On April 9, 2026, JSWANA Bay’s Mimouna will include music, dancing, ritual, food, a place for Arab Jewish and Muslim communities in the Bay Area to come together.

Some details:

Food will be served later in the evening to account for the Jewish holiday of Passover not officially ending until 8:20 PM. There will be snacks served before that are kosher for Passover. Dinner will be catered by Shawarmaji and there will be Moroccan pastries and mufleta abound.

Terga will start promptly at 6:30 P.M. Please come on time to hear them play!

There will be a DJ set later in the night (9-10), so be sure stay late for that and dance to close the event out.

Why Mimouna Now?

As fascism continues to rage in our backyard, genocide continues to unfold in Palestine, the U.S. and Israel instigate war in Iran, and our community grapples with how to resist, we know that gathering is one of the most necessary elements to build liberatory movements that sustain and nourish us for generations to come. This year, we are hosting Mimouna for that very reason: to honor the life-giving traditions that our North African Jewish and Muslim ancestors embodied to ignite the solidarity necessary to build a better future for us all.

Who are we?
We are an anti-Zionist collective of Arab, Mizrahi, and Sephardi Jews in the Bay for Palestinian liberation and a radical Jewish future worldwide. Our work includes creating spaces where SWANA Jewish diaspora identity is celebrated, building coalitions with Arab and Muslim communities in the Bay Area, and directly organizing with the Oakland People’s Arms Embargo. Now more than ever we insist that a thriving diaspora, a free Palestine, and an end to the US and Israeli empire in the SWANA region is the only future worth building toward.

What is Mimouna?

During Passover, North African Jews have a tradition of leaving their flour and bread products (chametz) at Muslim neighbors’ homes. When Passover ends, Jewish families retrieve their chametz and invite their neighbors to a big party, called Mimouna. The party lasts all night, people sing and dance in the streets and share blessings of good luck. During the day before the party, Jews from Marrakech would pay a visit to the most ancient olive trees to wish them to prosper, and on the day after, people would rest and clean their feet in a water spring that was also sacred to the Muslim, who saw the entire celebration as a source of blessings. Mimouna is a centuries old celebration of our coexistence as Muslims and Jews, cohabitating in the same lands.

How is this event in solidarity with Palestine?

We believe that Arab/SWANA Jewish organizing has to happen through reclaiming our own culture. We see Mimouna as a powerful action we can offer the community to embody the sense of kinship we hope to cultivate, and our Jewish-Muslim society at large. Not only can we stand united in multiple communities at once, but also reclaim our Jewish culture in spaces that are not simultaneously co-opted or steeped in Zionism. Through this concert and event, we hope to leverage our dual/plural identities in the struggle for Palestinian liberation and shift the narrative away from the normative Arab vs. Jewish binary. We hope to gift the movement a moment of communion through music where we can embody the world and the sense of kinship that we are fighting for.

Accessibility info: This venue is ADA accessible. We will be using microphones & will have chairs for folks to sit. This is a large space that will have some ventilation & air filters running during the event. Masks are suggested, and we will have some at the door. There will be one area near the back door where the door will be open & people may sit in the threshold to eat comfortably without masks, although we are not permitted by the venue to spill out into the alley.

N.B. No one will be turned away for lack of funds. Please reach out to jswana.bay@gmail.com to get a discount.

Mimouna 2026

By JSWANA Bay

Mimouna 2026

Palestine⁩ Fundraiser hosted by JSWANA Bay