New York, NY 10001
Phone (212) 972-1550
E-mail: [email protected]
In the immediate aftermath of World War II, memories of the Nazi occupation, the Holocaust, and the subsequent Greek Civil War were still very raw and people were reluctant to proactively bring back painful memories. But that begun to change in the mid-1970s when the Bulgarian government returned to Greece a bag full of valuable items—mostly watches—that had been confiscated from Jews in the Greek regions of Macedonia and Thrace.
Our Museum started with tiny tentative steps like these, and was able to grow into what it is today thanks to a handful of believers in Greece and the US. The AFJMG was founded in 1982 by Dimitri Molfetas, of blessed memory, to raise the funds needed to ensure the Museum’s survival and growth. During those early years, an art historian and artist, Nicos Hannan Stavroulakis, also of blessed memory, was the Jewish Museum of Greece’s pioneer director.
For close to a quarter century, the AFJMG provided the bulk of the funds needed for the Museum to keep operating. Today, the Jewish Museum is counted as a major center of Sephardic and Romaniote culture in continental Europe. The expanding scope of its activities has meant that the funds needed to support the institution has grown substantially, and the AFJMG remains committed to helping raise those funds so the Museum can continue its essential work.
The AFJMG remains a not-for-profit organization, with no salaried staff, and we remain committed to our support of the Museum in Athens. At the same time, the AFJMG has also evolved over the last four decades to become a hub of Greco-Jewish activity in the United States and today has an effective voice and platform for Greek Jews in New York and the US.
Our group maintains excellent relations with key stakeholders across both Greek and Jewish institutions, as well as universities and other educational organizations—doing so has enabled and empowered us to organize the kinds of activities that showcase the history, the culture, and ongoing contributions of the Greek Jewish communities and their diaspora. We have sponsored a wide range of activities in the US which feature the Jewish Museum and showcase the revival of Jewish community life in all of Greece and beyond. Our efforts have brought successful exhibitions like Synagonistis, Hidden Children in War-time Greece and the Good Shepherd to New York, Boston, Chicago, Florida, Los Angeles and elsewhere following their original runs in Athens and throughout Greece.
We at the AFJMG believe that the Greek Jewish communities are truly unique, and that their histories should be preserved, celebrated, and passed on to future generations. Romaniote or Sephardic, Greek Jews represent a unique strand of Jewish religion and history that still has tremendous potential to enrich both Jewish and secular life in the US, Greece, Israel, and beyond.
Accordingly, we of the AFJMG welcome new members of all faiths who wish to join the Friends. We strive to continue building a vibrant and diverse community to take part in our activities and to contribute to the outreach and development of these historic Jewish communities, projecting them into the 21st century and beyond.
Our Board
Executive Board Members
Solomon Asser
President
Leon M. Levy
Secretary
Ilana Benmayor
Treasurer
Rabbi Diana S. Gerson
Spiritual Leader of AFJMG
Leon Amariglio
Executive Board Member
Mimis Cohen, MD
Executive Board Member
Ninette Cohen, PhD
Executive Board Member
Yasmine Ergas
Executive Board Member
Mimica Hyman
Executive Board Member
Viktor Koen
Executive Board Member
Alexander V. Konstantinou, PhD
Executive Board Member
Daniel Levien
Executive Board Member
Neil Solomon Levy
Executive Board Member
Board Members
Stefanos Becharas
Mathilde Benveniste
Saranna Biel-Cohen
Steven Bowman
Annette B. Fromm
Sheldon Goldman
Joe H. Halio, MD
Jackie Matza
Judith Mazza
Evelyn Mordechai
Lily Recanati
Clifton S. Russo
Founders
Dimitrios Molfetas *
Eileen Molfetas
Honorary Council
Hon. Aghi Balta
Isaac Benmayor *
Richard Ben-Veniste
Hon. Catherine Boura
Rabbi Martin A. Cohen
David E.R. Dangoor
H. E. Archbishop Demetrios
Andre Gregory
Hon. Georgios Iliopoulos
Hon. Alexandros P. Mallias
Vivian B. Mann
Elias Recanati *
Isidoros S. Tiano *