New York

Throughout the 20th century, New York has seen several waves of migration from the cities explored in this project – with the arrivals often active in commerce and the preservation of heritage connected to these cities. From 1890, Aleppine Jews arrived, alongside Christians, seeking economic betterment as peddlers and small retailers of textile goods supplied by compatriots in Manchester, Kobe, Shanghai and Manila. Wealthier Jewish emigres leaving Aleppo after 1947 sojourned in commercial nodes in Milan and Latin America before arriving in New York. Many established firms in Manhattan’s garment district (and some in the ‘diamond district’) and entered real estate investment. Many settled in Flatbush, Brooklyn, maintaining vibrant Syrian/Sephardic community, heritage and religious institutions.

Bukharan Jews settled in New York from at least the 1930s, often moving to the city from London, Leipzig and Jerusalem, as merchant families dispersed members to the city’s ‘fur district’ to trade in Karakul furs. From the 1960s, approximately 200 Afghan Jewish families originally from Herat and Kabul arrived from London and Israel, establishing firms that traded with Afghanistan and provided commercial services to visiting Muslim Afghans. By the 1970s, most Afghan Jews in New York had entered the gemstone trade in the ‘diamond district’. Most settled in Forest Hills, Queens, before moving to nearby Jamaica Heights, establishing a synagogue which still plays a major role in preserving Afghan Jewish heritage in the US and elsewhere. The families of Muslims from central Asia who fled their homes after 1917 and had initially settled in Turkey, Afghanistan, and Saudi Arabia also increasingly moved to New York from the 1950s. They established the American Turkestanian Association, an organisation active in the ‘Freedom for Captive Nations’ movement during the Cold War, and, after 1991, in building relations between this community and the government of Uzbekistan.

Bukharan Jews leaving (post-) Soviet Central Asia en masse from the 1970s settled in Queens and Brooklyn, opening synagogues, up-market kosher restaurants, the multi-lingual transnational “Bukharian Times” newspaper, and businesses in the ‘diamond district’. They have strengthened transnational diasporic ties in North America as well as maintained ties to Central Asia through the Congress of the Bukharan Jews of the USA and Canada (est. 1999). The Cultural and Religious Centre of Bukharan Jews in Forest Hill, besides providing a range of services to the NY community, hosts official delegations from Central Asian states and undertakes people’s diplomacy initiatives.

Dr. Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: It is uncommon for Syrian Jewish businesses and cultural centres in New York to maintain active connections with Syria. However, since the 1990s, some individuals have funded efforts to repair the Great Synagogue in Aleppo’s Bahsita neighbourhood, and organised small group tours, with the blessings of the Asad regime, to visit the graves of their ancestors in the burial ground adjacent to it. Otherwise, religious, community and heritage organisations in New York have been active in sustaining a Syrian-Sephardic identity through certain religious practices, by organising activities and through the publication of for example Aleppine rite prayer books and Syrian Jewish songs (pizmonim) for Syrian communities worldwide.

The Congress of Bukharan Jews of the USA and Canada, with headquarts in New York and part of the World Congress of Bukharan Jews led by billionaire Levi Levaev from Israel (originally from Samarkand, Uzbekistan), performs a range of functions. One of its most public roles is in the realm of people’s diplomacy, through which Bukharan diasporic leaders establish and maintain diplomatic ties with Central Asian embassies and business delegations, as well as promoting Uzbek culture and heritage abroad. The head of the Congress of Bukharan Jews of the USA and Canada, Boris Kandov, has also participated as an international observer in presidential elections for several years.

Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: Aleppo has long been an ethnically and religiously diverse city. Across the Ottoman empire, some religious “sects” were granted communal autonomy, and European traders also employed individuals from particular ethno-national groups – especially Armenians, Greek Catholics and Jews – as commercial agents, which further brought the significance of such affiliations to the fore in Aleppo. Yet commercial partnerships developed between individuals of different religious affiliations both before and after the Jewish departure (1947 onwards); and while Aleppo’s Jews tended to reside in particular neighbourhoods, these were never ghettos and Jews always lived among Muslims.

