20 October 2017 In honor of ASF International Sephardic Leadership Award Recipient Ambassador Andrés Roemer, who was awarded an Honorary Knighthood of the Ecumenical Order of the Cross of Malta in a ceremony at Rhode last month
During Operation Torch, the November 1942 Allied invasion of North Africa, the twin pillars of American policy in the Middle East were established: “To instrumentalize the Middle East for the sake of larger U.S. security interests and to adopt a zero-sum approach toward U.S. relations with Arabs and Jews.” Those principles led to the betrayal of the Algerian Jews, who heroically helped facilitate America’s military victory, and they have colored America’s policy in the Middle East ever since.
A scene from The Night of Fools screened at the 20th NYSJFF
(Photo courtesy of filmmaker Rami Kimchi)
Aomar Boum was born in raised in the Amazigh (Berber) regions of southern Morocco. Today, Boum is an associate professor at UCLA, where he researches the Jewish history of Morocco, and, in particular, “how Muslims view the Jewish community and what it means to be of Moroccan Jewish descent in other parts of the world.” What inspires a Moroccan Muslim to study Moroccan Jewish history? “What drives me through research… is hopefully giving voice to the vulnerable.”
Nadira (aka Florence Ezekiel Nadira), a Baghdadi Jew and star of 1950s and 1960s Bollywood, in a scene from Shree 420
(Photo courtesy of Explore Jewish India)
The documentary film “Shalom Bollywood” shines a light on the pioneering role played by Jewish-Indian women in establishing the Indian cinematic colossus known as, “Bollywood.”
An Indian online magazine interviews Danny Ben-Moshe, a documentary movie-maker whose film exploring the role played by Jew women in Indian Cinema, “Shalom Bollywood,” was recently featured in Mumbai, “Coming here as a diaspora Jew, one of the first questions I asked the Jewish interviewees was about antisemitism. And they looked at me like my question was crazy and asked me, “What antisemitism?” I realised that there is something really unique about the Indian Jewish experience.”
The 19th NYSJFF featured a film starting Bollywood pioneer Pramila, who also appeared in the ASF exhibit Baghdadis & The Bene Israel in Bollywood & Beyond: Indian Jews in the Movies
(Photo courtesy of Wikipedia)
The American Sephardi Federation and New York Jewish Travel Guide proudly present:
Jewish Heritage of Malta An evening exploring a beautiful island's connection to Jewish history and culture
Monday, October 23
6:00 - 8:30 p.m.
Leo & Julia Forchheimer Auditorium and
Paul S. & Sylvia Steinberg Great Hall
Center for Jewish History
15 W 16th Street
New York, NY 10011
Evidence of Jewish history dates back to Roman times (4-5 Century) as seen at the St. Paul’s Catacomb site at Rabat, Malta, where several Jewish catacombs (pictured above) can be found alongside Christian burials.
The contemporary Maltese Jewish community is composed of immigrants from Gibraltar, England, North Africa, Portugal, and Turkey, arriving over the course of French and British rule starting in 1798. During the early 20th century, the islands Jews did not have a rabbi of their own and rabbis would often be flown in from Sicily to perform ceremonies. During World War II, Malta was the only European country not requiring visas for Jews fleeing German rule. Numerous Maltese Jews, moreover, fought Germany in the British Army during the war. Today, a small but active community of under 200 Jews live on Malta with their own synagogue and rabbis.
Featuring guest speaker Dr. John Baldacchino (Director, University of Wisconsin-Madison Arts Institute), the program will present multimedia presentations showing Jewish heritage sites in Malta today. Please click here to reserve tickets
Presented in Partnership with:
The Malta Tourism Authority
Exclusively Malta Luxury Travel, Ltd.
Corinthia Palace Hotel & Spa
Jewish Heritage of the Deccan Book Talk with
Dr. George Michell, Editor
and
Kenneth X. Robbins, Author
Thursday, October 26
6:30 p.m.
Oded Halahmy Gallery at ASF
Center for Jewish History
15 W 16th Street
New York, NY 10011
Please join us to celebrate the Deccan Heritage Foundation's new publication; Jewish Heritage of the Deccan; Mumbai, The Northern Konan, Pune.
Co-authored by Kenneth X. Robbins and Pushkar Sohoni, this guidebook is illustrated with splendid, newly commissioned photographs by Surendra Kumar. It is the first such publication to describe the synagogues, cemeteries, libraries, schools and research centers of the Bene Israel community and the more recent émigré Baghdadi Jews in the state of Maharashtra, India. Monuments and sites of both communities are preserved in Mumbai (Bombay) and Pune (Poona), as well as in the smaller towns in the northern Konkan region.
Descriptions are arranged according to itineraries to encourage citizens of Mumbai and Pune, as well as visitors to these cities and the towns of the Konkan, to discover this often overlooked aspect of local history. Intended as a handy reference to the Jewish presence in Maharashtra, the volume should contribute to a better appreciation of this significant aspect of Deccan history, and hopefully to the preservation of Jewish sites and monuments for future generations.
DR. GEORGE MICHELL trained as an architect and studied Indian archaeology at the School of Oriental and African Studies at University of London. He has conducted research projects at many historical sites in India, including Hampi Vijayanagara. Among his many publications are Architecture and Art of the Deccan Sultanates, Mughal Architecture & Gardens, Falaknuma Palace, Hyderabad, Late Temple Architecture of India, and Mansions of Chettinad. He is based in London, and is a founding trustee of the Deccan Heritage Foundation in the UK.
KENNETH X. ROBBINS is a psychiatrist based in Washington D.C., as well as a collector of South Asian art, and historian of expatriate communities in India. He is co-editor of African Elites in India: Habshi Amarat (Ahmedabad, 2006) and Western Jews in India (New Delhi, 2013), and curator of an exhibition on Jews in India held at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi, in 2017. He is also interested in Maharajas, Nawabs and Indian Princely States.
