In the Biblical tractate of Pirkei Avot, it is written "Im ein kemach, ein Torah," which means that "without sustenance [kemach], there cannot be Torah." But kemach is also Hebrew for bread, and on Shabbat the phrase could be read "without a yummy challah or...
Shavei Israel Chairman Michael Freund was interviewed on Israel Radio's English-language service about the dramatic developments taking place in Sicily and southern Italy. Michael discusses the long Jewish history of Italy, including the impact of the Inquisition which drove many Jews underground to become Anousim,...
Shavei Israel’s popular "Do You Have Jewish Roots?" book is now available in Italian. Already published in Spanish and Portuguese, the 109-page book is the first-ever practical guide to discovering one’s Jewish heritage. Its nine chapters cover all the major questions someone at the beginning...
More than 500 years after the expulsion of the Jews from Sicily, Palermo’s small Jewish community is set to celebrate the opening of its first synagogue since the Spanish Inquisition. The synagogue will be built atop the ruins of the former Great Synagogue of Palermo....
The president of Portugal, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, visited the Jewish community in Lisbon. Shavei Israel's Portuguese emissary Rabbi Elisha Salas was among the dignitaries attending, along with the Israeli ambassador to Portugal and representatives of the three Jewish communities in Portugal....
Shavei Israel Chairman Michael Freund has become a Limmud groupie. Well, not quite. But he is participating in a double header of eclectic Jewish learning retreats. The first was last week in the U.K. The second will be at the end of this month in...
We continue our Hanukah tour of Shavei Israel communities celebrating the Festival of Lights with visits to the Bnei Anousim of Portugal, El Salvador, Colombia, Palermo and San Nicandro, Italy. Happy Hanukah from Shavei Israel!...
The history of the Bnei Anousim in the southern Indian region of Goa is usually overshadowed by the larger Bene Israel, Cochin and Baghdadi Jewish communities in India (not to mention the Bnei Menashe with which Shavei Israel works). A conference in Jerusalem last week...
In 2010, Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz established a now annual event: The Global Day of Jewish Learning. Since 2013, the small Bnei Anousim community in Belmonte, Portugal, led by Shavei Israel’s emissary Rabbi Elisha Salas, has participated. Here's what they have planned for this year on...
More than fifty guests from across Italy descended on Palermo, the picturesque capital of the southern island of Sicily, this past weekend for a Shabbaton organized by Shavei Israel. “It was very emotional,” Rabbi Punturello recalls. “So many people shared that without Shavei Israel, the...