Vera Skvirskaja, Co-Investigator: In Bukhara during the Soviet period, religious identity remained important cultural marker but was not publicly performed or expressed, as it was largely relegated to the private sphere and strongly discouraged by the atheist state. Religious identity had very limited impact on urban dynamics, and the significant difficulties in securing kosher food led to a very flexible system of religious observances for the majority of Bukharan Jews, including those who considered themselves religious. People of different religious affiliations mixed freely in workplaces and social settings. This dynamic has largely persisted after the majority of Bukharan Jews emigrated from Central Asia. Many of those who did not emigrate are married to non-Jews, including Muslims, Christians, or atheists. At the formal level in Uzbekistan, the Soviet-era rhetoric of "Friendship between Peoples" has been replaced by a discourse of religious tolerance.

Dr. Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: It is uncommon for Syrian Jewish businesses and cultural centres in New York to maintain active connections with Syria. However, since the 1990s, some individuals have funded efforts to repair the Great Synagogue in Aleppo’s Bahsita neighbourhood, and organised small group tours, with the blessings of the Asad regime, to visit the graves of their ancestors in the burial ground adjacent to it. Otherwise, religious, community and heritage organisations in New York have been active in sustaining a Syrian-Sephardic identity through certain religious practices, by organising activities and through the publication of for example Aleppine rite prayer books and Syrian Jewish songs (pizmonim) for Syrian communities worldwide.

The Congress of Bukharan Jews of the USA and Canada, with headquarts in New York and part of the World Congress of Bukharan Jews led by billionaire Levi Levaev from Israel (originally from Samarkand, Uzbekistan), performs a range of functions. One of its most public roles is in the realm of people’s diplomacy, through which Bukharan diasporic leaders establish and maintain diplomatic ties with Central Asian embassies and business delegations, as well as promoting Uzbek culture and heritage abroad. The head of the Congress of Bukharan Jews of the USA and Canada, Boris Kandov, has also participated as an international observer in presidential elections for several years.

Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: The partition of Palestine and the ensuing wars imperilled the position of Jews in Syria, as did their association with the former colonial government (Syria achieved independence in 1946). Jews who remained in Syria after 1947 faced restrictions on mobility, property and both public and private employment; their official documents were stamped with “Musawi” (“Mosaic”) which curtailed their civil rights. Some Jews were able to be smuggled out of Syria; others remained even until the 1990s, in many cases unable to liquidate their assets.

Vera Skvirskaja, Co-Investigator: In Central Asia, the Six-Day War in Israel was a significant event that triggered the desire to emigrate to Israel, primarily due to fears of potentially escalating anti-Jewish sentiments among Muslim neighbours and Soviet state propaganda hostile to Israel. The emergence of a new nationalist agenda in independent Uzbekistan, coupled with broader fears of interethnic violence in the late 1980s and 1990s, was also crucial in many Bukharans’ decisions to emigrate. Economic considerations were also very important, particularly during the turbulent 1990s, marked by the shift to a market economy.

Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: It is uncommon for Syrian Jewish businesses and cultural centres in New York to maintain active connections with Syria. However, since the 1990s, some individuals have funded efforts to repair the Great Synagogue in Aleppo’s Bahsita neighbourhood, and organised small group tours, with the blessings of the Asad regime, to visit the graves of their ancestors in the burial ground adjacent to it. Otherwise, religious, community and heritage organisations in New York have been active in sustaining a Syrian-Sephardic identity through certain religious practices, by organising activities and through the publication of, for example, Aleppine rite prayer books and Syrian Jewish songs (pizmonim) for Syrian communities worldwide.

