(Photo courtesy of Idan Amedi/Facebook)
Artists and public figures have been saying prayers and sending their best wishes for a full recovery to actor and popular vocalist Idan Amedi, who was seriously injured in Gaza. Raised in a Kurdish family from Jerusalem, Amedi “has created a soulful, emotional catalog of hits that reflects the Mizrahi musical influences of his upbringing, as well as drawing inspiration from his combat history.” One of Amedi’s most famous songs, “A Warrior’s Pain,” details the difficulty of coming home to a lover carrying the trauma of combat:
And you don’t know how much/I tried to hide from you/All the nightmares at night/Screams and blood on the uniform/You don’t understand why anymore/I am no longer me/Pictures run [through my mind] from that night/Tears, a warrior’s pain.
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Feature: ‘I’m Kurdish and proud’: Fauda Actor and Singer, Idan Amedi, on his Kurdish-Jewish roots ✡️🙌
By Hevidar Zana, Rudlaw
Idan Amedi on Rudlaw, 18 June 2020
(Image courtesy of Rudlaw)
In a 2020 interview with Rudlaw, a Kurdish television station, Idan Amedi celebrates his Kurdish Jewish heritage, details the life of Kurdish Jews in Israel, and shares how he closes his shows with a Kurdish-language favorite, Sheikhani. Along the way he sings a couple of bars from the famous song and shares his hope to perform one day in Kurdistan.
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A Pizmonim: Sephardic-Hebrew Songs of the Middle East, Volume 1
By David Elihu Cohen
Pizmonim, a unity of poetry and song, have been an integral part of the Jewish People and may be traced in the Bible to the very beginning of our history.
The twelve selected Pizmonim contained in this booklet serve to perpetuate the Greater Sephardic culture and tradition of singing praise to the Lord on all joyous occasions.
By Dr. Hélène Jawhara Piñer, a 2018 ASF Broome & Allen Fellow
In this extraordinary, award-winning and best-selling cookbook now in its 4th imprint, chef and scholar Hélène Jawhara-Piñer combines rich culinary history and Jewish heritage to serve up over fifty culturally significant recipes. Steeped in the history of the Sephardic Jews (Jews of Spain) and their diaspora, these recipes are expertly collected from such diverse sources as medieval cookbooks, Inquisition trials, medical treatises, poems, and literature. Original sources ranging from the thirteenth century onwards and written in Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese, Occitan, Italian, and Hebrew, are here presented in English translation, bearing witness to the culinary diversity of the Sephardim, who brought their cuisine with them and kept it alive wherever they went. Jawhara-Piñer provides enlightening commentary for each recipe, revealing underlying societal issues from anti-Semitism to social order. In addition, the author provides several of her own recipes inspired by her research and academic studies.
Each creation and bite of the dishes herein are guaranteed to transport the reader to the most deeply moving and intriguing aspects of Jewish history. Jawhara-Piñer reminds us that eating is a way to commemorate the past.
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Upcoming Events or Opportunities
The American Sephardi Federation, the Sephardic Jewish Brotherhood of America, the Sephardic Foundation on Aging, and Shearith Israel League Foundation proudly present:
Bendichas Manos:
The 7th Annual New York Ladino Day
Curated by Jane Mushabac and Bryan Kirschen
Featuring:
Rabbi Marc Angel, author and editor of 38 books, and a 2023 International Sephardic Gala Honoree for his decades of remarkable community leadership.
Rachel Amado Bortnick, teacher and founder of the renowned online group, Ladinokomunita, now in its 25th year with 1500 Ladino-speaking members worldwide.
Elizabeth Graver, author of the groundbreaking 2023 Sephardic novel Kantika, and long celebrated for her prize-winning fiction.
Sarah Aroeste, singer/songwriter, and Susan Barocas, foodwriter/story-teller, a duo whose “Savor” program of songs and talk about Sephardic cuisine is garnering raves here and abroad.
Sunday, 21 January at 2:00PM EST
In-Person @the Center for Jewish History
Sign-up Now!
Tickets:
General Admission $25
VIP $36 (includes VIP seating and reception)
Since 2013, Ladino Day programs have been held around the world to honor Ladino, also known as Judeo-Spanish. January 21st marks New York’s 7th Annual Ladino Day hosted by the American Sephardi Federation.
