Canadian refugee hearings: Gladys's story

 Gladys Daoud

The transcripts of the Canadian Parliamentary committee investigation into the plight of Jewish refugees on 2 and 7 May 2013 have now been published. The committee heard testimony from Libyan-born Gina Waldman and Iraqi-born Gladys Daoud and Lisette Shashoua. Here is Gladys's story (with thanks to all those who emailed me):


  After World War I, Iraq became independent from the Ottoman Empire. Jews played an important role in the financial, cultural, and political life of the new country. Iraqi Jews occupied prominent positions in the ministries of finance and justice and in Parliament. Furthermore, Jewish lawyers were instrumental in drafting the constitution of the new state.

    My grandfather sent my father and his two brothers to France for their education. My father became a doctor, and was lucky to return to Baghdad before World War II. His two brothers, one a real estate developer and the other a medical student, ended their short lives in a concentration camp in Germany, but that is another story.

    My father returned to Iraq and established his medical practice after serving in the Iraqi army as a colonel. My parents' life in Iraq until the creation of the State of Israel was relatively happy, even though it was marred by tragic events that occurred at various intervals. For example, my paternal grandfather was murdered. His murder was not investigated by the police, and his murderer was never brought to justice.

     In 1941 the people of Baghdad, encouraged by the pro-Nazi government at the time, went on a murderous rampage in the Jewish quarter, killing close to 200 Jews and pillaging homes and businesses. My maternal grandfather miraculously survived despite being hunted by rebels trying to get hold of the key to the country's treasury. In spite of that, my parents endured and prospered.

    After the creation of the State of Israel, the Iraqi government embarked on a policy of ethnic cleansing and persecution of its Jewish population. Prominent Jews were publicly hanged. Jewish businesses were confiscated. Import licences were cancelled. Jewish public servants were fired.

    Jews were forbidden from leaving the country under the pretense that they would join the Zionist enemy and attack Iraq. Under international pressure, the government finally relented, and allowed Jews to leave Iraq provided they abandoned all of their assets in favour of the state. Out of 150,000 Jews, 140,000 left the country, abandoning all of their possessions with the exception of one suitcase of clothes.

    Those who stayed behind were deluded optimists who believed that the violence directed at the Jews would pass, and that coexistence in harmony with their Muslim and Christian neighbours was still possible.

    Things took a turn for the worse in 1963, after the Baath regime took power. Their first priority was to embark on an ethnic cleansing policy towards the Iraqi Jews. They banned all exit visas for Jews, and actively promoted a culture of hatred and incitement towards them.

    I was a teenager going to school in 1967 when the Six Day War took place. I saw my entire world collapse around me. All Jews in Baghdad were declared spies and enemies of the people. The radio was blaring all day, calling the people to action to kill the Jews. Needless to say, we were terrified, and we had nowhere to go.

    The government proceeded with a plan of total isolation and economic strangulation. Employers were instructed to fire their Jewish employees. Christian and Muslim co-workers and business partners were terrified of being associated with enemies of the state, and thus all Jewish-owned businesses closed their doors, and our school lost all its teachers. Our Muslim and Christian friends whom we grew up with no longer dared to speak to us.

    My father's medical clinic was adjacent to the local government intelligence office. His patients were afraid of being seen there, so the only patients he treated were policemen and the intelligence officers who were treated free of charge while keeping a close watch on his movements.

    As Jewish students, we were refused admittance to any higher education. The few students who were already enrolled in university were regularly beaten by their classmates while the teachers and administration turned a blind eye.

    I finished my government high school exam in June 1967. I ranked second in all of Iraq and was immediately accepted into Baghdad University. In fact, I had also applied to McGill and MIT and was accepted at both of these universities. However, on learning that I was of the Jewish faith, my acceptance at Baghdad University was retracted and I was refused a passport to study abroad. For the four years that followed, I endured the life of a non-person and watched all my hopes and aspirations go to ashes as I sat confined to my room, between four walls, thinking of what other young people all over the world were doing.

    I applied for a secretarial job at the Belgian consulate and was accepted. Three weeks later, I was called into the consul's office and informed very politely that although I was not being asked to leave, they had received word that my father would be imprisoned should I not leave immediately. Needless to say, I did just that.

    My family's bank accounts were frozen, our property was confiscated, and we were only able to survive thanks to the money that my mother had the foresight to bury in our garden. We were forbidden to leave Baghdad. Our telephone line was cancelled, and we could not meet with other Jewish families since this could lead to an accusation that we were conspiring against the state. Our condition was desperate.

    To make things worse, the government decided to publicly execute 14 Iraqis in 1969, most of whom were innocent Jews. I personally knew a couple of them who were students like me, unable to work or study and trying to keep busy by learning a foreign language. They were hanged in the public square and the population was given the day off and invited to gather and dance in celebration underneath the dangling corpses. I still have nightmares about being back in Baghdad and reliving the anguish of those days.

    Those were not the only Jews who lost their lives. Every so often, a Jew would randomly be arrested, never to be heard from again. Their families to this day have no closure.

    The situation was so desperate that we had no choice but to seek to escape by any means possible. Many left on foot or on the back of a mule, across the mountains in northern Iraq and into Iran with the help of Kurdish guides. Some were arrested and brought back. Those who were carrying any diplomas or valuables with them would try to flush them down a toilet so as not to provide proof about their intended flight. These secret departures added to the despair of those left behind. They saw their close friends and relatives disappear while they were left behind not knowing what the next day might bring.

    On April 17, 1971, with one suitcase of clothes and some pocket change, my parents and I locked the front door of our home in Baghdad for the last time and started a long journey to come to Montreal to seek a new beginning.

Read transcript in full

Transcripts of hearings: 2 May; 7 May here and here 

Expulsion of Jews had no 'political consequences'

Canadian Parliament to investigate Jewish refugees 

More proof that Tunisian Salafists hate all Jews

This video was shot a few days ago in the Tunisian tourist resort of Sousse. It shows Tunisian Salafists smashing bottles of alcohol. About two minutes into the clip, the Salafists are shouting down their favourite bogeyman - the Jews.

Mark their words. You can clearly hear the Arabic 'al Yahud'. Are demonstrators railing at Israel, or are they shouting, ' Down with the Jews, but not Tunisian Jews' ? No.

 When it comes to purveying the 'demon drink',  the worst offenders, in these Islamists' eyes, are in fact Tunisian Jews. After all, they originated the famous Boukha - or fig brandy.

