Aleph Melbourne is a Jewish

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organization located in

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, Australia.

History

Aleph Melbourne was founded in January 1995 for gay Jewish men. In the late 1990s bisexual men were also welcomed as members. In 2007 the group became inclusive of LGBTIQ Jews, families and allies. Aleph attempted to join the Jewish Community Council of Victoria (JCCV) in 1999, but was denied acceptance when Orthodox

synagogue A synagogue, also called a shul or a temple, is a place of worship for Jews and Samaritans. It is a place for prayer (the main sanctuary and sometimes smaller chapels) where Jews attend religious services or special ceremonies such as wed ...

s threatened to quit the JCCV if Aleph was permitted to join. In 2015 the group celebrated their 20th anniversary by creating a documentary about themselves called "Aleph Melbourne- Celebrating 20 Years." The documentary was screened at the St Kilda Film Festival, the North Brisbane Film Festival, the Respect

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Human Rights Film Festival, the Santa Barbara Jewish Film Festival, and the

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My True Colors Festival.

Events and services

Religious services

Aleph Melbourne is primarily

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, but has hosted services and dinners for major

Jewish holidays Jewish holidays, also known as Jewish festivals or ''Yamim Tovim'' (, or singular , in transliterated Hebrew []), are holidays observed by Jews throughout the Hebrew calendar.This article focuses on practices of mainstream Rabbinic Judaism. ...

like Passover and Rosh Hashanah. The group has also celebrated Hannukah with other members of the Melbourne community. Aleph Melbourne and its coordinator Michael Barnett also speak out to end

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in the Jewish community across Melbourne and Australia.

Pride March

Aleph Melbourne has participated in Melbourne's Pride festival " Midsumma" every year since 1997. In 2016, the group excluded themselves after the festival made a financial partnership with

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, which Aleph Melbourne believed had supported homophobic journalists.

Political involvement

Aleph Melbourne created and distributed Voters Guides for the

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2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...

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and 2022 federal elections, the

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and

2022 Victorian state election The 2022 Victorian state election was held on Saturday, 26 November 2022 to elect the 60th Parliament of Victoria. All 88 seats in the Victorian Legislative Assembly, Legislative Assembly (lower house) and all 40 seats in the Victorian Legislat ...

s and the 2020 Melbourne City Council election, covering voting areas with large Jewish populations. These guides presented political candidates' views on LGBTQ issues, including

same-sex marriage Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same legal Legal sex and gender, sex. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 38 countries, with a total population of 1.5 ...

References

{{Religion and LGBT issues LGBTQ organisations based in Australia Organizations established in 1995 Jewish organisations based in Australia LGBTQ culture in Melbourne LGBTQ Jewish organizations Jews and Judaism in Melbourne Organisations based in Melbourne 1995 establishments in Australia