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11 April 2021 
 
Mazal tov/Mabrouk to ASF Young Leaders Ezra Mosseri & Michelle Bassaly on their engagement!

 Click here to dedicate a future issue in honor or memory of a loved one.

Thank you to 
Sephardi World Weekly Patrons Professor Rifka Cook,  Maria Gabriela Borrego Medina, Rachel Amar, Deborah Arellano, and Distinguished ASF Vice President Gwen Zuares!
Become a Patron today!


During Passover, Iranian regime-backed Houthis expelled almost all of Yemen’s last Jews. They continue to illegally imprison Levi Salem Musa Marhabi. Don’t turn away. Don’t close your eyes. Don’t let another group of Jews become forgotten refugees. Join the ASF’s campaign to #FreeLeviMarhabi.
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Hakham Rabbi Elie Abadie, MD, “The Exodus of Jews from Arab Lands and the Legal Struggle for Their Rights,” Bar-Ilan University Aharon and Rachel Dahan Center for Culture, Society & Education in the Sephardic Heritage and the ASF Institute of Jewish Experience’s The End of Jewish Communal Life in the Arab Lands, Kumble Stage/Leo and Julia Forchheimer Auditorium, Center for Jewish History, 2 December, 2019
(Photo courtesy of Chrystie Sherman)
Rescuing the last Jews in ravaged Yemen
By The John Batchelor Show

Rabbi Dr. Elie Abadie, Chair of the American Sephardi Federation’s Council of Sephardic Sages, joined John Batchelor and Malcolm Hoenlein (Executive Vice Chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations) to detail how the anti-Semitic, Iranian-backed Houthi terrorists have been persecuting Yemen’s last remaining Jews. The Houthis continue to illegally imprison Levi Salem Musa Marhabi, a Prisoner of Zion, who has been tortured for allegedly helping to smuggle a Torah Scroll to Israel.  R’Abadie worked with the UAE to realize a remarkable humanitarian gesture: reuniting Yemenite Jewish families in Abu Dhabi. With the Houthis’ latest expulsion of almost all of Yemen’s last Jews to Egypt during Passover, Marhabi and a few others represent the sad ending of a Diaspora community with a glorious 2,500-year-old history.

Click here to join the ASF’s #FreeLeviMarhabi Campaign
Feature: Mimouna! with the Israeli Andalusian Orchestra Ashdod & Special Guests


Israel Andalusian Orchestra Ashdod, Mimouna 2021 (Screenshot courtesy of Youtube

The Israeli Andalusian Orchestra Ashdod hosted a rousing concert last week in celebration of Mimouna, the Moroccan-Jewish holiday held at the end of the week-long Passover festival. Veteran Moroccan diplomat and Morocco’s envoy to Israel, Abderrahim Beyyoudh, was honored as a special guest, while Ashdod’s Chief Rabbi, Haim Pinto, offered up a blessing for the Moroccan monarch, King Muhammed VI. All the while, the concert stage was framed by two stars: one from Israel’s flag, and the other from the Kingdom of Morocco.
Moroccan Ambassador to Israel celebrates Mimouna with Israelis” 
By Sarah Ben-Nun, The Jerusalem Post

The Israeli Andalusian Orchestra Ashdod celebrated Mimouna this year by hosting the Kingdom of Morocco’s Special Envoy to Israel, Abderrahim Beyyoudh, for an evening of Andalusian music. Morocco’s Monarch, King Muhammed VI. sent on his own video message to the performance, which will be broadcast in its entirety in Morocco. Capturing the spirit of Mimouna, Beyyoudh offered, “‘Your holiday is our holiday.’”
Renowned Moroccan Jewish singer Raymond El Bidaouia (Abecassis)

Book cover The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem
Yes Studios Unveils First-Look Trailer For ‘The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem’
By Elsa Keslassy, Variety

