Advocacy & Action

JIMENA advances initiatives that protect and promote the rights, history, heritage, and lived experiences of Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews. Through advocacy, coalition building, education, and public engagement, we work to secure recognition for the nearly one million Jewish refugees from the Middle East and North Africa, counter antisemitism and antizionism, protect our communities’ heritage, and ensure Sephardic and Mizrahi perspectives are represented in public policy, education, and communal life.

Rights and Redress for Jewish Refugees

Nearly one million Jews were forced from their homes across the Middle East and North Africa. Everything we do works toward recognition of their history, culture, and rights, at the United Nations, in U.S. policy, and in Jewish communal life.

Jewish Refugees from the Middle East and North Africa

Who they were, how they were uprooted, and why their history, culture, and rights must be recognized.
Learn the History

United Nations Advocacy

From the first testimony by a Jewish refugee before the UN Human Rights Council to our submission to the Commission of Inquiry, we bring refugee voices to the UN.
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Countering Antizionism and Historical Revisionism

For our families, antizionism was not a debate. It was written into law and used to strip Jews of their citizenship, property, and homes. We speak and write about that history, and we respond when Sephardic and Mizrahi history is distorted or erased.

We Have Seen Antizionism Before

Why JIMENA speaks up against antizionism, and how our speakers and staff educate the public about its history in the Arab world.
Read Our Statement

The Laws That Criminalized Zionism

Country by country, the nationality codes, decrees, and seizures that stripped Jews of their rights across the Middle East and North Africa.
Explore the Legal Record

Sephardic and Mizrahi Organizations Challenge New York Magazine

A coalition convened by JIMENA responds to “Habibi City,” a feature that defined belonging to the region in ideological terms that exclude its Jews.
Read the Letter

Communal Response to Jewish Voice for Peace

JIMENA and a coalition of Sephardic and Mizrahi synagogues and organizations called on JVP to stop appropriating our history in its literature.
Read the Letter

Communal Statement on Academic Research

As interest in Middle Eastern Jewish history grows, our communities set out principles for research that represents us accurately and with consent.
Read the Statement

JIMENA Response to CAIR

Our denunciation of antisemitic statements made by California Democratic Party leader Hussam Ayloush.
Read Our Response

K–12 Education

For too long, our histories have been left out of classrooms or distorted in them. We write curriculum, train educators, and hold public education systems accountable, so that every student learns the histories of Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews accurately.

Our Work on California’s Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum

When the first draft of California’s Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum left out Middle Eastern Jews, JIMENA intervened. In 2021 the State Board of Education adopted our lesson on antisemitism and the Middle Eastern Jewish experience.
Read Necessary Disruption

California’s Anti-Bias Education Grants

Only four of 75 grantees in California’s $20 million Anti-Bias Education Grant Program budgeted funds to address antisemitism. In 2023, JIMENA called on the state to require it before more funds were disbursed.
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Our Call for a Federal Investigation of California's Subject Matter Project (CSMP)

JIMENA and the Education Policy Project ask Congress and federal agencies to review the California Subject Matter Project and suspend its federal funding until violations are corrected.
Read the Letter

Campus to K12 Classroom

JIMENA's Executive Director traces how one-sided university teaching on Israel and the Middle East reaches California’s K–12 students.
Read in Times of Israel

Lessons on Antisemitism and Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews

A curated collection of lesson plans and educational units that help educators bring our histories into the classroom, as the U.S. National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism calls for.
Explore the Lessons

Cultural Property Rights

Forced displacement should not sever a community’s rights to its heritage. We advocate for the rights of displaced Jewish communities to their confiscated cultural property, beginning with the Iraqi Jewish Archive.

The Iraqi Jewish Archive & Cultural Property Agreements

The recovery of a community’s history, U.S. cultural property agreements, and JIMENA’s call to put the rights of dispossessed Jews from the Middle East and North Africa first.
Learn More

Voices from the Archive

A JIMENA fiscally sponsored project that makes the digitized Iraqi Jewish Archive easier to search, read, and explore.
Explore the Archive

Cultural Property Statements

Our testimony, correspondence, and policy positions on Jewish cultural property and the rights of displaced communities.
View All Statements

Defining and Confronting Antisemitism

Antisemitism cannot be fought if it cannot be named. We champion the IHRA definition of antisemitism, lead the call for California to adopt it, and helped shape the U.S. National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism.

Combating Antisemitism

We cannot effectively combat antisemitism without teaching who Jews are. An overview of JIMENA’s work in education, public advocacy, and at the United Nations.
Explore Our Work

Urging California to Adopt IHRA

JIMENA leads a coalition of 26 Jewish organizations calling on Governor Newsom to adopt the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism by executive order.
Read the Letter

JIMENA Welcomes the National Strategy

Our 2023 statement on the White House strategy that includes the IHRA definition and calls for teaching the histories of Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews, shaped in part by JIMENA’s participation in White House listening sessions.
Read Our Statement