2015 General Report of JIMENA Activities

Students at Jewish Community High School of the Bay in JIMENA garb during Mizrahi Commemoration Month

Community Outreach, Engagement and Education

Oral History and Digital Experience Project 

  • Our central website received over 300,000 website hits per month and earned #1 Google rankings for our Arabic JIMENA Experience websites, thus educating hundreds of thousands of individuals worldwide.
  • This past year the focus of the Oral History and Digital Experience Program was on developing our relationship with Ben Gurion University in order for them to serve as an official repository for JIMENA’s Oral History archive. Moving forward, all of JIMENA’s Oral History content will be preserved in perpetuity at The Ben-Gurion Institute for the Study of Israel and Zionism at Ben-Gurion University.
  • Together with BGU, we oversaw the work of an international team of seven grad-student interns who were responsible for transcribing, abstracting, and adding our videos to BGU’s server and YouTube page.

Work on College Campuses

  • In the last year JIMENA led over 40 programs, reaching an estimated 4,000 students on the following campuses: American Jewish University, American University, Ben Gurion University, Bar Ilan University, Capitol University, Chico State University, Eastern Carolina University, George Washington University, Kent State University, Loyola University, Northwestern University, Ohio State University, Pace University, San Francisco State University, Santa Monica College, University of California Berkeley, University of California Davis, University of California Los Angeles, University of Nebraska, University of Nevada Las Vegas, University of North Carolina, University of Oregon, University of Southern California.
  • JIMENA content, like The Forgotten Refugees film and information from the JIMENA Digital Experience Project, was distributed and utilized by students on over 100 college campuses
  • JIMENA had an international team of college interns who executed a number of impactful projects on their respective campuses including: a French Social Media initiative (USF) and an Oral History transcription and abstraction project for a group of BGU interns from sub-Sahara Africa and China.
  • Campus programs included JIMENA Speaker talks, henna gatherings, Mizrahi cooking classes, Mizrahi Shabbat dinners, Mimouna, and Forgotten Refugees presentations.
  • Our work on college campuses was done in careful partnership with the following organizations: Hillel International, Chabad, Jewish Agency for Israel, Students Supporting Israel (SSI), Alpha Epsilon Pi, and a number of other grassroots, student-led campus organizations.

Testimonial from Natan Sharansky, Chairman of the Executive of the Jewish Agency for Israel

 

Advocacy and International Work

For photographs please visit our facebook photo albums or our JIMENA_Voice istagram account. #jimenavoice

Tags

  • Sephardic
  • Mizrahi
  • Education
  • JIMENA's Initiatives

More Statements

Antisemitism

Jewish Communal Request to Californa Governor to Adopt IHRA

To 40th Governor of California, Gavin Christopher Newsom. Jewish communities throughout our state are deeply affected during these challenging times of conflict and tragedy in Israel, and your unwavering support is pivotal for our collective sense of safety and wellbeing.

Antisemitism

Endurance and Unity: Upholding Our Heritage in the Face of Continuing Threats

Dear Friends and Members of the Jimena Community, As Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews, we are all too familiar with attempts to erase our existence– from the Inquisition, to dhimmitude (the second-class status Jews held under Islamic rule for hundreds of years), to the mass expulsions of our communities in the mid-20th century– our history has, unfortunately, been colored by antisemitic threats and violence as an ethnic minority of the Middle East and North Africa. These efforts to erase our existence continue as we continue to bear witness to nearly daily direct attacks on Israel. As we watch the Islamic Republic of Iran and their proxies launch hundreds of rockets and drones, we understand these events are not isolated, but a continuation of the threat to Jewish life in the Middle East. Israel symbolizes not only the preservation of our rich and cherished history but also the triumph of reclaiming indigenous land. It stands as a beacon of strength and hope for all indigenous peoples of the MENA region who have faced subjugation and oppression under imperialism. We extend our hand in solidarity with the people of Iran, who know all too well the terror imposed by the Islamic Republic regime occupying their land. We understand that the regime’s actions do not reflect their own aspirations for freedom, liberty, and peace. This conflict is with the Islamic Republic, not the Iranian people, and we look forward to the day when they, along with us and the entire Middle East, are liberated from the regime’s despotism and chaos. In the face of threats by tyrannical rulers today, we stand steadfast in our identity as Jews, as Jews whose diasporic experience heralds from the Middle East and North Africa, and as Jews who support the existence of Jewish life in our ancestral homeland. Just as before, we will triumph over those who wish to destroy us, and we will continue to advocate for peaceful coexistence for all peoples in the region, so we may live our lives free from persecution, antisemitism, and hate. The People of Israel Live, today, tomorrow, and forever. Am Israel Chai. -The JIMENA team.

Antisemitism

A Brief Guide to IHRA Definition of Antisemitism

An Introduction of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Definition of Antisemitism