Author Sarit Yishai-Levi visited the ASF to discuss her award-winning novel, The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem, in November of 2016. That novel has now been turned into a T.V. series backed by Tel Aviv’s “Yes Studios,” the international producer and distributor behind Netflix megahits “Fauda” and “Shtisel.” Originally produced by Artza Productions, the serialized melodrama follows the story of a Sephardic Jewish family in the Ottoman Empire, through the British Mandate, and then Israel’s War of Independence in 1948. Artza’s co-CEO, Dafna Prenner, says that the series is, “‘a period drama about issues that are as relevant as ever today, a family tale of different generations that keep on making the same mistakes and a love story about the absence of love.’”
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Upcoming Events or Opportunities:


Global Nação:
Synagogue Tour – Indonesia, Dominican Republic, and St. Thomas


Sunday, 18 April at 10:00AM EDT

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Yaakov Baruch was born in Jakarta, Indonesia. His grandmother’s family came from the Netherlands. In 2004 Mr. Baruch opened a synagogue for the Jews of the Netherlands who remain in Indonesia.

Dr. Hakham Yehonatan Elazar-Demota was born in Miami. He comes from a long line of Sephardic families from Spain, Portugal, and North Africa who established themselves in the Caribbean. He is trained as a Hakham, shochet, and mohel. The Sephardic community in La Romana, Dominican Republic was established in 2013. Today there are over 50 families that gather there. The synagogue was established in 2017 in its current location. Members from the community built the hekhal, teba, and a wooden menorah for Hanukkah.


Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


Global Nação:
Five London Hakhamim in the Early Enlightenment


The centers of Sephardic life in early modern Europe: Amsterdam, London, Hamburg, Livorno, Venice were at the very same time the fulcrum of Enlightenment culture.
While we know about Sephardic figures like Spinoza and da Costa who were deeply engaged with Enlightenment ideas, most Sephardim were engrossed in commerce. What was on the minds of their Hakhamim, who, in the case of London, lived in close proximity to Locke, Newton and Boyle?


Monday, 19 April at 12:00PM EDT


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About the Speaker:
Professor Matt Goldish, Dept. of History, Ohio State University is a specialist in Jewish and European History, with interests in Messianism, Jewish-Christian intellectual relations, and Sephardic studies. He holds the Samuel M. and Esther Melton Chair in Jewish History.
He earned his B.A. degree from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1986. His Ph.D. (1996) is from Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Professor Goldish has published Judaism in the Theology of Sir Isaac Newton (Dordrecht: Kluwer– International Archives of the History of Ideas, 1998), The Sabbatean Prophets (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2004), Jewish Questions: Responsa on Jewish Life in the Early Modern Period (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), and several edited collections, as well as articles and book reviews. Professor Goldish is active as an invited lecturer in various academic and community environments.


Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


Global Nação:
How the Unique Confluence of Culture can Benefit Modern Jewry


Western Sephardim have lived in the West for over 400 years. Yet their unique background in Spain, rather than Germany and France, has given them a different lens on Western life and thought and we just may discover valuable lessons from them.

Wednesday, 21 April at 12:00PM EDT


Sign-up Now!

Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


The American Muslim & Multifaith Women's Empowerment Council with the Combat Anti-Semitism Movement present:

Interfaith Iftar

“Oh, you who believe! Fasting is prescribed to you as it was prescribed to those before you, that you may learn piety and righteousness”
 [Quran, 2:183]

“AMWEC brings together people of all faiths and nationalities to celebrate in the spirit of peace, tolerance, and co-operation.

You will hear directly from leaders across the political, spiritual, and cultural world- coming together for this special evening. And you'll hear from the women of AMWEC- which challenges bigotry by empowering Muslim women on the frontlines.

Inspired by their own journeys as immigrants who have prospered in America, they are proud American Muslim leaders who unite to strengthen their communities, confront bigotry in all its forms, celebrate culture heritage, and build enduring bonds with fellow Americans of all faiths.”



