Dear Friends,
We wish to thank all those who contributed to the renewed success of the 2012 European Day of Jewish Culture.
The figures are impressive : Activities organised in 260 cities throughout 27 countries gathered near to 200.000 visitors, 165.091 participants - 679 activities.
As you know, the success of the European Day of Jewish Culture is the result of a fruitful cooperation between Jewish and non-Jewish organisations, including professionals and volunteers among which many members of B'nai B'rith Lodges.
This close cooperation and solidarity among the participating countries : i.e. Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Norway, The Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and Ukraine, brings together over 10.000 volunteers and professionals from different institutions to organise these events. Jewish Organisations, Historical Societies, Tourist Information Centres, Municipalities, Museums, artists and students, all working together to prepare the Day of which the official programme will be circulated on our website and on Facebook.
Launched in 1996 in the Bas-Rhin (Alsace/France), under the Open Day formula by the Jewish association B'nai B'rith Hirschler in Strasbourg, in partnership with the Agence de Développement Touristique du Bas-Rhin (Tourist board of Lower Alsace), the day was progressively extended and became the European Day of Jewish Culture in 1999. From 2000 to 2003, this event was co-organised on the European level by four structures: the Agence de Développement Touristique du Bas-Rhin, B'nai B'rith Europe, the European Council of Jewish Communities and Red de Juderías de España (Spanish Jewish Network). Today, the event is being co-organised by B'nai B'rith Europe Red de Juderías de España.
For all information : http://www.jewisheritage.org
For the third consecutive year the regional Heritage Commission of Provence Midi Pyrénées participated in the European Days of Jewish Culture and Heritage in organising an event in the premises of B'nai B'rith in Marseille.
This year, the organizers of the traditional day of Jewish culture chose "The spirit of Jewish humour" as a theme. There is no doubt that humour in art always demonstrates distinctly the traits of the nation that creates it. In world literature, one can find different publications on the subject, such as Jews are laughing, Jewish humour, Jüdischer Humor, Mathematicians joke, Physicists laugh. These are publications that not only describe the characteristics of this particular type of folklore, but also enrich it by different short examples of funny situations, jokes and anecdotes. 