Tell that to Ahmed Maher of the BBC. Recently a reader received a BBC reply to her complaint relating to Ahmed Maher’s claim in a BBC website news piece:

 “Several media reports spoke about YouTube videos that showed radical Islamists threatening Tunisian Jews. Despite searching extensively, I did not find any of them.” 

The reader provided four video clips in support of the complaint – viewable here, here, here and here.

The mind-boggling reply she received could have come straight of Alice in Wonderland:

 “We have reviewed Ahmed Maher’s article “Tunisia’s last Jews at ease despite troubled past”, and discussed your complaint with him. Regarding the You Tube links, Mr Maher reaffirms that he conducted an extensive search in Arabic and English to find clips or links of Salafists or hardliners attacking “Tunisian Jews” – a specification he makes clear in his piece.

    "He found clips of rallies in support of Osama Bin Laden, but stresses he did not find anything attacking “Tunisian Jews” specifically (my emphasis - ed) . Mr Maher says: “The chants heard in the four links cited [in your complaint] are against ‘the State of Israel and Jews but not Tunisian Jews’. 

    "The chants were echoed across several Muslim countries in the past two years in the wake of the Arab spring (and even before the revolutions) by extremists (even lay people and leftists in Egypt in particular who attacked the headquarters of the Israeli embassy in Giza in August 2011) to protest what they term ‘the Israeli occupation of Palestine, the blockade of the Gaza strip’.

    "They chanted it in Tunisia during the visit of the Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyah. Again, the chants, which are in Arabic, were not directed at ‘Tunisian Jews’ but ‘Israel’ in general.

    “I spoke to Sheikh Bashir Bin Hassan, one of the most prominent Salafi, Wahabi sheikhs in post-revolution Tunisian, and asked him again about two things: the chants and the protest in front of the Tunis synagogue. He said: ‘The chants were not aimed at the Tunisian Jews; make no mistake. It was directed at Israel because Israel is a very sensitive issue in the Muslim world. Our Prophet Muhammad asked us to take good care and protect non-Muslims living in our countries like Christians and Jews.’

 "Get it?" says the excellent BBC Watch blog." According to the BBC, if Tunisian Islamists (and presumably any elsewhere too) chant “Killing the Jews is a duty” or “Khaybar, Khaybar ya Yahud” or ”the army of Mohammed will return”, then local Jews have nothing whatsoever to worry about because in fact they are not referring to them – or indeed to Jews at all – but to Israel, which should apparently be perfectly understandable.

"And the BBC website’s Middle East desk is quite sure of that because a prominent Salafist – who obviously thinks it unremarkable to chant hate speech relating to “the Zionist entity’s policies” in front of a synagogue in Tunisia – told them so.

BBC Watch concludes:

" If that is the level of understanding and interpretation prevalent among staff at the BBC’s Middle East desk, then the only conclusion can be that the licence fee payer is funding an outfit not fit for purpose."

 No doubt the BBC would also rubbish the latest video (above ) from Sousse.

As for Mr Maher's playing down 'exaggerated' media reports of Tunisian antisemitism, he maintains that all the Tunisian Jews he interviewed told him, "we are fed up" :

"I have not put words into their mouths, neither did I push them to speak on this angle. There is no question about that.”

As pointed out by Point of No Return, Mr Maher has selectively interviewed 'dhimmi' Tunisian Jews with a vested interest in playing down 'exaggerated' media reports of Tunisian antisemitism.

However,  Mr Maher's colleague Magdi Abdelhadi, in his two-part radio series on the Exodus of Jews from Arab countries, Heart and Soul, broadcast six months ago, managed to find three Tunisian Jews who held the opposite view.

" It is the Salafists we fear", restauranteur Jacob Lellouche is heard to say.

Whatever happened to BBC standards of impartial reporting?

Knesset to confirm 30 November as Refugee Day

Point of No Return exclusive (with thanks: Levana)

The Israeli Knesset is expected to confirm 30 November as the Memorial Day for Jewish refugees from Arab countries.

Moroccan-born MK Shimon Ohayon (pictured) this week tabled a bill stipulating the Memorial Day as part of "the Rights of Jewish Refugees who were uprooted, expelled or fled from Arab countries with the establishment of the state of Israel or in the wake of it."

The date chosen, 30 November, is the day after 29 November 1947, which marks the passing of UN Resolution 181 on the Partition of Palestine.

The subsequent furore in the Arab world that year led to antisemitic unrest in Egypt and Libya, and pogroms in Syria, Aden and Bahrain. November was traditionally a notorious month for anti-Jewish disturbances in Arab countries coinciding with the anniversary of the Balfour Declaration.

The Israeli Ministry for Tourism will  be responsible for the observance of Memorial Day, working together with the Ministries for Education, Culture and Sport. The Israeli Foreign ministry will also be expected to organise special events outside Israel. If 30 November falls on a Friday or Saturday, the Day will be observed at the start of the following week.

Although the idea of a Memorial Day has long been in the pipeline, it was heavily promoted by Danny Ayalon, deputy foreign minister in the last government.

Shimon Ohayon is a new arrival in the Knesset, where he represents Yisrael Beytenu. Next week he is due to meet representatives of the organisations of Jews from Arab countries as well as Sam Grundwerg, Director of the World Jewish Congress in Israel and Edna Weinstock-Gabay, Director of Global Strategic Initiatives.

The meeting will lay the groundwork for a cross-party group to promote awareness in the Knesset  of Jewish refugees from Arab Countries.

Moroccan book fair slammed for its Jew-hatred

When it comes to the treatment of Jews, the  Moroccans -  and notably their king - tend to get a very good press (see previous post).  This is why the blatant display of books encouraging Jew-hatred at the Casablanca book fair alarmed the Simon Wiesenthal Centre (which monitors antisemitism)  enough to send a letter to the Moroccan Minister of Culture (with thanks: Ralph):

In a letter addressed to Mohammed Amine Sbihi, Moroccan Minister of Culture, Shimon Samuels, director of International Relations of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, presented the results of his fourth annual investigation into incitement to antisemitism on the bookstands of the SIEL book fair.

The fair, which took place from 29 March to 7 April, is the largest in the Arab world, with 150 Moroccan stands, 30 Lebanese, 20 Syrian, 10 Egyptian, five Saudi, two Palestinian and one Libyan. 
Mr Samuels declared:"It is frightening to note that ... in spite of the Arab Spring, Jew-hatred remains an implacable constant of the Arab literature on display at the last three book fairs, leaving an indelible stain on the SIEL event."




