Sephardic co `'mui iry starts a
new some in West Bloom el d.

Moshe Schwab listens to speakers near a waiting shovel.

SHELL' DORFMAN

Editorial Assistant

S

Rabbi Hanoch Gez breaks ground for the new
building.

4/30
1999

14 Detroit Jewish News

Judith Chicorel, who emigrated to
Detroit from Turkey in 1917.
Finding American synagogue
melodies and service formats foreign,
her father organized other new
Sephardic immigrants into a congre-
gation. Renting various locations to
hold High Holiday services and social
gatherings, Jacob Chicorel looked

hirley Chicorel Behar faced
the crowd of 200 on Sunday
and, in a voice breaking with
emotion, welcomed those
gathered to a dream that was 80 years
in the making.
Behar stood under a
white tent that for a brief,
symbolic moment
enclosed the hopes of
Detroit's Sephardic Jews.
Ground was being broken
in West Bloomfield for
the first synagogue that
community has built in
Michigan.
The past president of
the Sephardic
Community of Greater
Detroit, Behar is among
1,500 Detroit-area Jews
originally of Spanish
descent, known as
Sephardim. She spoke of
her parents, Jacob and
Model of the future Sephardic synagogue.

toward the future with a yearning for
a synagogue of their own.
As newcomers arrived here from
20 different countries, including
Venezuela, Argentina and Morocco,
local Sephardim began talking more
than 30 years ago of establishing their
own synagogue. Following her father's
death, Behar said the congregation
continued to meet,
adding Sunday and
then Shabbat services.
Synagogue presi-
dent Isaac Ben-Ezra
spoke to those
attending the cere-
mony on the north-
west corner of
Walnut Lake and
Orchard Lake roads.
"We have dreamed
and planned for the
day when we would
have a permanent
home," he said. "This
is the day." The syna-
gogue will be "a place
for our children, a