ADDED FOR CHANUKA 2023
From Essaouira, Morocco, whose Jewish community dates to Roman times, recorded in Live Concert from the 2020 Eid El Bannat Celebration —-عيد البنات - חג הבנות — Lala Tamar (“Miss Tamar”, “Lady Tamar”) is the stage name of Moroccan Brazilian Israeli Tamar Bloch, who in her early 20s discovered the language and culture of “Haketia,” a Romance language once spoken by Sephardic Jews in North Africa — Haketia has elements of Darija (Moroccan Arabic), Spanish and Ladino — painstakingly transcribing the only known ethnographic recordings at the Israel State Archives and at Hebrew University, becoming the first modern artist to record an album in Haketia.
Eid El Bannat, the ancient Hanukah jewish women holiday is celebrated again in our new shared - Jewish and muslim interpretation, with traditional Hebrew piyutim mixed with Darija - Moroccan arabic songs. We are so happy to bring this beautiful old north african Jewish tradition to life again with the possibilty to meet with our friends and family in Morocco. Beginning with ״אין די באר״ “Ya lsmar” to “Ma tovu tsevia” to “Lellah Yal Ghadi Lessahra” chgouri song by Lili Labassi. Who's making the magic: Hind Ennaira, Chakib JallaliIman Ennaira Aicha Outanin. Hope you enjoy! Thanks again to the amazing Hit The Road music studio ... recording and filming by the lovely kreatologia. And To Khadija for hosting us in her beautiful Riad.. And big thanks to Jimena for inviting us to this beautiful event — Bless.
Eid Al-Banat (or Hag HaBanot or Rosh Hodesh LaBanot in Hebrew and Fete de Filles in French) is a holiday celebrated by women on Rosh Hodesh Tevet/1 Tevet (which falls on Hanukkah). No one knows for sure when people started celebrating it. There are accounts of it being celebrated throughout the Mediterranean (specifically Libya, Algeria, Morocco, Greece, and Turkey) and is linked to several events throughout Jewish history, but it was preserved in Tunisia and the island of Djerba especially, best kept and widely still celebrated by the Tunisian Jewish community today. The holiday's essence is women sisterhood and celebration of women….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1VbwMeuhLA
The Book of Esther tells that in the month of Tevet, was the time when Queen Esther was crowned and many of the Rosh Chodesh l'banot practices are similar to those of Jewish holiday of Purim. Rosh Chodesh of the month of Tevet always applies on Chanukah, which according to various traditions the miracle occurred there by a woman, and is therefore linked to the heroic stories of Judith and Hanna, the daughter of Mattathias. In addition, there are those who link the holiday to the story of Jephthah's daughter, to the expulsion of the alien women during Ezra the Scribe times, and there are those who ascribe the holiday to the story of other heroic women: Deborah and Jael, Serah daughter of Asher, Hannah and her seven sons and Bruriah the wife of Rabbi Meir.
In Yemen and North Africa, this night marks
... Chag Ha’Banot (“Eid Al Banat” in Judeo-Arabic), or The Festival of Daughters, which celebrates one of the best things Judaism has given to the world: Jewish women. [This is a festival of] singing, dancing and lighting the hanukkiah in honor of Jewish women like Judith, the young widow-turned-heroine of the Hanukkah story — the Book of Judith is on par with the Book of Maccabees itself. Judith falsely told the Syrian Greek General Holofernes she’d help him and his army take the city of Bethulia, offering him salty cheese and wine and then, once he was drunk enough, beheading him. The sight of their headless general terrified enemy soldiers into fleeing and revived the morale of Maccabee fighters.
...In countries like Libya and Tunisia, women traditionally went to synagogue on Chag Ha’Banot to touch the Torah and pray for their daughters’ health; young women and old women would dance together; girls who had turned their backs against one another would reconcile; and, in many communities, there was a dairy feast in honor of Judith.