Wednesday, 21 April at 3:00PM EDT

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The Department of Anthropology & Archeology at the University of Calgary, King’s College London, the International Network of Jewish Thought (Universidad Complutense of Madrid), & the American Sephardi Federation present:

Sephardi Thought and Modernity 2021 Webinar Series

A monthly lecture from February through June 2021, presenting different experiences of Sephardi modernization in different places and times.

On Thursdays at 1:00PM EDT 
(11:00AM MST)


22 April
Clemence Boulouque (Columbia University):
In praise of the Orient: Elia Benamozegh’s Sephardic Modernities


20 May
Gabriel Abensour (Hebrew University of Jerusalem): Rabbi Yosef Knafo’s Struggle for Democratization of Knowledge in Fin de Siècle Essaouira

17 June
Yuval Evri (King’s College London) and Angy Cohen (University of Calgary): Foreign in a familiar land: language and belonging in the work of Jacqueline Kahanoff, Albert Memmi, and Jacques Derrida.

Sign-up for the Webinar Series Now!
(Complimentary RSVP)


The intention of this series is to spark the interest in processes of Jewish modernization not exclusively mediated by Europeanization. The questions we will be dealing with are related to non-dichotomic identities, multiplicity and loss of language, colonization, social transformation, and intellectual responses to it. We will approach these questions by looking at Jewish-Arab influences, the Sephardi response to European modernization, the responses of the rabbinic leadership and the work of Sephardi intellectuals.

Series organized by Yuval Evri (King’s College London) and Angy Cohen (University of Calgary).

There will be a change to Daylight Saving Time in March, so the event times in North America will remain the same, but the event time in your area may change, depending on your location. The start time on Feb. 18 is 11 a.m. (MST), 1 p.m. (EST), 6 p.m. (GMT), 7 p.m. (Madrid; GMT +1); on March through June events, the start time will be 11 a.m. (MDT), 1 p.m. (EDT).



Global Nação:
Tour of the Venice Ghetto


Sunday, 25 April at 1:00PM EDT

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About the tour guide:
Moshe Bassali was born in Milan to Sephardic Jewish parents that came to Italy from Iran in the 1950’s and married in Italy. His mother arrived at age 12 and went to school in Milan. Moshe has a degree in economics, works in diamonds, and is an official certified tour guide for Venice and Italy. He has been working in Venice since 1991 and after his marriage, Moshe and his wife, Tally, decided to move there. Currently they have three children. Moshe’s father and brothers still live in Milan.

Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


Global Nação:
Dayan Dilemmas


In the past, when Jewish communities were largely insulated and autonomous, the functions and jurisdiction of a Beth Din were more clearly defined. In today’s global world, where Jewish communities are less clearly defined, and the Beth Din is largely a private endeavor operating within the general legal framework of the local government, many dilemmas regarding authority and jurisdiction arise.

Dayan Ofer Livnat will try to address some of the dilemmas dayanim are faced with, and in particular how they relate to issues of Jewish identity, conversions and monetary disputes.


Monday, 26 April at 12:00PM EDT


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About the speaker:
Dayan Ofer Livnat serves as a Dayan on the Sephardi Beth of London. A graduate of the Eretz Hemdah Institute for Advanced Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, Dayan Livnat teaches in a number of programs for training rabbis and Dayanim, including the Semicha and Dayanut Programs run jointly by the Montefiore Endowment of London and Eretz Hemdah. A lecturer on Tanach at the Jerusalem College as well, Dayan Livnat has previously served in an artillery unit in the IDF and is currently studying for a PhD in Jewish studies at University College London.


Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


New Works Wednesday and Global Nação:
Chocolate Around the World


Around the globe today, chocolate is embraced not only by enthusiastic consumers but also by truly passionate creators who pour their hearts into their confections.
​Here in this convenient guidebook are nearly 300 of these chocolate masters. From Brussels to Boston, Paris to Tokyo, London to Los Angeles, these are some of the most dedicated artisans anywhere.