Read article in full (French)

Why is the Moroccan King funding Jewish sites?

 The King of Morocco was virtually the sole funder of the restored Cape Verde Jewish cemetery (photo: AFP)


What lies behind the King of Morocco's drive to restore synagogues and Jewish cemeteries? Are his motives pure, or is he just trying to attract Jewish tourism and improve Morocco's standing with the US? The Times of Israel investigates:

With virtually no practising Jews on Cape Verde today, the cemeteries had fallen into neglect. Now a Washington-based nonprofit is spearheading their restoration.

The Cape Verde Jewish Heritage Project has a board stuffed with prominent Jewish Washingtonians, but its funding comes almost entirely from one man — King Mohammed VI of Morocco. According to the group’s US tax filings, the king was the organization’s sole donor in 2011 and 2012, giving $100,000 each year.

Andre Azoulay, a senior Jewish adviser to the king and a member of the project’s advisory board, told JTA that the effort is reflective of the king’s “deep commitment” to preserving Jewish heritage in Morocco and elsewhere. But even if, as some speculate, it is motivated by a desire to attract tourists and curry favor with American Jews, the king’s drive clearly sets Morocco apart from other Middle Eastern countries where Jewish sites have faced increasing threats under new Islamist governments.

“This is all part of a strong push from His Majesty the King that started three, four years ago, when we saw cemeteries have become vulnerable because of lacking care by all of us,” Azoulay told JTA.

Approximately 3,000 Jews are living in Morocco, a North African monarchy about the size of Texas that had been home to a large and thriving Jewish community for centuries. In the 19th century, a number of Moroccan-Jewish families resettled in Cape Verde, attracted by the financial potential of this transatlantic hub.

Over time the families totally assimilated, though their Creole-speaking, Christian descendants include some of Cape Verde’s most prominent businessmen and politicians, including the country’s first democratically elected prime minister, Carlos Alberto Wahnon de Carvalho Veiga.

Unlike many Arab countries with once sizable Jewish communities, Morocco has taken wide-ranging steps to preserve its Jewish history. The Casablanca Jewish museum was restored, the small but colorful 17th century synagogue in Fez was renovated, and dozens of former Jewish schools and more than 100 synagogues were rehabilitated with funding from the crown.

In 2011, in a move that Azoulay calls unprecedented in the modern Middle East, the Moroccan constitution was changed to note that the country has been “nourished and enriched … [by] Hebraic influences,” among others. The Moroccan parliament adopted the new language along with amendments that transferred some powers from the king to elected parties.

“I am not trying to paint a one-sided rosy picture. There are some difficult and maybe black pages in the book of Moroccan Jewry,” Azoulay told JTA. “But there are many, many more beautiful chapters.”

The king’s restoration activity already has brought benefits in the form of increased Jewish tourism. More than 19,000 Israelis entered Morocco in 2010, a 42 percent leap from the previous year, according to Israel’s Tourism Ministry. The World Federation of Moroccan Jewry says the kingdom receives another 30,000 non-Israeli Jews annually.

Among them was Joel Rubinfeld, the Brussels-based co-chair of the European Jewish Parliament, who spent 12 days in Morocco in March meeting with government officials and visiting his mother’s hometown. Rubinfeld believes the government’s intention to honor the country’s Jewish past is sincere, but he said other considerations are at work as well.

“There may certainly be pragmatic incentives: attracting tourism and investments down the line,” Rubinfeld said. “For some, it is a political calculation to improve Morocco’s international standing.”

A Moroccan diplomat, who spoke to JTA on condition of anonymity, said the restoration project could bring political dividends for Morocco, which has been accused of human rights abuses in Western Sahara, a disputed territory to which the kingdom lays partial claim.

“To Morocco’s great consternation, the US last month proposed the UN peacekeeping mission in Western Sahara help monitor human rights,” the diplomat said. “It’s very useful for us to have someone — a strong lobby group, perhaps — to help talk the State Department out of this idea. The Jewish lobby is a very strong one.”

The board of the Cape Verde Jewish Heritage Project includes Howard Berman, a former California congressman who chaired the House Foreign Affairs Committee until his defeat last year; Daniel Mariaschin, the executive director of B’nai B’rith International; Herman Cohen, a former US assistant secretary of state; and Toby Dershowitz, who heads a Washington public affairs consultancy.

But Azoulay grows indignant at any suggestion the king has his eye on the economic or political benefits of his largesse.

“This effort is the concrete manifestation of a consensus in Moroccan society, that our society is partly built on Jewish culture, a culture deeply rooted in three millennia of history,” he said.

“You have to understand the purity of it,” Azoulay added. “Those who think it is to attract tourists are just out of order.”

As popular revolutions have swept the Arab world since late 2010, Jewish heritage has suffered under newly empowered Islamist governments. Two Jewish cemeteries were desecrated earlier this year in Tunisia, prompting Israel to express concerns for the safety of the country’s Jews, the daily Maariv reported.

In Egypt, the government prevented several dozen Israelis from making the annual Passover pilgrimage to Alexandria’s main synagogue, one of the few properly maintained and functioning Jewish sites in the country. Egypt also briefly censored a film about the flight of its Jews following Israel’s establishment.

But in Morocco, a similar film, titled “Tinghir-Jerusalem: Echoes from the Mellah,” won a prize last month at the Tangier Film Festival. It also triggered protests from a few hundred Islamists and left-wing activists saying the film promoted “normalization” of ties with Israel, The Associated Press reported.

Read article in full

This Shavuot pogrom haunts us still

 A scene from the Farhud of 1941 by artist Nissim Zalayet

Over 70 years later, the Nazi demons unleashed by the Farhud pogrom in Baghdad are still with us, argues Lyn Julius in The Times of Israel. The Arab war against Israel is simply a continuation of the ethnic cleansing it started:

Salim Fattal was just eleven when the two-day Baghdad pogrom known as the Farhud erupted on Shavuot 72 years ago, yet its memory is engraved deep in his soul. Despite the passage of time, the shrieks and wails of the pogrom’s 179 Jewish victims still echo in his ears. 

On 1 June, the first day of Shavuot in 1941, Fattal, his widowed mother and four siblings endured unimaginable terror, as he describes in his vivid memoir In the Alleys of Baghdad:

Helpless Jews had been cornered in their homes and fallen easy prey to robbers, murderers and rapists, who abused their victims to their heart’s content, with no let or hindrance. They slit throats, slashed off limbs, smashed skulls. They made no distinction between women, children and old people. In that gory scene, blind hatred of Jews and the joy of murder for its own sake reinforced each other.

