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OBITUARIES
OF BLESSED MEMORY
60 | APRIL 7 • 2022
Bodzy; great-grandchildren,
Alexander and Haley Bodzy,
and Ellie Firsht; sisters, Ceil
Cicurel and June Rubenstein;
brother and sister-in-law,
Bryan Levy and Diana Trivax;
brother-in-law and sister-in-
law, Norman and Carolyn Shy.
Mrs. Shy was the beloved
wife for 54 years of the late
Leon Shy; the dear sister-in-
law of the late Sol Cicurel and
the late Seymour Rubenstein.
Interment was at Hebrew
Memorial Park. Contributions
may be made to Forgotten
Harvest, 21800 Greenfield
Road, Oak Park, MI 48237;
St. Jude Children’s Research
Hospital, 501 St. Jude Place,
Memphis, TN 38105; or to
a charity of one’s choice.
Arrangements by Ira Kaufman
Chapel.
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considerations. For information, have your funeral director call the
JN or you may call Sy Manello, editorial assistant, at (248) 351-
5147 or email him at smanello@thejewishnews.com.
Sephardic Leader
Stephen Shalom
JTA
Stephen Shalom, a leader of the
U.S. Sephardic Jewish community
who promoted Middle East peace
and religious tolerance, died at 93,
March 24, 2022.
The heir to a handkerchief man-
ufacture fortune, I. Shalom, now
known as New York Accessory
Group, Shalom was at different
times in his life a leader of major
Jewish and pro-Israel philanthropies.
They included the United Jewish
Appeal of Greater New York (now
the UJA Federation of New York),
the World Sephardi Federation
and Israel Bonds. He was also
involved with the American Jewish
Committee; HIAS, the Jewish immi-
gration advocacy group; the Jewish
Agency, and the Joint Distribution
Committee.
Shalom said the accomplish-
ment of which he was most proud
was working with Rep. Stephen
Solarz, D-N.Y., with the blessing of
President Jimmy Carter, to bring
400 Jewish women who wanted
to marry within their faith to the
United States from Syria in 1977.
Born in Brooklyn to parents who
had immigrated from Aleppo, he
regretted and resented the stereo-
type that had attached to Jews of
Middle Eastern and Sephardic ori-
gin as being militant and intolerant
of Arabs.
As Israeli governments turned
to peace-making, he encouraged
Sephardic leaders in Israel to join
the efforts, in order to increase their
influence in a country that once was
dominated by Ashkenazi Jews, but
also to roll back perceptions that
Sephardim and Mizrahi Jews were
anti-peace.