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27 March 2020

In Memory of the Michele “Micky” Sciama, A”H, a Cairo-born, Italian Jewish leader (former Secretary General of Milan’s Jewish Community), who succumbed to COVID-19
 
Click here to dedicate a future issue in honor or memory of a loved one. 
The Sephardi World Weekly is made possible by generous readers like you. Show your support by becoming a Patron via Patreon and your name will appear in each edition along with timely, thought-provoking articles on Greater Sephardi history, the arts, and current affairs. Thanking you in advance! And thank you to Sephardi World Weekly Patrons Maria Gabriela Borrego Medina and Gwen Zuares!
 
Decolonizing the Soul” 
By Karen Lehrman Bloch, The Jewish Journal
 
Karen Lehrman Bloch recently joined the new Moise Safra Center on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Her time there, “‘has made me feel Jewish in ways I’m still processing.’” She found “‘an unabashed pride in being Jewish’” that moved her to wonder, “‘Does Sephardic culture better nurture that pride?’” She also offers some advice. Embracing the fundamentally Middle Eastern roots of all Jews, she thinks that, “‘Ashkenazim now need to unite with Sephardim and Mizrahim,’” in order to, “‘fully decolonize[e] our minds and souls.’”

Moise Safra Center
(Photo courtesy of PDBW Architects

 
Feature: Jo Amar, a Chorus and an Oud: The Moroccan Haggadah


Jo Amar
(Photo courtesy of Aazran/Dafina.net)

 The novel Coronavirus can stymie commerce and travel, but it can’t stop Passover from happening and it’s time to start getting ready. You can get in the mood with the great Moroccan payytan Jo Amar, accompanied by a chorus and an oud, as he narrates the Passover Haggadah, according to traditional Moroccan rhythms and tunes.

Michelle Azar Aaron
(Photo courtesy of the author) 


 
Passover Palate: Sephardi Food for Passover” 
By Linda Morel, Jewish Exponent
 
Michelle Azar Aaron singer, actor, writer, and daughter of an Iraqi-Jewish father, is getting ready for Passover. She’s got recipes for Yemenite charoset, tasty Moroccan-Jewish stew, North African Jewish orange date almond torte, and the Sephardi staple of huevos haminados (hard-boiled eggs). She playfully offers, “‘I put eggs and onion skins in the oven all night… After they’re cooled and dry, I write everyone’s name on an egg with a Sharpie. At seders, you crack your egg on someone else.’” Recipes included.
Sephardi Gifts:
Generations Eat Together, a Celebration of Jewish Foods
by Anita Capouano

Generations Eat Together is a collection of over 325 unique recipes for well-known Mediterranean dishes, European specialties, and Southern American favorites. Together they bring to life the delicious flavors of the Sephardic and Ashkenazi - two distinct cultures represented in the Agudath Israel Etz Ahayem Synagogue of Montgomery, Alabama.

Even if you are not a cook, this book is for you. You'll love the delightful family food stories woven throughout the book showing just how much enjoying food together is part of the fabric of our lives. Helpful drawings and tips from the experts are a plus for cooks of every level.

 
Contemporary Sephardic Identity in the Americas: An Interdisciplinary Approach
by Margalit Bejarano; Edna Aizenberg


The Sephardic population in the Americas is formed by a large number of small groups, divided according to the communities of origin in the Iberian Peninsula, the Middle East, and North Africa, and dispersed among English–, Spanish–, Portuguese–, and French-speaking societies. While the emigration from the Ottoman Empire that began one hundred years ago resulted in the fragmentation of Sephardic communities, their dynamism allowed them to adapt and survive, striving to retain the old yet gesturing continually to the new. On the threshold of the twenty-first century, these communities became subject to transnational migrations and globalization that called for a new definition of the boundaries between the different Sephardic groups and new interpretations of their culture. 

In this pioneering collection, Bejarano and Aizenberg provide a vital contribution to the long-neglected study of the Sephardic experience in the Americas. Spanning from the 1908 revolution of the young Turks that motivated migration from the Ottoman Empire to the establishment of new Sephardic centers in South Florida, the editors draw from the fields of history, literature, musicology, and linguistics. Focusing on recent developments such as the growing participation of Sephardim in Jewish politics and the emergence of orthodox trends that challenge separate Sephardic identities, contributors highlight the growing influence of Sephardim on the culture of their respective countries.