Salim’s uncle Meir was pulled off a bus by a raging mob baying for Jewish blood, and never seen again. 

Salim and his family managed to get through the night unscathed by bribing a local policeman to stand guard over their house. Haggling over how much he would be paid for each bullet he fired at the rioters, the policeman finally settled with the family at a quarter of a dinar for each shot.

The Farhud (Arabic for “violent dispossession”) marked an irrevocable break between Jews and Arabs in Iraq and paved the way for the dissolution of the 2,600-year-old Jewish community barely 10 years later. Loyal and productive citizens comprising a fifth of Baghdad, the Jews had not known anything like the Farhud in living memory. Before the victims’ blood was dry, army and police warned the Jews not to testify against the murderers and looters. Even the official report on the massacre was not published until 1958.

Read article in full

Remember the Farhud for the future's sake

 The brutal antisemitism of the Farhud culminated in the hanging of Shafik Ades in 1948
 

The festival of Shavuot starts tomorrow. For Iraqi Jews, it will be indelibly associated with the Farhud of Shavuot 1941. Zvi Gabay in Israel Hayom reminds us why the memory of this bloody pogrom is important, 72 years on:

On Shavuot, the holiday which Jews around the globe begin celebrating this Tuesday night, Iraqi Jews mark 72 years since the Farhud -- the 1941 riots in which 137 people were slaughtered and hundreds more injured. The Babylonian (Iraqi) Jewry Heritage Center in Or Yehuda has inscribed the victims' names, and Iraqi Jews worldwide recall the horrible disgrace of those events, which were so reminiscent of Kristallnacht in Germany. The Farhud riots were carried out by a mob that had been incited to violence, and resulted in the Iraqi Jewish community losing faith in the country they had called home for millennium; the community of some 140,000 Jewish people dwindled to just a sparse few today. 

Iraqi Jews were harassed for no apparent reason. The Jews, who had lived in Iraq for 2,600 years, weren't subverting the country from within, like the Palestinian Arabs who fought against the Jewish settlements, and eventually the State of Israel. Actually, Jews were the targets of hostility in every Arab country in which they lived, not just in Iraq. One-hundred-and-thirty-three Jews were killed in Libya as anti-Jewish violence reached its peak in the North African country in November 1945; in Aden, Yemen, some 100 Jews were murdered in November 1947; in Egypt, the Jews were ejected from their homes and expelled from the state. And, despite all the international attention paid to the "Palestinian Nakba," little has been said about the great injustice that the Jews of Arabia suffered. It's true that history is not a competition of tragedies, but it's important to note the ethnic cleansing that spread throughout the Arab nations. The scope of this tragedy was quite extensive -- some 856,000 Jews were forced to flee their homes in Arab countries, compared to the 650,000 Palestinian refugees. And yet, for unknown reasons, the government in Israel still hasn't placed the catastrophe that befell Arab Jews high on its domestic, or international, agenda. 

Jews were being harassed before Israel was declared a state. Historian Edwin Black, Prof. Shmuel Moreh and Dr. Zvi Yehuda have published research that uncovers the links between then-Iraqi Prime Minister Rashid Ali al-Gaylani's pro-Nazi government and the Third Reich in Germany. Iraq implemented discriminatory regulations against Jews that affected all aspects of their daily life, and afterward incited mobs to violence against the Jews. The Farhud riots of 1941 were the culmination of these efforts. 

The fusion of xenophobic-tinged nationalism and a contagious anti-Jewish sentiment created a reality that was ripe with Jew hatred. Then-German Ambassador to Iraq, Dr. Fritz Grobba, readily fueled the attitude, and Haj Amin al-Husseini, who had fled from Palestine, found Iraq to be a convenient arena for anti-Jewish activities. The brutal, anti-Jewish environment culminated in the hanging of Shafiq Ades, a wealthy Jewish businessman, in Basra's central square, as inflammatory, anti-Jewish radio broadcasts and speeches at the U.N. podium filled the air. 

Finally, with no other choice, the Jews of Iraq gathered their belongings and deserted their country, the Iraq that they had ushered into the modern age. Iraqi Jews left behind their private belongings and the ancient property of their communities, including the supposed burial sites of the prophets Ezekiel, Jonah, Nahum Alqoshi and Ezra the Scribe, which the Iraqi government proceeded to take over.

There were, of course, Iraqis who refused to condone attacks against the Jewish population, but they were mostly silenced. The Jews had become the scapegoat in the conflict between Sunnis and Shiites, just as today Israel stands between Iran and the Arabs in their conflict. Were the Jews still residing in Arab countries, it's reasonable to assume that their communities would have been ravaged in the recent uprisings in Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Yemen and Syria. 

Read article in full

On the supposed 'whiteness' of Israeli Jews

 Yitnish Aynaw, the current Miss Israel, arrived from Ethiopia aged 12

This year's Miss Israel is a young lady of black Ethiopian heritage. But how many people, including prominent intellectuals and leaders, believe the myth that most Israelis are white? Jeff Weintraub puts them to rights.

In 2003 a very great man, Nelson Mandela, made a very inaccurate and unfortunate statement:

Why should there be one standard for one country, especially because it is black, and another one for another country, Israel, that is white.

That remark was was especially bizarre because the country Mandela referred to as "black" was Iraq. I very much doubt that this was the way Saddam Hussein would have described himself.

As I pointed out in 2008, Mandela's statement reflected a misconception about Israel that is all too prevalent. His description of Israel as a "white" country was no doubt based on a taken-for-granted assumption that Israeli Jews are of European origin.

 In fact, about half of Israeli Jews are Middle Eastern Jews, or Mizrahim (sometimes also called Sephardim, though strictly speaking that term covers only Jews who can trace their ancestry back to pre-1492 Spain)--and for most of the history of Israel, until the arrival of the Russian Jews in the 1990s, a solid majority of Israeli Jews were Mizrahim.

These people are not Europeans or ex-Europeans, but refugees from the Arab world and Iran (and their descendants), and the now-vanished Jewish communities they represent had roots in the Middle East, including what is now Iraq, that long pre-dated the coming of Islam.

(For some details, see A historic optical illusion - Israel & the invisible Middle Eastern Jews and Irwin Cotler on the Middle Eastern Jews & the Arab-Israeli conflict, as well as the very useful website Point of No Return.)