...Jackie Barzvi, a North Carolina-based dance instructor and performer ... recently created the Mizrachi Dance Archive, a virtual catalog of information about Mizrahi dance traditions whose aim, according to its website, is to “help preserve, celebrate and bring a new light to the stories, cultures, and history of Mizrachi Jews...”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7TLX0aTW3w
From email by Ms. Sapir Taib, Sr. Program Director, JIMENA.org/ (<small>Jews Indigenous to the Middle East & North Africa</small>), see also the full version of her article at Jewish Women's Archive:
Among the many legends surrounding the Hanukkah rebellion is a story known in Hebrew as Ma’ase ha-Isha ha-Yehudit [Deeds of the Judean Woman]. This version preserved by Sephardi Jews tells of a Jewish woman who beheaded the Selucid king, Aleforne/ Holofernes <small>[—Hebrew versions of the tale in the Megillat Antiochus and the Chronicles of Jerahmeel identify "Holofernes" as Nicanor; the Greek version used "Holofernes" as deliberately cryptic substitute, similarly using "Nebuchadnezzar" for Antiochus….</small>—] to free Israel from foreign occupation. According to some traditions, the king's soldiers found his decapitated body and responded, “A single Israelite woman has brought about this horror!” Judith demonstrated bravery and resilience; she was a woman who daringly tricked and killed the Syrian-Greek king through her cunning and desire to protect her people.
Other legends such as Megilat Antiochus record the atrocities committed by the Greek Syrian soldiers against women in Judea as well multiple instances of mothers who risked everything in order to oppose the anti-Jewish imposition upon Israel. Likewise, in the Book of Maccabees, we learn of Hannah, who suffered martyrdom along with her seven sons, rather than submitting to the culture and religious values of the Hellenists. These tales of both heroism and suffering fill the pages of Jewish history and particularly the legends surrounding women during the Maccabean revolt.
The honor and courage of these Jewish women has long been celebrated by Sephardi and Mizrahi communities in a North African Jewish festival called Hag Ha-Banot which translates to the Festival of the Daughters. Hag Ha-Banot occurs on the seventh night of Hanukkah [a new moon, Rosh Chodesh, itself special for women] and brings together generations of Jewish women in celebration as we light the menorah and honor our brave women ancestors. In some communities, mothers give their daughters gifts and women or girls who had drifted apart reconcile their differences and reignite their friendship. All of these were among the traditions celebrated by my ancestors who lived in Tripoli, Libya and the Tunisian island of Djerba.
The bravery and sacrifice of Middle Eastern women did not stop during the days of the Maccabees but continue on. In 1950, my maternal grandmother, Rina Taib fled antisemitic persecution in Libya, to Israel with my grandfather, two kids, and two suitcases. Initially, they lived in the ma’abarot (refugee absorption camps established in Israel in the 1950s); life in the ma’abarot wasn’t easy, and my grandma even gave birth to her third child in one of these camps. The family stayed there for eight years before moving to an apartment in Bnei Brak. In 1964, my paternal Safta [grandmother] Alusha Hadad left Tunisia for Israel on a small boat with my saba (grandfather) and their six children…
Chag Ha Banot not only honors Yehudit, but subsequent generations of strong Jewish women, like my grandmothers, and the vital role women play in protecting Judaism and our ancestral homeland. These stories of brave Jewish women continue to resonate deeply with me as a woman, an Israeli, a recent immigrant to the U.S., a descendant of Jews from North Africa, and as a Jewish communal professional committed to advancing the heritage and rights of Sephardic and Mizrahi women and the Jewish people on a daily basis.