​Special listings for gluten-free, vegan, organic, and other dietary needs are also included.


Wednesday, 28 April at 12:00PM EDT


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About the speaker:
Joshua de Sola Mendes is the proprietor of www.sandpcentral.org and www.grahamesguides.com. He is a proud S&P community member and researcher who works to bring the international communities together through his website, and under a separate hat, make us all happy through insight into chocolate and chocolatiering.Joining him will be master chocolatiers who will share some of their background.


Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


New Works Wednesdays with José Alberto R. Silva Tavim

The Diasporas of Jews and New Christians of Iberian Origin between the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean


This book consists of a set of contributions, with different themes and chronologies, on the general theme of Jews of Iberian origin after the late 15th century conversions, that is, with an official Christian identity; and also about welcoming others, of remote Portuguese origin or not, in contemporary Portugal, but also in other longitudes, such as Egypt and Brazil, in different and sometimes even adverse circumstances.

In the light of the dispersion between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, one can visit, as an example, the fortunes of some of these New Christians in Portugal, and their presence, assuming again a Jewish identity, in Diaspora lands, in Europe and in the New World. Modernity reveals the resistance in Portugal of an awareness of being Jewish; and also that, alongside this phenomenon, the arrival of other Jews, especially from the Maghreb, is more than just a return, it is actually another stage of permanence in completely different contexts with regard to people’s origins, their activities, acceptance and respect for its identity.


Wednesday, 5 May at 12:00PM EST

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About the speaker:
Editor José Alberto R. Silva Tavim will share insights into the book along with some of the contributors: Hugo Martins, who is in Potsdam with a German research grant, published an article in English about the Jews of Hamburg in the 17th century; Angela Benoliel Coutinho (Portuguese-Cape Verdean) wrote about the migration of Jews from Morocco to Portugal and Cape Verde in the 19th and 20th centuries; and Luís Filipe Meneses, from the University of Belo Horizonte (Brazil), wrote an article about a Brazilian Jewish writer of Moroccan origin – Leão Pacífico Esaguy.


Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


Tell Your Sephardi-Mizrahi Story

With award winning author Gila Green

Have you always wanted to write your life story? Gila Green’s new Middle Eastern flavored Autofiction Workshop explores a writing form that pushes beyond memoir and borrows fiction techniques. Inventing your own dialogue and creating details can often free you from the need to stick to the facts, opening the door to a deeper story with emotional truth at its center. This zoom course includes a weekly lesson and in-class exercise. Instructor feedback will be provided on weekly writing assignments (up to 1,000 words). Short readings will feature Middle Eastern writers that include authors such as: Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Rachel Shabi, and Ariel Sabar. The workshop is open to women and men of all writing levels.
Special bonus for this session: 4,500 manuscript editing at the end of the course included.


On Thursdays
27 May- 24 June at 11:00AM EDT

5 online sessions


Sign-up Now!
(Registration required for the full course; Space is limited)
The workshop is open to women and men of all writing levels.


About Gila Green:
Gila Green’s novels feature characters of Sephardi, Yemenite, and mixed Middle Eastern heritage because she couldn’t find any Jewish stories that reflected her experience growing up and decided to write them herself. Her novel-in-stories White Zion explores one Yemenite family’s journey from Sanaa to Jerusalem to Canada. In Passport Control, heroine Miriam Gil struggles to understand her Yemenite father’s past against a trove of family secrets. Gila is an author, a creative writing teacher, an EFL college lecturer, an editor, and a mother of five. When she’s not exploring the Middle East in her novels, she migrates to South Africa in her continuing environmental young adult series that takes place in Kruger National Park. In addition to her four published novels, her short works have been featured in dozens of publications including: Sephardic Horizons, Jewish Fiction, Jewish Literary Journal, Fiction Magazine, Akashic Books, The Fiddlehead, and others.