 
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Upcoming Events or Opportunities:


The ASF Institute of Jewish Experience presents:

The Crypto Experience
The Global History of Secret Jews

An online course presented in 10 minute episodes.
Learn at your own pace.


Please sign-up now!
Total cost of the course is $75.00

The ASF Institute of Jewish Experience is proud to present “The Crypto Experience,” an online course on Crypto-Jews. It is part of a series of online courses on a variety of topics that make up the robust Jewish experience.

For hundreds of years there have been descendants of Crpto-Jews, who have covertly kept some of their traditions while maintaining a very different public persona. It is a question of identity, be it Huegenot, Catholic, Sephardi, or Mashadi. Professing one faith on the outside and another on the inside speaks to our quest for defining identity today.

These questions of identity that we think are so new and so relevant are really rather old questions under different circumstances. In this course Dr. Hilda Nissimi (Bar Ilan University) presents an overview of crypto societies historically and in the context of today. She challenges the participants to ask themselves difficult questions like: What defines identity? If I project this outer self, how do I keep my real me? Who is the real me? Am I the me before the expression of an outer facade? Is it a new me?

The course discusses these questions as they pertain to Jews, specifically. What does it mean to be a Jew? What do I have to keep if I want to call myself a Jew? Am I allowed to change? Am I the person to decide? Who will decide? How can anyone decide under such circumstances?

In order to understand this in historic and cultural contexts, world-renowned scholars and experts in the field have joined Dr. Nissimi and will be presenting the challenges facing a range of crypto societies: 

Huegenots – Dr. Hilda Nissimi
Spanish-Portuguese Crypto Society – Dr. Ronnie Perelis (Yeshiva University)
Bildi’in of Morocco – Professor Paul Fenton (Sorbonne Université, Paris) 
Mashhadi Jews of Iran – Dr. Hilda Nissimi
Tracing Jewish Roots – Genie and Michael Milgrom
Growing Up Mashhadi– Reuben Ebrahimoff


For more information and other ASF IJE online course offerings visit: https://courses.instituteofjewishexperience.org/


The ASF Institute of Jewish Experience presents:

The Greek Experience
Explore the world of Greek Jewry from the ancient Romaniote to the Sephardim and others who made it to and through Greece.

An online course presented in 10 minute episodes.
Learn at your own pace.


Please sign-up now!
Total cost of the course is $75.00

Jews have been in Greece since before the Temple was destroyed. They were in Greece upon the founding of the Greek Orthodox Church. Community members, known as Romaniote, made their way through Venice, Byzantium, Spain, across the Ottoman Empire, and beyond.
 
Dr. Yitzchak Kerem provides an overview of the unique languages, liturgical nuances, and communal life of Jews across Greece. Dr Kerem spent significant time living in Greece and researching Greek and Sephardic history. Photographs, maps, and personal accounts provide course participants with a full picture of the unique nature of the Jews of Greece and its surroundings.
 
In the course, participants will look at major influential points in Greek Jewish history. They will explore The Golden Age of Salonika, a time when Greece’s northern city was a hub of Jewish scholarship. Kerem introduces the tension arising in the Greek Jewish community because of Shabtai Tzvi and the Sabbateanism movement that brought with it false messianism and conversion to Islam, at least outwardly.
 
The course looks at when the Alliance Israélite Universelle moved in and the Sephardic culture in Greece developed a rich secular culture with its own novels, theater, and music. 
 
This is part of the greater Jewish heritage and history that is often overlooked. ASF IJE online courses will bring to life all parts of the greater Jewish Experience.

For more information and other ASF IJE online course offerings visithttps://courses.instituteofjewishexperience.org/

 and your generous tax-deductible contribution will empower the ASF to fight for Jewish unity and champion the Sephardi voice in Jewish communal affairs at home and abroad, as well as in our programs, publications, and projects. 

Contact us by email to learn about giving opportunities in honor or memory of loved ones

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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).

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