Today, on Hag Ha Banot, I hope you will join me in celebrating and honoring the contributions of brave Jewish women, like Judith, my grandmothers, and your grandmothers.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoFxzgPTCmY
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Loolwa Khazzoom is an Iraqi American-Jewish writer, journalist, activist, and musician. She has spoken and written extensively about Jewish multiculturalism as well as the cultural traditions and modern struggles of Sephardi, Mizrahi, Yemenite, and Ethiopian Jews. She was heavily involved in the Jewish feminist movement of the 1990s and is the founder of the Jewish Multicultural Project. She has also worked as a public relations manager for health and wellness practitioners. ...She was also involved in SOJIAC (Student Organization for Jews from Iran and Arab Countries) and JIMENA (Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa).[2] She participated in the filming of The Way Home, a documentary about the interplay of race and gender in America,[5] and played a significant role in diversifying the group of Jewish women represented in the film.[6] She is featured in the Jewish Women's Archive's online exhibit Jewish Women and the Feminist Revolution for her work on topics of multiculturalism and gender.[7] Khazzoom is featured in the documentary, Young, Jewish, and Left. Her books include Consequence: Beyond Resisting Rape — The Flying Camel: Essays on Identity by Women of North African and Middle Eastern Jewish Heritage (Live Girls) — I WANT SEX: A Book of Songs and Poems on Sexual Freedom, Power, Authenticity, and Intimacy in a World Enslaved by Porn
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pICIo-0Ipw
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Dianne Cohler-Esses, who grew up in [Brooklyn], is the first Syrian-Jewish woman to become a rabbi [and also the first non-Orthodox rabbi from that community]. She was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1995...The art exhibit “Holy Sparks”, which opened in February 2022 at the Heller Museum and the Skirball Museum, featured 24 Jewish women artists, who had each created an artwork about a female rabbi who was a first in some way. Siona Benjamin created the artwork about Dianne,,.
Raised in a traditional Syrian-American community, Cohler-Esses has written about her struggle for acceptance, explaining her desire to become a rabbi to friends and family, and the painful and surprisingly beautiful process of seeking permission to deliver her father’s eulogy at his Orthodox synagogue.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XjX5DrJdQQ from the album “Chansons d'exils d'Afrique du Nord”, Mazal hai mazal, words and music Lili Labassi, sung by
Sultana Daoud (also known as Reinette L'Oranaise, 1918 in Tiaret, French Algeria – 17 November 1998, in Paris) was an Algerian Jewish singer,[1][2] who helped preserve Arab-Andalus music, as well as introducing the genre to European audiences.[3]
...the daughter of a Moroccan Rabbi [and] blind as a result of smallpox when two years old, she studied at a school for the blind in Algiers, until her mother encouraged her to take up music. She studied with Saoud l'Oranais, who gave her the nickname Reinette l'Oranaise ("Queenie from Oran"). From him she learned to play several instruments, and learned a great many traditional songs in the Arab-Andalus and Raï styles. [Moving between Algeria and France, she played] in restaurants and private parties for the Maghrebi Jewish community in Paris [but was limited in home audiences until] 1980s the increased interest in "World Music" brought her to the media's attention... She sang in Arabic and ladino and was a highly respected chaabi performer, performing with even Cheik El Hadj M'Hamed El Anka, … was very loved by Oran's Muslim population and left a rich chaabi legacy…
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In 1981 Maurice el Medioni wrote the song Ahla Sahla for the amazing Algerian Jewish singer Line Monty. It was first performed in the Theatre Champs Elysses and become a hit song in many countries and is still performed in most happy ceremonies between North Africans- regardless of religion. Medioni is in this clip, produced by Yvonne Kahan-OLAMALE in Israel , here 84 years old and together with talented young musicians and dancers…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lb2EyWjImXw
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And back to Ashkenazim: I brought a version of the below Yiddish classic to an IAN Chanuka post a few days ago, and Youffraita came back with the best, most adorable version I’ve ever seen! It’s about potatoes. Not for latkes, but everything! Subtitled! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OME2X-R2zBg
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Note: As of early 2022, the ancient Jewish community of Yemen was assessed as extinct; only one Yemenite Jew known to remain there, an elderly man imprisoned on cultural theft charges, for having helped one of the last surviving groups emigrating to Israel to bring their Torah with them.