If they are "white," then so are Iraqis ... not to mention Syrians, Algerians, Egyptians, Saudis, and so on.


Read post in full

Al-Alusi: Iraqi Jews are bridge to peace

 Iraqi ex-MP Mithal al-Alusi paid a heavy price for his support for normalisation with Israel: his two sons and a bodyguard were blown up. But he still believes in peace, and that 400,000 Iraqi Jews in Israel can help achieve it, he tells The Times of Israel (with thanks: Lily):

An anti-Baath activist since the mid 1970s, Alusi was forced to flee the Middle East for Germany, where in 2002 he staged a takeover of the Iraqi embassy in protest of Saddam’s human rights abuses. The following year, after the American invasion in March, he was back in Iraq heading the de-Baathification commission responsible of cleansing the administration of Saddam loyalists.

As an outspoken advocate of normalization with Israel, Alusi traveled to Tel Aviv in 2004 to take part in the annual counterterrorism conference at Herzliyah’s Interdisciplinary Center. Upon his return to Iraq, he was stripped of his official positions for violating a law banning Iraqis from traveling to Israel.

On February 8, 2005, gunmen ambushed Alusi’s convoy driving through western Baghdad, killing his two sons Ayman and Jamal and his bodyguard. He had no doubt the attack was a response to his pro-Israel stance.

“I will repeat it, even if these terrorists try to kill me again, peace is the only solution. Peace with Israel is the only solution for Iraq. Peace with everybody, but no peace for the terrorists,” Alusi told AFP that day.

Mithal Al-Alusi (photo credit: courtesy)

Alusi stood behind those words and traveled to Israel again in September 2008. A supreme court decision three months later saved him from prosecution after a parliamentary majority removed his diplomatic immunity. The court abrogated the Saddam-era law, ruling that it was no longer a crime for Iraqis to travel to Israel.

If the opportunity arose, Alusi would travel to Israel again. With 400,000 Iraqi Jews and their descendants currently living in Israel, Alusi believes that Iraq is well-positioned to serve as a bridge between Israel and the Palestinians.

“Peace will only come about through the will of the people, not through agreements signed by leaders,” he said. “But no peace can emerge with the existence of organizations like Hamas and Islamic Jihad.”

Iraq and Israel have shared interests in combating the Iranian threat and Islamist terrorism as well. But security coordination, not to mention full diplomatic relations, cannot come about as long as Maliki is in power, he said.

“I’ve never heard of fascists and traitors calling for peace,” he said of his own government. “As long as a militia is in power, there can be no peace.”

Read article in full

More about Mithal al-Alusi

Iraqi Torah scroll fragments to be buried in NY

 The Jewish archive was found in a sewage-flooded basement in the Iraqi secret police HQ


Fragments of Torah scrolls,  unfit for use (Psoulim)  and beyond repair or preservation, are to be handed over to the Iraqi-Jewish community and buried in their cemetery in New York, Point of No Return has learnt. They were seized by Saddam Hussein's secret police along with other artefacts and books belonging to the Baghdad Jewish community and shipped to Washington for restoration.

The request by the US-based World Organisation of Jews from Iraq (WOJI ) to bury the scroll fragments has been approved by the Iraqis, according to Iraqi media reports. Iraq's National Security Adviser confirmed the decision to WOJI, but no date has been fixed for the handover. The Iraqi government would arrange the approval through a written document agreed with the State Department, but the process has been painfully slow.


The so-called Jewish archive consists of hundreds of items seized from Jewish homes and synagogues in the 1970s by the Iraqi Muhabarat, or secret police.  US soldiers found them during the 2003 invasion, floating in the sewage-flooded basement of the Muhabarat's headquarters. A tug-of-war has ensued between the Iraqi government and those who argue that the documents should stay in the US, or be returned to the Iraq-Jewish community from which they were stolen. The vast majority of Iraqi Jews and their descendants live in Israel.


Items from the collection are due to be displayed in a special exhibition at the National Archive and Records Administration in downtown Washington DC this autumn.

WJC approves Jewish refugee motion in Budapest

New WJC secretary-general Robert Singer

Jewish Refugees from the Middle East were on the agenda at the World Jewish Congress plenary in Budapest this week. Some 500 delegates from 70 countries took part in an hour-long session discussing the issue, Point of No Return has learnt.

 Led by president Rabbi Elie Abadie and director Stan Urman,  members of the Justice for Jews from Arab Countries Board were present at the Budapest meeting and several were billed to address the delegates. 

The delegates passed a resolution urging the international community to recognize the legitimate rights of Jewish refugees in the Middle East who were forced to flee their countries after 1948.

Robert Singer, whose appointment as WJC secretary-general was ratified at the Budapest plenary, pledged to continue the work of his predecessor Dan Diker, who chaired the September 2012  WJC conference in Jerusalem calling for Justice for Jewish Refugees. The Jerusalem conference, organised in association with the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was followed by a high-profile meeting on Jewish refugees in the UN building in New York.

The man most credited with thrusting the issue to the fore is Israel's former deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon. Robert Singer pledged to keep up the momentum generated by Mr Ayalon.
 

The World Jewish Congress  is the international organization representing Jewish communities in 100 countries to governments, parliaments and international organizations. The Plenary Assembly is the highest decision-making body of the organization. It meets every four years and elects the WJC officers.

Expulsion of Jews had 'no political consequences'

The Arab world has committed a terrible crime against its Jewish citizens, yet the international community has exacted no political price. "There have been no political consequences", as Gina Waldman puts it to the Canadian parliamentary committee investigating Jewish refugees this week. Instead, the tables are turned: Israel, which gave safe haven to the majority of these refugees - is in the dock: world-famous figures such as Professor Stephen Hawking have joined the Israel academic boycott - allowing themselves to be suckered by genocidal fascists and ethnic cleansers.   

Gina Waldman, wearing her grandmother's bridal dress, gives testimony to the UN Human Rights Commission in 2008


VANCOUVER, Canada (JTA) -- Jewish refugees from Arab countries have been ignored by the Western world, the Canadian Parliament was told in its first-ever hearings on the issue.

"The expulsion of nearly 1 million Jews from nine Arab countries has had no political consequences," Gina Waldman, president of JIMENA, a nonprofit group dedicated to the preservation of Mizrahi and Sephardic culture, told the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development on Tuesday.

