Sephardic Jews
The Latest
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Fast Forward Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Claims Sephardic Jewish Roots
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the newly elected firebrand congresswoman, has revealed for the first time that she has Sephardic Jewish heritage. The 28-year-old Democrat said her distant ancestors fled the Spanish Inquisition to emigrate to Puerto Rico, where her immediate family roots lived until they moved to New York. “Generations and generations ago, my family consisted of…
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Opinion Think Julia Salazar Isn’t ‘Jewish Enough’? You’re Writing Off All Latin American Jews.
The Jewish world is in an uproar over Julia Salazar, a candidate for state senate. Salazar portrayed herself in multiple interviews as a Jew of Color, claims that a recent exposé called into doubt. The article split the Jewish community in two. Salazar’s detractors called her a Jewish Rachel Dolezal, a reference to the woman…
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News Ashkenazi Jews Have A Nickname. Or Is It A Slur?
In 2018, brevity is the soul not of wit, but of identity politics. Feminine is “femme.” Masculine is “masc.” And Ashkenazi is “Ashki.” The term, sometimes a dig and sometimes a diminutive, is popping up more frequently on social media. Like other internet-era terms for Jewish sub-groups — “ortho” for Orthdoox, “OTD” for those who…
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News The Spanish Inquisition Was ‘Moderate’ Solution. So Says This Conservative Columnist.
(JTA) — Here’s something no one expected: A reputable conservative magazine has published a column defending … The Spanish Inquisition. To be clear, this is not Monty Python. This is a column in the National Review. Here’s the headline: “The Spanish Inquisition Was a Moderate Court by the Standard of Its Time.” Moderate? We’ll run down…
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Life Finally, A Safe Space For Sephardic And Mizrahi LGBTQ Jews
On a Saturday night in May, somewhere in Crown Heights, a group of young professionals in their 20’s and 30’s swayed back and forth to the classic Mizrahi songs they grew up on — everything from Ofra Haza to Cheb Khaled. The gathering, set with mood lighting and a perfect sound system, was attended by…
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Fast Forward Sephardic Chief Rabbi Could Be Charged For Racist ‘Monkey’ Remark
JERUSALEM (JTA) — An Israel Justice Ministry official told Israeli media that the government is considering taking criminal action against Sephardic chief rabbi for likening a black child born to white parents to a “monkey” in explaining a point of ritual. Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef made the comparison earlier this month during a Saturday evening lecture,…
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Community What’s So Different About A Persian Passover Seder?
There are two times a year that my entire family comes together — Rosh Hashanah and Passover. Although both holidays have their respective traditions, Passover is particularly special. Exhausted mothers and grandmothers have spent the last month before the holiday cleaning their homes with arduous rigor. They have cooked every day, while also having to…
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Fast Forward 1,800 Sephardic Jews Get Portuguese Citizenship
(JTA) — Nearly 1,800 descendants of Sephardic Jews acquired the Portuguese nationality in 2017 under a law enacted two years earlier, with another 12,000 still in the application process, officials in Lisbon said. The tally for last year is six times higher than the total for 2016, during which the application of the law hit…
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