Vera Skvirskaja, Co-Investigator: The Congress of Bukharan Jews of the USA and Canada, with headquarters in New York and part of the World Congress of Bukharan Jews led by billionaire Levi Levaev from Israel (originally from Samarkand, Uzbekistan), performs a range of functions. One of its most public roles is in the realm of people’s diplomacy, through which Bukharan diasporic leaders establish and maintain diplomatic ties with Central Asian embassies and business delegations, as well as promoting Uzbek culture and heritage abroad. The head of the Congress of Bukharan Jews of the USA and Canada, Boris Kandov, has also participated as an international observer in presidential elections for several years.

Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: Aleppo has long been an ethnically and religiously diverse city. Across the Ottoman Empire, some religious “sects” were granted communal autonomy, and European traders also employed individuals from particular ethno-national groups—especially Armenians, Greek Catholics and Jews—as commercial agents, which further brought the significance of such affiliations to the fore in Aleppo. Yet commercial partnerships developed between individuals of different religious affiliations both before and after the Jewish departure (1947 onwards); and while Aleppo’s Jews tended to reside in particular neighbourhoods, these were never ghettos and Jews always lived among Muslims.

Vera Skvirskaja, Co-Investigator: In Bukhara during the Soviet period, religious identity remained an important cultural marker but was not publicly performed or expressed, as it was largely relegated to the private sphere and strongly discouraged by the atheist state. Religious identity had a very limited impact on urban dynamics, and the significant difficulties in securing kosher food led to a very flexible system of religious observances for the majority of Bukharan Jews, including those who considered themselves religious. People of different religious affiliations mixed freely in workplaces and social settings. This dynamic has largely persisted after the majority of Bukharan Jews emigrated from Central Asia. Many of those who did not emigrate are married to non-Jews, including Muslims, Christians, or atheists. At the formal level in Uzbekistan, the Soviet-era rhetoric of "Friendship between Peoples" has been replaced by a discourse of religious tolerance.

Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: The partition of Palestine and the ensuing wars imperilled the position of Jews in Syria, as did their association with the former colonial government (Syria achieved independence in 1946). Jews who remained in Syria after 1947 faced restrictions on mobility, property and both public and private employment; their official documents were stamped with “Musawi” (“Mosaic”) which curtailed their civil rights. Some Jews were able to be smuggled out of Syria; others remained even until the 1990s, in many cases unable to liquidate their assets.

Vera Skvirskaja, Co-Investigator: In Central Asia, the Six-Day War in Israel was a significant event that triggered the desire to emigrate to Israel, primarily due to fears of potentially escalating anti-Jewish sentiments among Muslim neighbours and Soviet state propaganda hostile to Israel. The emergence of a new nationalist agenda in independent Uzbekistan, coupled with broader fears of interethnic violence in the late 1980s and 1990s, was also crucial in many Bukharans’ decisions to emigrate. Economic considerations were also very important, particularly during the turbulent 1990s, marked by the shift to a market economy.

Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: Among the Syrian Jewish diaspora in New York, Arabic melodies are used in religious services as well as celebrations, and since 1985, books of liturgy have been printed following a specifically Aleppine rite. At a Passover service at the Magen David synagogue in Bensonhurst, New York, in 2023, the congregation read from prayer books which specified the distinctively Aleppine aspects of the liturgy. One man recited a portion of the Torah in a way that gave full expression to the Arabic scales. As he took his seat again, he commented “Doing it the Aleppine way”, and asked had I heard the echoes of Quran recitation in his singing? Another Aleppine-born businessman in New York who had left Aleppo as a teenager in the 1980s still used Arabic in some of this commercial interactions within the community. Reflecting on the respect and social status that his father had enjoyed in Aleppo, but not in New York, said “I told my doctor yesterday that on my tombstone I want to put, “from Halab [Aleppo], Syria”, even though it is not my country”.