The hearings on Tuesday, as well as May 2, are part of a new push by Jewish groups and the Israeli government to highlight the plight of the refugees in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"The two refugee populations were created as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict," David Koschitzky, the chair of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs Chair, told the Jewish Voice. "Unfortunately, the plight of Jewish refugees has been completely omitted from Canada's Middle East policy, while that of the Palestinians features prominently."

According to JIMENA, the goal of the hearings is to urge the Canadian Parliament to pass legislation stating that a comprehensive Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement must deal with all issues relating to refugees, including Jewish refugees. The U.S. Congress passed similar legislation in 2008.

Last fall, Israel's then-deputy foreign minister, Daniel Ayalon, launched the "I am a Refugee" campaign in a bid to create parity between the struggle of Jewish and Palestinian refugees. Ayalon included publicizing the issue through Israel’s diplomatic missions.

According to information presented at the hearings, 856,000 Jews from Arab countries were displaced between 1948 and 1952, compared with 756,000 Palestinians.

On Tuesday 7 May, the committee heard testimony from Libyan-born Gina Waldman herself and two Jewish refugees from Iraq. One goes by the name of 'Chantal.' Here are Gina's and Chantal's stories: 

Read JTA article in full 

Transcripts of hearings: 2 May; 7 May here and here

Gina Waldman's story 

Chantal's story 

JJAC kicks of Canadian study into Jewish refugees

Canadian parliament investigates Jewish refugees 

Remembering the Jewish refugees of Jerusalem

It's been 46 years since the re-unification of Jerusalem: two internally-displaced Jewish refugees, Carmella and Sarah, interviewed in 2011 for CiFWatch by IsraeliNurse,   were able to to re-connect with the Old City where they had been born. Their families were brutally evicted by the Jordanian Legion in 1948:

Perhaps most significantly – because there exists a clear political agenda to make Jews appear as newcomers and non-native inhabitants of the city – rarely does a Western audience get to hear that Jews in fact made up the majority of the city’s population at least from the mid-nineteenth century, or that many of them became internally displaced when they were forced to leave their homes both before and during the War of Independence.
 
Recently I met up with two ladies whose memories of their childhood in Jerusalem are part of the story of the city itself. Both were born there – Carmella in 1935 and Sarah in 1921. In a country in which one receives such a variety of often unexpected answers to the question ‘where did your family originate?’ it is fairly rare to meet people who do not have a reply. Carmella looked puzzled for an instant, and then replied “Oh – my mother came from Tsfat and my father from Jerusalem”. As for Sarah – the answer to her was obvious; “From the Old City”.

Carmella

 Neither of them could tell me exactly how many generations of their family had lived in Jerusalem before them, but Sarah was proud to recount how her great- grandfather, who lived in the Rothschild Building built in 1870 in the Jewish Quarter, had met the building’s sponsor, Baron Rothschild, when he came with his daughter to tour the sites of his investment.  Apparently, the whole neighbourhood had been busy preparing delicacies in honour of the distinguished visitor – mostly citron (etrog) cakes – but the Baron’s clerks had warned him in advance not to partake of anything cooked in the Jewish Quarter due to the famously insanitary conditions there. In fact the only thing which the Baron consumed throughout his entire visit to the Old City was a glass of water drawn from the cistern at Sarah’s great-grandfather’s sparsely furnished house.  

A clue to the origins of both families perhaps comes from the fact that the languages they spoke at home were Ladino (Judeo-Spanish) and Arabic, with a smattering of Yiddish for good measure. 

Ladino was the predominant language among Jews in Palestine between the 17^th and 19^th centuries after Sephardi Jews who were exiled from Spain in 1492 returned to the land of their forefathers,  settling in Jerusalem, Hebron, Tsfat, Tiberius and even Schem and Gaza.  

However, after so many generations of life in the Jewish Quarter, Sarah’s family, along with almost half of the Jewish population of the Old City, finally had to leave it in 1936 as a result of the riots which were part of the Arab revolt. This, of course, was not the first case of Jerusalemites who were no less indigenous than their expellers being forced out of their homes: in the 1929 riots some 4,000 Jews had also fled Neve Ya’akov, Motsa, Romema, Beit HaKerem and Talpiot. Neither was this phenomenon confined to Jerusalem; in the 1929 riots Carmella’s grandfather’s brother and his wife were both slaughtered by an axe-wielding mob in Tsfat.   

Jewish refugees leaving the Old City -1936

Carmella described their home: one of six houses built around a communal courtyard and lacking electricity, sewage or running water, but with a strong community life in which people readily shared what little they had. Both women spent their childhood under the British Mandate with regular curfews from 5 p.m. until 7 a.m. the next day. Sometimes they knew that the curfew was a reaction to activities by Jewish underground groups, but more often they had no idea why they were under curfew. One 9^th of Av, Carmella’s father and the neighbours in the yard wanted to pray. Because of the curfew they could not go to the synagogue and there were not enough men to make up a minyan, (prayer quorum) so they snuck out to bring additional men from surrounding streets to the prayers. Unfortunately, someone left the door to the courtyard open by mistake, and the British promptly arrested them all, imprisoning them in the Russian compound until the next morning.

On November 29^th, 1947, friends and family gathered at Carmella’s parents’ home – the only one in the neighbourhood with a radio – to listen tensely to the UN vote on partition. As the votes were announced, they made lists of the results on scraps of paper. “We have a state!” cried Carmella’s brother, but as they set off to dance in celebration on Jaffa Road, their father urged caution; “Let’s see what happens tomorrow morning.” And indeed, difficult days lay ahead.  

During the siege of Jerusalem, their daily routine revolved mostly around the fight to survive. Water was strictly rationed as the British-built pipeline had been sabotaged by the Arab militias. Initially they had to rely upon the original cisterns which collected rainwater from the roofs of the houses: Sarah and Carmella painstakingly explained to me the knack behind filling a bucket on a rope from a deep cistern.  Later, water tankers began to arrive intermittently in Jerusalem and Carmella and her siblings would spend hours standing in line waiting to take their rations home in buckets and tin cans. 

Queuing for water, Jerusalem 1948.

The precious fresh water would be stored in large clay pots – both Sarah and Carmella call them by the Ladino name ‘Tanaja’. One contained fresh drinking and cooking water and the other water which had already been used to wash their hands. Once a week – before Shabbat – the children would be washed, the laundry then done in the same water, the floor then washed with that soapy water and anything left used to water the few plants such as mint and lemon balm which they grew in tin cans in the yard.