Sponsorship and Naming opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


The ASF Institute of Jewish Experience presents:

The Persian Experience

Sign-up now!

Jews lived in the Middle East, and particularly Iran, even before the advent of Islam. Iran has a long history with varying dynasties, dynastic changes, and evolving borders and Jews have been there continuously throughout these changes. Throughout the ascent of Islam in its different forms, Jews were integrated at times more and at times less economically. There were times of intellectual and spiritual growth as well as suppression and persecution. All this will be addressed and discussed in a historical context.

The course is divided into seven units:


1. The Ancient Period – the settlement of the Jews in Iran, Acaemenid, Parthian, and Sassanian times
2. 7th to 9th Centuries – The emergence of Islam, Islam and the Jews, Dhimma, and Jewish religious streams
3. 13th to 18th centuries – Mongols, Jewish Persian poets, Safavid times
4. Mid-18th century to 19th century – Invasion, dynasties, and persecutions
5. The latter part of the 19th century – Interactions with World Jewry, legal status and conversions
6. Early 20th century – Modernization and education, constitution revolution, Zionism
7. The 20th century – Pahlavi dynasty, Revolution, Mashadis, and Migration


Dr. Daniel Tsadik
Dr. Daniel Tsadik, a former professor of Sephardic and Iranian Studies at the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies, has been awarded The Prime Minister’s Prize (Israel) in 2020 for the Encouragement and Empowerment of Jewish Communities in Arab Countries and Iran for The Jews of Iran and Rabbinic Literature: New Perspectives, published by Mosad Ha-Rav Kook.
Tsadik researches the modern history of Iran, Shi'ah Islam, and Iran's religious minorities. A Fulbright scholar, he earned his Ph.D from the History Department at Yale University.

Dr. David Yeroushalmy
Born in Tehran, David Yeroushalmy completed his primary and part of his secondary education at the Alliance Israelite school in Tehran. He immigrated to Israel in 1961 and upon completing his secondary education he enrolled in the Department of Middle Eastern History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Completing his B.A. in Middle Eastern Studies and in Political Science, he served in the Israeli Army as an officer. He pursued his doctoral studies at Colombia University New York, in the Department of Middle East Languages and Cultures. He specialized in Persian and Hebrew languages and literatures. D. Yeroushalmy was appointed lecturer in the Department of Middle Eastern and African History at Tel-Aviv University, where he has been teaching Persian language and Iranian history and culture. His Book entitled The Judeo-Persian Poet Emrani and His Book of Treasure, was published by E.J. Brill Publishers, Leiden, in 1995. Dr. Yeroushalmy's current research focuses on the communal and cultural history of Iranian Jewry in the course of the nineteen-century.

Ms. Lerone Edalati
Lerone Edalati is a member of the Mashadi community of New York. In addition to her role as Associate Director of Donor Relations at ISEF, she researches and records the history and current practices of the Mashadi Jews. She holds a BA from NYU in Middle Eastern & Islamic Studies, and an MA in Middle Eastern Studies from The Graduate Center, CUNY. She is a Broome & Allen Fellow at the American Sephardi Federation and is currently gathering oral histories of Iranian Jews in NY.

Dr. Hilda Nissimi
Dr. Hilda Nissimi is the chair of the Generatl History Department at Bar Ilan University. Her most current research focuses on the formation adn change of identity layers in crypto-religious communities, with a particular focus on Mashadi Jews. Her book, The Crypto-Jewish Mashadis, was published in 1985 and remains the main text on the study of that population. She has written numerous articles on identity and forced conversions.


This course is made possible with the support of The Shazar Center, Israel.

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



Sponsorship opportunities available:
info@americansephardi.org


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/

With your generous, tax-deductible donation, the ASF can cultivate and advocate, preserve and promote, as well as educate and empower!



Please donate now to support the American Sephardi Federation!
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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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