Fall 2025 - New York City Metropolitan Area

Professor Samuel Torjman-Thomas (center) performing at a special Sephardic Musical Evening in August

We’ve had a packed Summer of activities in the NYC Metropolitan Area! For the third time, we proudly marched in the Celebrate Israel Parade in New York City on Sunday June 2nd with our own specially designed float. This annual parade brings hundreds of thousands of Jews from the NYC Metropolitan area together for a spectacular celebration of all things Israel. We marched up Manhattan’s 5th Avenue from 57th to 73rd Street with our affiliate congregations Kehila Kedosha Janina, Congregation Shearith Israel, West Side Sephardic Congregation, and our partners at the Sephardic Young Professionals Network and the American Sephardi Federation.  On Sunday June 16th, we held our annual Sephardic Families Picnic in Overpeck County Park in New Jersey, where we had some delicious kosher catered Turkish food, sports and games like water balloon tosses for kids, and a free Sephardic kids book giveaway thanks to our partners at PJ Library.

Musical evening participants singing along with the various Hazzanim throughout the evening

In August, we hosted a beautiful Evening of Sephardc Song and Celebration in conjunction with the Sephardic Rabbinic Conference. The evening drew a packed audience and celebrated the rich cultural heritage of Sephardic Jewry through music, song, and communal spirit. Six hazzans representing the Turkish-Ladino (Rabbi Frank Varon), Moroccan (Prof. Samuel Torjman Thomas), Syrian (Rabbi Jack Varon, Dr. Benjamin Zalta, Mark Faiena) and Spanish & Portuguese (Rev. Zachariah Edinger) traditions led a moving journey across the pan-Sephardic liturgical landscape. The evening featured delicious Sephardic cuisine and a special talk from Rabbi Joseph Dweck, Senior Rabbi of the S&P Sephardi Community of the United Kingdom.

Our Sephardic Young Professionals Network has also been busy this summer with its Tour of Jewish Greece and the Balkans in July, and a special Greek Jewish Shabbaton in June in Manhattan with a delicious Shabbat Dinner and special scholar Theo Cantor!

We have a lot of new exciting events coming up for the Fall, including the annual Community Wide Sephardic Selihot Program at the Sephardic Congregation of Fort Lee (led by Rabbi Ilan Acoca) in September, a young families Pre-Rosh Ashana Sephardic Learning Seder, our annual Ziara - communal visits to our local cemeteries in September, and some exciting new Ladino language programs in November! Check out our website for more info at sephardicbrotherhood.com, and make sure to always check our weekly La Boz Sefaradi - the Sephardic Voice, for all our upcoming local and national events.