Food too was strictly rationed with each item weighed scrupulously by the shop-keeper in exchange for coupons. Carmella’s family lived mostly off bean or lentil soup with small amounts of meat becoming a rare delicacy and bread limited to 200 grams per person. Carmella’s father used to give his portion of bread to the children, saying “I’m grown already”. Just before Pessach a truck-load of fresh vegetables managed to make it through the blockade. Carmella recounts how that became a whole day’s entertainment as everyone gathered around just to gaze at the vegetables – the likes of which they had not seen for so long.

Fuel was also severely rationed and because they had no electricity, both light and heat came from the paraffin they had to stand hours in line waiting for every time the arrival of a lorry load was announced by megaphone. That winter was a particularly harsh one in Jerusalem, and often the only way they had of warming themselves was to stand around the kettle or cooking pots.

On the afternoon of the Declaration of Independence Carmella’s family once more gathered around their radio, but yet again violence followed their celebrations: the next day shops were burned to the ground in the Old City and less than two weeks later it fell to the Jordanian forces.  Many of the men were arrested and taken prisoner by the Arab legion, including Carmella’s father. He returned only almost a year later, but Carmella says “We don’t know what he went through there. He never talked about it”.  The women and children were transported by lorry to the Katamon neighbourhood from which the Christian Arab residents had fled and four or five families found shelter in each empty house. Carmella’s family later moved to the Nahalat Zion neighbourhood which had been built in 1908 to answer the growing need for housing outside the walls of the crowded Old City.  

Jewish girl, Rachel Levy, 7, fleeing from street with burning buildings as the Arabs sack Jerusalem after its surrender. May 28, 1948. John Phillips

With war still raging and the Arab Legion installed in the Old City, the nights became unbearable with repeated shelling forcing them to huddle together in the lower storey of their building, along with all the other neighbours. The lack of food and water became even worse; children had not been able to go to school for a year and few people had work as factories and workshops had closed due to lack of materials.

Like all the other young men, Carmella’s brothers were of course fighting in the army, specifically at Latrun and Ma’ale HaHamisha. The dead from the battles were brought to Bikur Holim hospital and every morning, Carmella and her mother would make their way there to check that the names of her brothers did not appear on the list of names of the dead attached to a tree in the courtyard with a drawing pin.

After the first cease-fire, there was an improvement in the amount of goods which got through to Jerusalem, and the schools re-opened at last, but the fighting still continued, as did the shelling by the Arab Legion.  Carmella’s best friend was injured and her father killed by a direct hit on their house.  
By 1967, Camella was married and living in Kiryat HaYovel . Her husband, like many others, had been called up some three months before the war broke out and was stationed on the Egyptian front.  Once more the women of the family found themselves alone in wartime. Day after day they would hear Nasser threatening total annihilation of the Jewish state on the radio and there was a real fear that the tiny young country would not be able to survive such an onslaught.  With a shortage of air-raid shelters making for unbearable over-crowding, Carmella and her two small children took to sleeping in the corridor outside their apartment as an alternative.

Soon, soldiers coming to visit their families began telling them that the Old City had been re-taken:  stories which at first they did not believe as there had been no official announcement on the radio. Gradually they began to realise that after 19 years they could indeed finally go to the Western Wall. It was the festival of Shavuot, and so as observant Jews they walked all the way to the Old City – along with Carmella’s youngest sister who was nine months pregnant at the time and yet insisted upon not missing out on such a momentous occasion.

 Carmella was surprised to see that the Old City retained many of the features she remembered from 19 years before – the same paved streets, the same lack of electricity, sewage or running water – and that it was terribly neglected.  When they arrived at the Western wall, they at first wondered if they had come to the right place; their memories were of a narrow, confined area beside the wall where they had always prayed, but now it was an open area with plenty of room for the crowds of people who had come to be part of the miracle.  Torah scrolls appeared from nowhere, and people prayed and sang, elated not only by the fact that their most holy site which they had been unable to visit for 19 years was once more accessible, but full of relief that their country actually still existed.

Read article in full

Why Jewish refugees are central to quashing BDS

 A synagogue in Iran

Two weeks ago, a resolution was passed by the students of Berkeley, California, to boycott, divest from and sanction Israel.  Aryella Moreh, whose family are Jews from Iran, explains in the Daily Californian why the story of the uprooting of Middle Eastern Jewish 'people of colour' and their resettlement in Israel is central to frustrating the efforts of the BDS campaign. (With thanks: JIMENA)

I come from a family of refugees. My mother was younger than I am now when she was forced to flee for her life from the Islamic Revolution of Iran. My mother recalls being forced to sit in the back of her classroom along with a group of young Jewish children during her school years.

When my mother went to buy groceries in the market, she was not allowed to touch the produce because she was considered a “dirty Jew.” These are only a few indicators of the systematic oppression of the Iranian Jews, some of the oldest inhabitants of Persia. At the age of 20, she was forced to abandon her life in Iran as her family was scattered across the world. My grandmother, Mamanjani, was never allowed to return home because of her active involvement in Jewish organizations. Though she had no ties to any other government, she was warned not to go home for fear of execution without trial. Despite calling Persia home for 2,500 years, in 1979, my family and many Jewish families like my own were forced to forced to flee their homes. My family’s home, business and property was confiscated. We were torn from our homes, forced to flee to whichever country would take us in.

Though these experiences define me, some students on our campus seem to think my history does not count. During the “divestment” meeting two weeks ago, Students for Justice in Palestine tweeted about those opposed to divestment: “the Zizis are literally white people crying about their privilege, lol.” Apparently, Zizi is SJP shorthand for Zionist. And later, Daily Cal Blogger Noah Kulwin discussed a clear division he seems to see between “students of color” and “Jewish students,” implying that Jewish students like me cannot be considered students of color. I am here to address ignorance about what truly defines the Jewish people. Amid claims — or rather accusations — of “privilege” or the inability of Jews to understand the plight of “colored people,” I realized many people on this campus are unaware of who the Jewish people actually are.

My story is not unique among those who stood against divestment. Many of my peers who spoke against divestment come from families that experienced similar persecution before making it to America. For some, it was the Iraqi Farhud, where hundreds of Jews were killed and injured as Baghdad’s Jewish community was destroyed. For others, it was the oppression Jews faced under Soviet rule in Russia. And for others still, it was the Holocaust of Eastern Europe. But although they come from different corners of the globe, these Jewish students are here for a single reason: because making it to America was the difference between a new life and death in the countries they used to call home.