Ladino is a bridge to many cultures. A variety of Spanish, it has absorbed words from Hebrew, Turkish, Arabic, French, Greek, and Portuguese. The mother tongue of Jews in the Ottoman Empire for 500 years, Ladino became the home language of Sephardim worldwide. While the number of Ladino speakers has sharply declined, distinguished Ladino Day programs like ours celebrate and preserve a vibrant language and heritage. These programs are, as Aviya Kushner has written in the Forward, “Why Ladino Will Rise Again.”
© Ioannina, mid-19th century Sephardi & Romaniot Jewish Costumes in Greece & Turkey. 16 watercolours by Nicholas Stavroulakis published by the Association of the Friends of the Jewish Museum of Greece, Athens, 1986.
Please support the New York Ladino Day with a generous, tax-deductible contribution so we can continue to cultivate and advocate, preserve and promote, as well as educate and empower!
Sponsorship opportunities available:
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The Omni-American Future Project, Combat Antisemitism Movement, Jazz Leadership Project, and American Sephardi Federation present
The Blues and Resilience: A Concert in Honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day
This cultural-educational experience with live music featuring acclaimed Israeli Jazz musician (and ASF Pomegranate Award recipient) Itamar Borochov.
Tuesday, 30 January at 6:30PM EST
In-Person @the Center for Jewish History
15 West 16th Street, New York City
Sign-up Now!
Tickets: $20
Proceeds will benefit Holocaust education programs
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The Academic Council of the American Jewish Historical Society invites submissions:
2024 Biennial Scholars Conference on American Jewish History
Revisiting Jewish New York: Centers and Peripheries
Returning to the Center for Jewish History for the first time since 2016 after the Covid-19 pandemic shifted 2020’s conference fully online, next year’s conference seeks to reconsider New York City as a central locus of Jewish life in the United States and around the world.
We hope to interrogate the specific amalgam of “Jewish” and “New York” in varied ways, such as its inner diversities, its boundaries and limits, and its relationship with populations beyond its borders.
12-14 May, 2024
@the Center for Jewish History
*Submissions from now until January 31st.
Sign-up Now!
2024 Biennial Conference Co-Chairs: Hasia Diner and Leah Garrett
Conference Committee Members: Allan Amanik, Hadas Binyamini, Jonathan Karp, Eddy Portnoy
Tickets will go on sale in early 2024. All attendees must also register or renew their Academic Council membership in order to attend.
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The American Sephardi Federation presents:
Convergence: Arabic, Hebrew, and Persian Calligraphy in Conversation
Featuring the multilingual art of Ruben Shimonov Convergence creates a visual world where Hebrew, Arabic, and Persian languages interact with, and speak to, one another; a world where stylized letters and words dance together on the page; a world where cultures, religions, communities, and philosophies intersect.
Juxtaposing cognates from these ancient West Asian languages, artist Ruben Shimonov encourages the viewer to explore the deep-rooted connections between these tongues, as well as the multilayered and transnational identity of the artist himself.
On View in the Leon Levy Gallery
through 31 May 2024
@ the Center for Jewish History
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The American Sephardi Federation and Mimouna Association’s Rebuilding Our Homes Project present:
Re-Creation: Judaica by Moroccan Muslim Artisans
Explore the exhibition of Judeo-Moroccan art, Moroccan Judaica, cultural and religious objects, including Menorot, Mezuzot, Yads, Shabbat Candleholders, Seder Plates, Hallah Covers, and much more.
On View through 31 May 2024
@ the Center for Jewish History
As Moroccan Jewish populations largely left the mellahs (Jewish quarters) in the latter half of the 20th century, there was a danger that not only designs but even the traditional artisanal techniques needed to create them would be lost. Passed down from one artisan to another and perfected over time, these designs and techniques. ranging from vibrant patterns to intricate metalwork and soulful wood carvings, are expressions of Moroccanity and reflect the individual character of each city. The materials and craftsmanship of Rabat are different than Fez, and Essaouira is distinct from both.
Mimouna Association and the American Sephardi Federation’s Rebuilding Our Homes Project, a multi-year USAID-supported New Partnerships Initiative, brought three notable experts-Ms. Zhor Rehihil, Ms. Deborah Koenigsberger Gutierrez, and Ms. Meryem Ghandi to train Moroccan Muslim artisans in the history of Judeo-Moroccan art and guided them in re-creating Moroccan Judaica, which encompasses a diverse array of cultural and religious objects, including Menorot, Mezuzot, Yads, Shabbat Candleholders, Seder Plates, Hallah Covers, and much more.