AMERICAN SEPHARDI FEDERATION ASF

AMERICAN SEPHARDI FEDERATION (ASF). The American Sephardi Federation was founded in 1973. In 2002 it affiliated with Sephardic House to create one, stronger organization. With its main office in New York City, and regional offices in Miami, Seattle, and Los Angeles, the American Sephardi Federation with Sephardic House is a national Jewish organization dedicated to ensuring that the history, legacies, and traditions of the great Sephardi communities throughout the world be recorded, remembered, and celebrated as an integral part of the Jewish heritage. The Sephardim were the first Jews to settle in the Western Hemisphere, and the ASF/SH seeks to educate the broader American Jewish and non-Jewish communities about the unique history and values it perpetuates, while revitalizing a sense of affiliation and commitment among the younger Sephardi generations. ASF/SH endeavors to foster understanding and cooperation with significant members of the non-Jewish community of the countries where Sephardim lived in peace and harmony for so many generations. The activities of the American Sephardi Federation with Sephardic House include a Sephardi library, publications, and cultural and educational programming dealing with the Sephardi experience, including the International Sephardi Film Festival, the only permanent Sephardi exhibition gallery, its unique publication, the Sephardi Report, and a scholarship program for Sephardi studies. Since its arrival at the Center for Jewish History, New York, which is the joint home of YIVO, The Leo Baeck Institute, Yeshiva University Museum, and the American Jewish Historical Society, the archival holdings and   library of ASF have been enriched with valuable records of personal and community history. (Esme E. Berg (2nd ed.)