ASF proudly worked with Dr. Robbins to create the traveling exhibit, “Baghdadis & the Bene Israel in Bollywood & Beyond,” which was covered by NBC News, Desi Talk (the NY Metro print edition of The New Times India), The Jewish Week, and The Jerusalem Report. The exhibit was inaugurated with a talk by India’s Consul General at New York.
Tuesday, November 7
7:30 p.m.
Leo & Julia Forchheimer Auditorium
Center for Jewish History
15 W 16th Street
New York, NY 10011
At a time when the freedom of the Kurdish people is imperiled, join the American Sephardi Federation for a virtual guided tour of Jewish historical sites in Iraqi-Kurdistan, ranging from the traditional shrines of Biblical prophets to the tomb of the first woman rabbi, and then hear how the Kurds assisted an Iraqi Jew escape Saddam Hussein’s tyrannical regime.
ASF Board Member Jamil Ezra, a native of Baghdad, will share his inspiring story of fleeing 1970s Baathist Iraq with the help of the Kurds, including a young Masoud Barzani, now President of the Kurdish Regional Government. Barzani personally drove Jamil to freedom.
This virtual guided journey to Jewish-Iraqi Kurdistan is the product of nine years of research and multiple research expeditions.
Just before the rise of ISIS, a team of researchers from the Diarna Geo-Museum of North African and Middle Eastern Jewish Life journeyed to Iraqi-Kurdistan to document the last remnants of Jewish life, more than fifty years after the community disbanded. Warmly greeted by Kurds who fondly remembered their Jewish neighbors and Peshmurga who invited them for tea at a checkpoint, the Diarna researchers discovered hidden Jewish history in caves and behind crumbling walls. Learn about fascinating sites in Amediye, Akre, al-Qoosh, Betanur, Kirkuk, and elsewhere.
More recently, as detailed in Newsweek’s March 3, 2017 cover story, a Diarna researcher survived an ISIS chemical attack at Sinjar as work continues to discover and document the area's rich Jewish history.
Reservation required. Please click here to reserve tickets
November 5-7 Philadelphia, PA
Academics, genealogists, and the interested public are invited to the 27th conference of the Society for Crypto-Judaic Studies, an international academic research and cultural association devoted to the history of the descendants of Jews who were persecuted in Spain and Portugal from the 15th-18th centuries.
This year’s theme, “Crypto-Judaism in the Americas,” explores crypto-Judaism from many disciplines (e.g., anthropology, history, sociology, philosophy, literature, music, art history, etc.) and from many geographic locations or time periods, especially the issue of crypto-Jewish identity, both historic and contemporary.
Keynote speaker Professor Ronnie Perelis, PhD, of Yeshiva University, scholar of medieval and early modern Jewish history, professor of Sephardic Studies at the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies of Yeshiva University, and author of Narratives from the Sephardic Atlantic: Blood and Faith, will discuss the Inquisition, crypto-Judaism, and Sephardic culture. We are further proud to present noted academic, author and specialist in Spanish language, literature and Hispanic-Judaic studies, Dr. David Gitlitz, who will present “The First Practicing Crypto-Jewish Family in Mexico.”
Through December 2017
in ASF’s Leon Levy Gallery Center for Jewish History
15 W 16th Street
New York, NY 10011
The Philos Project and American Sephardi Federation cordially invite you to “Nosotros," an art exhibit featuring the work of two renowned Latino artists, Angel Urrely (Cuba) and Carlos Ayala (Puerto Rico)--as a symbolic recognition and “step forward” to improving Jewish-Latino relations. We thank the Dominican artist, Juan Bravo, for exhibiting his pieces for the exhibit’s Opening Night. Each piece reflects the shared roots of Jewish and Latino communities and expresses hope for a more positive future from the perspective of each respective artist.
Each artist has displayed their works in hundreds of exhibits in both the US and Latin America, having many of them included in some of the most coveted collections in the world. We are very excited to bring them and their works to celebrate the importance of uniting us (or Nosotros), the Jewish and Latino communities, and having this art displayed in a very powerful way at the American Sephardi Federation at the Center for Jewish History. Artists:
Angel Urrely is to the point. This son of Cuba does not beat around the bush. At least not for what the brush comes to reveal—his theory is clear and sharp. Each frame creates a specific, assertive and brutal connection. The reading of his work is—from the perspective of the viewer—very simple, to the point that if you assume an interpretation of what you are reading, believe me: Urrely is addressing exactly what you are thinking. Urrely has something to tell you and will let you know one way or another.
Carlos Ayala presents himself as the “Benjamin” of the tribes, the youngest of them all. This son of Puerto Rico presupposes that his youth may seem an obstacle to you, so he shows you his clutched fists from the introduction. This young man is fierce. Carlos shows us the deepest pains experienced by man, and brings them to an entertained, distracted and ill-bred public. He does not sit down to dream on the Caribbean coast and wait for boats loaded with promises. He does not have the time for it, but rather wants to remind you that even at the best moments pain is present. And at any moment it can befall us.
We look forward to having you join us!
Please click here for additional information and viewing hours
Echoes of Jewish Morocco: A Photographic Exhibit by Joshua Shamsi/Diarna: The Geo-Museum of North African and Middle Eastern Jewish Life
Through October 23
in ASF’s Myron Habib, A”H Memorial Display
Selma L. Batkin Mezzanine Center for Jewish History
15 W 16th Street
New York, NY 10011
Please click here for additional information and viewing hours
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The American Sephardi Federation is located at the Center for Jewish History (15 West 16th Street, New York, New York, 10011).
