15 July 2016 Mazel Tov/Mabrouk Erez Bitton, Moroccan/Algerian-Israeli Poet and ASF Pomegranate Award Recipient, on his life-long struggle to give voice to the Sephardi-Israeli experience in the face of marginalization and ignorance
Four months ago, Israel’s Education Minister Naftali Bennett asked the poet Erez Bitton, an Israel Prize Laureate and recipient at the 18th NY Sephardic Jewish Film Festival of the American Sephardi Federation’s Pomegranate Award, to head a committee dedicated to introducing Sephardi heritage into Israel’s schools. The committee handed in its work last Thursday, and Bennett celebrated the moment by emphatically declaring: “After 68 years, we are righting a historic wrong… I will see to it that every student learns about their family heritage and is proud of it.”
Miri Regev, who comes from a Moroccan background, formerly served as an IDF Spokeswoman, and is currently Israel’s Culture Minister, said: “I am happy and even excited to see the Bitton Committee’s recommendations... Enough exclusion, now is the time for exaltation — 2016 is the year that the golden age of Mizrahi culture in Israel begins” (Photo courtesy of Cyclowiki)
Erez Bitton (left) reciting a poem as Aryeh Tepper (right), ASF’s Director of Publications, provides simultaneous translation, Opening Night of the 18th NY Sephardic Jewish Film Festival, 12 March 2015 (Photo courtesy of Steven Smith/Guest of a Guest)
According to Erez Bitton, teaching Sephardi heritage in Israel’s schools can help fashion an Israeli identity that is grounded in Jewish history, as opposed to rebelling against it: “We are grappling with the question of what the new Israeli identity is. The ideological stance that served as a foundation for the establishment of the State of Israel was a concept known as ‘the melting pot’ — the creation of a sabra, a native-born Israeli clean of any connection to historical Diaspora Judaism. That position hurt the possibility of building an Israeli identity that stemmed from generations.”
Listen as HaBerira HaTivit, one of the pioneering bands of Mizrahi-Israeli music, transform Erez Bitton’s poem, Hatuna Morokayit (“Moroccan Wedding”), into an earthy and celebratory song.
Ashley Perry, Director General of the Knesset Caucus for the Reconnection with the Descendants of Spanish and Portuguese Communities, celebrates the completion of the Bitton Committee’s report: “There is no one Jewish way in anything, not history, culture or tradition…There are a myriad of histories, a kaleidoscope of cultures and cacophony of traditions which makes the Jewish People a beautiful mosaic, each with its roots in our ancestral homeland but with different experiences during the millennia Diaspora.”
Education Minister Naftali Bennett (right) accepts Erez Bitton’s (left) Report (Photo courtesy of Yossi Zeliger/Israel HaYom)
Southhampton Jewish Film Festival
7:30PM on August 9th Southampton Arts Center
25 Jobs Lane
Southampton, NY 11968
The Last Jews Of Baghdad provides a historical and personal view of the persecution, torture, escape, and flight of over 160,000 Jews from Iraq between the years 1940 and 2003. Carole Basri, born to Iraqi Jewish parents and Vice President of the American Sephardi Federation, presents an amazing account of Jewish life in Iraq based on first hand accounts. Ms. Basri will be on hand to discuss her film and the history of Iraqi Jews. This will be a very special evening and a rare opportunity to meet the filmmaker. The Last Jews Of Baghdad premièred at ASF’s NY Sephardic Jewish Film Festival.
Please click here to purchase tickets (General Admission $15; Students under 21 $7.50) Reservations Suggested
April 7th through September 9th Center for Jewish History 15 West 16th Street
New York City
The American Sephardi Federation, Portuguese Consulate of New York, the Sousa Mendes Foundation, and the Municipality of Almeida, Portugal proudly present a new exhibition in the Leon Levy Gallery honoring Aristides de Sousa Mendes, the courageous and creative Portuguese diplomat who saved Salvador Dali, the authors of Curious George, and thousands of other Holocaust refugees.
Please click here for additional information and viewing hours
The American Sephardi Federation invites you to experience
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The American Sephardi Federation's Sephardi House is located at the Center for Jewish History (15 West 16th St., New York, New York, 10011).
Miri Regev, who comes from a Moroccan background, formerly served as an IDF Spokeswoman, and is currently Israel’s Culture Minister, said: “I am happy and even excited to see the Bitton Committee’s recommendations... Enough exclusion, now is the time for exaltation — 2016 is the year that the golden age of Mizrahi culture in Israel begins” (Photo courtesy of 
