Joshua Lazoff

Concept, Research, Script and Creative Direction: Sreekala Sivasankaran Music, Cinematography and Direction: Sanjay Maharishi Language: Multilingual with English subtitles Duration: 1 hour 8 minutes https://independent.academia.edu/SreekalaSivasankaran The film moves between the past and present Cochin Jewish life through memoirs, interviews of local communities, writers and scholars and places that tell the stories of presence and absence of Jews in Kerala today. About Cochin Jews of Kerala: There were once 2,500 Jews recorded in the area where now only about 60 remain. Varied traditions about the origin of the Cochin Jews appear in travelers’ accounts and in Hebrew chronicles from Malabar, some written as early as the 10th century. Some records say the first Jews sailed to South India on the ships of King Solomon; others say they came during the Babylonian exile; others that they fled to Malabar after the destruction of the Second Temple; and others refer to a fourth-century migration from Majorca. Most of these stories revolve around the existence of a Jewish community in the ancient trade center of Cranganore (which the Jews called Shingly), north of Cochin. Sreekala Sivasankaran is Associate Professor in the Janapada Sampada Division of Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi. She was educated at Mahatma Gandhi University, Kerala (M.A) and Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi (M.Phil-Ph.D). She has held visiting research fellowship at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and post- doctoral fellowship at the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi. She has taught Sociology in the Hidayatullah National Law University, Raipur. She has been an academic coordinator of inter-disciplinary studies on art and culture in South India at IGNCA. She also holds project directorship of Worldview of Visvakarmas and Jewish Cultural Heritage of India under the Janapada Sampada Division. Areas of her research interest include Interdisciplinary Cultural Studies, Migration, Indian Diaspora and Jews of India. Her publications include a book, “Immigration, State Policy and Identity: Jews of India in Israel, New Century Publications, New Delhi, 2009” and several articles in various journals in Malayalam and English. Her film, “Remains of a Dream: The Jewish Saga of Kerala” has been completed and screened at IGNCA in the year 2016. She has also published poems in journals like Indian Literature and Muse India.

Host Jay Fidell speaks with Professor of Chinese & East Asian Studies, Dr. Ping Zhang (Department of East Asian Studies Tel Aviv University) about the history of Jewish people in China.

Only few people know about the Chuetas of Palma de Mallorca. Chuetas are descendants of Jews who were forced to convert to Catholizism in the 15th century. While officially Christians, their descendants secretly continued to live as Jews, always in danger to be caught and executed by the infamous Inquisition. In 2006 Rabbi Shaul Friberg is sent to Mallorca. He is the first official Rabbi to Palma de Mallorca in centuries, and he is out on a mission to find out if there are any traces of Jewdaism left among the Chuetas. While diving into the past and present, discovering a lot more than he had expected, he also finds out something about himself and his own family. A documentary by Paula Zimerman Targownik and Daniel Targownik

“Legends of the Lost Tribes” is an invitation to explore the hidden history of the Hebrew faith, to extend beyond the boundaries inherent in the concept of the “Jewish People”. The essence of the Hebrew movement, of which Judaism is only a small fragment, has touched the whole of mankind. In the steep mountainous region which lies between the borders of India and Burma, live the Mizo people, numbering one and a half million. Paradoxically, this tribe, with typical oriental features, discovered its Hebrew origin when introduced to the Old Testament by Christian missionaries. A small but growing group of 5,000 converted fully to Judaism believing that they come from the tribe of Manasseh. Geographically isolated, they long for any tidbit of information on Judaism that they can get, and dream of returning to the land of Zion. The chapter concludes with a moving scene in Israel’s Ben-Gurion Airport with the arrival of immigrants of Mizo tribe.

A Report From Our Correspondent Ross Perlin Passover in Kaifeng

The remarkable story of a black African from a royal lineage in Swaziland who was raised a Christian, converted to Judaism and became a Litvish Haredi Rabbi in Israel. It begins with Rabbi Natan Gamedze's first visit home in 16 years and traces back his extraordinary spiritual journey from Swaziland to Israel. By following Rabbi Gamedze's journey to Judaism, this story provides an extraordinary insight into orthodox Jewish thinking from a completely different background. Along the way it gently explores race issues, pre and post apartheid. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natan_Gamedze http://www.rabbigamedze.com http://www.ou.org/pdf/ja/5766/summer66/37_40.pdf

for the finest in nostalgic jewish music check out https://www.youtube.com/user/vintagembd/videos

I live a few blocks from a Hasidic Jewish community in Crown Heights, Brooklyn that has unfortunately been the target of a rise in hate crimes over the past year. My friend Rabbi Yoni Katz shows me around his community as we talk about finding one\'s purpose and fighting hate by getting to know each other.

Welcome to Puerto Rico, home to the largest Jewish community in the Caribbean with almost 3,000 people.