Emmanuelle Chriqui

Chriqui in 2011, Joe Seer / Shutterstock.com
Birth Name: Emmanuelle Sophie Anne Chriqui
Place of Birth: Montréal, Québec, Canada
Date of Birth: December 10, 1975
Ethnicity: Moroccan Jewish
Emmanuelle Chriqui is a Canadian film and television actress. She is known for her roles in the films Snow Day, Wrong Turn, In the Mix, and You Don’t Mess with the Zohan, and on the shows Are You Afraid of the Dark?, Entourage, The Mentalist, and Superman & Lois.
Emmanuelle was born in Montréal, Québec, Canada, the daughter of Jewish emigrants from Morocco. Her mother was born in Casablanca and her father in Rabat, and Emmanuelle has relatives in Israel. Her family practiced Orthodox Judaism in the Sephardi tradition. Her mother was an aesthetician. Emmanuelle’s family moved to Toronto, Ontario, when she was a small child, settling in Markham. She became a U.S. citizen in 2017.
Her ancestors also include Italian Jews, Spanish Jews, and Portuguese Jews.
Emmanuelle’s maternal grandfather was named Jacob Benisty. Jacob was born in Ben Ahmed, Settat.
Emmanuelle’s maternal grandmother was Esther Elkaim (the daughter of Aaron Elkaim and Hnina Ruimy). Esther was born in Casablanca. Aaron was the son of Mimoun Elkaim and Estreilla Ruimy. Hnina was the daughter of Abrahm Ruimy and Aicha.
Sources: https://atlantajewishtimes.timesofisrael.com
Genealogy of Emmanuelle Chriqui (focusing on her mother’s side) – https://www.geni.com
Sephardic Jews from Muslim-Arab countries (such as Morocco) are considered Mizrahi Jewish as well.
Add that “Mizrahi Jewish” tag.
That’s an outdated definition of who the Sephardi Jews are. North African and Turkish Jews are generally considered Sephardi while Mizrahi Jews are most often from the Middle East and Iran.
I’m a Sephardi Jew from Israel with grandparents who hail from Iraq and Tunisia.
All Sephardic Jews with ancestors who lived in any Arab country (Middle East & North Africa), or Turkey, or Iran, are considered Mizrahi Jews.
That’s according to their own definition, and according to everyone else here in Israel from any other Jewish ethnic group.
The only Mizrahi Jewish ethnicity that is ‘pure’ and isn’t Sephardic, is the Yemenite-Jewish one.
I’m not Jewish and won’t pretend to know more than I do about the religion, but it would be very unhelpful for the purpose of this site to view the Mizrahis as a subgroup of Sephardis, as opposed to just viewing both as two Jewish subgroups. Often times it isn’t hard to tell them apart, the surnames often give away which one someone is.
Sephardi Jews and Mizrahi Jews correlates as ethnic group in the most part. I know it’s confusing but barely any former ‘pure’ Mizrahi Jews weren’t mixed with Sephardic Jews in Arab countries in North Africa and the Middle East (including the Muslim non-Arab countries of Iran and Turkey). Keep in mind that happened for several centuries after the Jewish Expulsion from Spain. Even if the surname doesn’t sound Spaniard-ish, they still go to a Sephardic synagogue and have a Sephardi rabbi at their wedding. This is why the Jews are one of the first groups to be categorized as ‘ethnoreligious’. Our ethnicity goes hand in hand with our religion.
Either way, Sephardic Jews are either from Southern Europe (Portugual/Spain/France/Italy/Greece/Bulgaria), or from where I mentioned above, and that’s it. The rest are fairly small communities.
The Mizrahi Jews are, again, the same North African and Middle Eastern countries I mentioned above, yet with one extra ‘pure’ Mizrahi Jewish country that is Yemen. Even their rabbis and syangogues aren’t Sephardic, they are uniquely Yemenite-Jewish.
This is like basic knowledge for kids in Israel, taught by their family, friends, the news, reality shows, etc. I hope you get what I mean by that.
Love your website by the way.
Cheers
Mycarf i agree with you. Whts wrong with people right here. They think all Jewish originated from Europeans. They forget about middle east roots in all jewish groups. Sad reality
You wrong. How do you know her ancestors from spain and italian?sephardic jews not always from europe!! She is like mizrahi!!!
I looked into her uncle’s marriage record for her maternal grandparents’ birthplaces.
Jacob was born in Ben Ahmed, Settat.
Esther was born in Casablanca.
Judaism is an ETHNO-religion. I am tired of people saying Judaism is a religion not an ethnicity, it’s BOTH, there are Jews that aren’t even religious, that’s just their ethnicity. Ethnic Jews have ties to the Middle East meaning a lot of us are not white, including Emmanuelle. The only reason Jews could be white is conditional whiteness.
“conditional whiteness” what?
nina dobrev’s sister? she looks like her only darker
Middle eastern version :)