Vera Skvirskaja, Co-Investigator: The most visible and enduring emotional connection of Bukharan Jews to their cities of origin is represented by ancestral graves and Jewish cemeteries. Different hometown associations have been established in the diaspora (e.g. Fund ‘Tashkent’, Memorial Fund ‘Bukhara’, Fund ‘Kokand’, and so on) to raise funds in the global Bukharan diapora for the reconstruction and maintenance of Bukharan Jewish cemeteries in Central Asia. Additionally, some synagogue-based fundraising initiatives are organized within the diaspora for specific Jewish cemeteries. These various fundraising efforts operate alongside the burgeoning individual and organized "cemetery tourism" or cemetery pilgrimage.

Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: Aleppine Jews leaving the Middle East in the first half of the 20th century did not just travel to Europe and the Americas, but also sojourned in East and South East Asian trading ports such as Shanghai, Kobe, Hong Kong and Manila. In Shanghai and Kobe, it was not uncommon for Jewish, Christian and Muslim compatriots to mix socially: regardless of their religious affiliation, they often found that cultural and social boundaries were more fluid in trading outposts than they had known in Aleppo.

Vera Skvirskaja, Co-Investigator: Bukharan Jews emigrating en masse to the West and Israel in the 1970s and 1980s were among the first Soviet citizens permitted to leave the USSR. As part of the larger Russophone Jewish diaspora in New York and Vienna, they have become one of the key established groups of former compatriots for the more recent post-Soviet and ongoing flows of labour migrants from Central Asia. In New York and Vienna, Bukharan Jews often cooperate with Muslim Central Asians, primarily by providing various forms of employment in the domestic sphere (e.g. help with the elderly and children) as well as in the transport and restaurant industries. Linguistic affinity and cultural familiarity are particularly sought-after factors for Bukharan Jewish family-run businesses and the employment of Muslim ex-compatriots in the domestic sphere.

Paul Anderson, Co-Investigator: In Aleppo, a handful of wealthy Jewish families moved their primary residence from Bahsita in the walled city to Jamiliyeh, an extra-mural neighbourhood, when it was founded in the late 19th century. From the outset, Jamiliyeh was a centre for important merchants, Ottoman state officials, and educated elites. In the early 20th century, Jews formed a substantial proportion of the residents. Until the 1940s, Jewish families continued to move out of Bahsita to Jamiliyeh, following a path of upward social mobility. The social landscape and built environment of Jamiliyeh, which had always been a mixed Muslim-Jewish area, changed dramatically with the partition of Palestine and the subsequent departure of many of its Jewish inhabitants. Many physical traces of the Jewish presence in Aleppo’s neighbourhoods were subsequently lost to urban development projects.

Vera Skvirskaja, Co-Investigator: Syrian Jews who arrived in New York in the first half of the twentieth century did not settle in already established Sephardic areas, but established their own institutions and areas. They first settled on the lower East Side before moving to Bensonhurst, and then (from the 1950s) to Ocean Parkway. While the Magen David synagogue in Bensonhurst was renovated in the 2000s, the area is now largely Korean and few Syrian Jews reside there; the synagogue is active on high holidays and for some funerals.

New York

How have the businesses and cultural centres established by migrants in New York helped to bridge connections between their communities and their countries of origin?

What role did religious identity play in the urban dynamics of cities like Bukhara and Aleppo before and after mass emigration?

How have the businesses and cultural centres established by migrants in New York helped to bridge connections between their communities and their countries of origin?

How have historical events such as nationalism and civil conflict /and economic hardships/political-ideological control specifically impacted non-Muslim communities in Muslim Asia?

How have the businesses and cultural centres established by migrants in New York helped to bridge connections between their communities and their countries of origin?

What role did religious identity play in the urban dynamics of cities like Bukhara and Aleppo before and after mass emigration?

How have historical events such as nationalism and civil conflict /and economic hardships/political-ideological control specifically impacted non-Muslim communities in Muslim Asia?

What stories and practices have you encountered that highlight the emotional ties migrants maintain with their cities of origin?

In what ways do you see the experiences of Muslim and non-Muslim migrants intersecting, and what does this tell us about their shared histories?

Can you discuss specific examples of buildings /neighbourhoods/ethnic quarters that illustrate the changes in community demographics over time?