In the second half of the 20th century, millennia-old Jewish communities throughout the Middle East and North Africa were completely destroyed. The number of Middle Eastern Jewish refugees like my parents is on par with the number of Palestinian refugees following the Arab-Israeli War of 1948. {not correct - there were more Jewish Refugees (870, 000 v 711, 000) and that number does NOT include post 1979-Iran Jewish refugees - ed}

Not every Iranian Jew achieved asylum in America. For those who were not fortunate enough to make it here, Israel was the only country to which refugees could go. That’s what it means to have a Jewish State. It is a place — the only place — Jews like my family are guaranteed security. For our senate to refuse to recognize Israel as the Jewish State means that they are refusing to acknowledge my right to a place where my family, and others like me, are safe.

The pro-divestment movement wants you to believe that its cause is a struggle between the ethnic minority Palestinians and the “white” and “privileged” Jews and Israelis. By pretending that Jews are white Europeans, they argue that Israelis are foreign occupiers. But Jews are not a homogenous group of white people; we are an ethnically Middle Eastern people, comprising many unique communities from across the globe. After centuries of persecution, we have found security in this country and in our nation’s first home, Israel. And although we have achieved the privilege of statehood, our personal histories are defined by our recent struggles.

Read article in full

JJAC kicks off Canadian study into Jewish refugees

 Sylvain Abitbol, vice-president of Justice for Jews from Arab Countries, was called as a witness

A study of the experience of Jewish refugees from the Middle East and North Africa by the Canadian Parliament this week may result in a correction to an imbalanced Canadian foreign policy, Paul Lungen blogs in the Canadian Jewish News:

The House of Commons standing committee on foreign affairs is scheduled to wrap up two days of study this week on the experience of Jewish refugees from Middle Eastern countries.

The committee was to have heard from eight witnesses by the time it concluded its session on May 9, including representatives of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) and Justice for Jews from Arab Countries (JJAC).

In a news release, CIJA stated it has long called for a change to Canadian foreign policy “so that it correctly reflects the historic plight of Jewish refugees from Arab countries.”

More than 850,000 Jews fled persecution throughout the region after Israel’s creation in 1948, but “Canada’s official Middle East policy neglects this fact, only accounting for Palestinian refugees,” CIJA stated.

South of the border, the U.S. House of Representatives has already taken action on the file. In 2008, the House adopted a resolution that stated in part that a “comprehensive Middle East peace agreement… must address and resolve all outstanding issues relating to the legitimate rights of all refugees, including Jews, Christians and other populations.”

In 2012, bipartisan Congressional lawmakers sponsored a bill to recognize the plight of Jewish refugees from Arab countries, as well as other refugees, such as Christians from the Middle East, North Africa, and the Persian Gulf. The resolution also called on the Obama administration to bring up the issue of Jewish and other refugees when mentioning Palestinian refugees at international forums.

At the time, JJAC vice-president Sylvain Abitbol stated, “Right now Jewish refugees are not on the international agenda. We have been called the forgotten refugees. After 1948, many Arabs from Palestine left their homes and yes they have been refugees. The difference is that we were never called refugees. We adapted to the places where we went, which was not the case for Arab refugees.”
Abitbol, who served as co-president of Canadian Jewish Congress, said, “We’re talking about recognition, about justice.”

CIJA chair David Koschitzky applauded the foreign affairs committee for examining the situation faced by Jews who had resided in Arab lands.


“Two refugee populations were created as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict  – one Palestinian and the other Jewish. Unfortunately, the plight of Jewish refugees has been completely omitted from Canada’s Middle East policy while that of the Palestinians features prominently. It is essential that policymakers correct this inherent imbalance in Canadian policy. Equitable consideration of Jewish refugees from Arab countries is a necessary component for any just and lasting Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement.”

To request the unedited transcript of the 2 May committee proceedings, featuring witness statements from Sylvain Abitbol, Stan Urman, David Matas and David Bensoussan, please email bataween@gmail.com 

Jewish Voice report


Canadian Parliament investigates Jewish refugees 

Renovated Jewish Museum in Casablanca re-opens

 It's the only Jewish museum in the Arab world. But the renovated Jewish museum in Casablanca, where barely a thousand Jews still live, is increasingly a memorial to a vanishing past. (With thanks: Michelle, Lily): 

(JTA) -- The Museum of Moroccan Judaism, one of the only institutions of its kind in the Arab world, was reopened in Casablanca following months of renovations.

The reopening ceremony earlier this month was attended by Moroccan government officials, museum President Jaques Toledano and Samuel Kaplan, the U.S. ambassador to Morocco and a past president of the Minneapolis Jewish Federation, according to the Moroccan news site LNT.ma.

At the reopening, the museum's halls were filled with the sound of violins and the scents of incense and orange blossom. The museum, with a floor space of a few hundred square yards, features photos of synagogues from across the kingdom, Torah scrolls and Chanukah lamps, Moroccan caftans embroidered with gold, jewels, ancient rugs and objects of Jewish-Moroccan cultural heritage.
“It’s not a fancy museum, but it contains some real treasures of cultures,” said Joel Rubinfeld, co-chair of the European Jewish Parliament, who saw the museum last month during a visit for talks with Moroccan officials.

Founded 15 years earlier by the Jewish community of Casablanca, the museum was later managed by the Foundation of Moroccan Judaism under its chief administrator, Simon Levy. The building was renovated following his death in 2011.

Read article in full 

 Yael Miller found her stay with a Jewish family in Marrakesh an eye-opener (Haaretz):

 Indeed, while I came to study Islam and Arabic, I learned much about Jews in Morocco and my connection to a broader Jewish community. I was extraordinarily lucky to gain this new, Jewish perspective. Shabbat dinners, for example, to which I had been accustomed to experiencing with Ashkenazi tunes and flavors, became a veritable slew of Moroccan traditions, from the hardboiled egg in the cholent to new tunes for Shabbat songs. Spending time with this family taught me different ways of celebrating holidays and Jewish events in a way that enriched and enhanced my appreciation for the Jewish Diaspora.

 My hosts, who stand to date as the most gracious people I have ever met, truly brought me into their family: from sitting in their living room eating dates and walnuts while I heard of the struggles and successes of living in Morocco as a Jew, to the beautiful Shavuot celebration I spent in the mountains of Morocco, I became so much more appreciative of my own Judaism and of how our people, who were so spread throughout the world, were really one community.

 Not everyone is as lucky as I was to experience first hand a different Jewish tradition than one’s own. For that reason, I am truly happy that the Museum of Moroccan Judaism is open once again. It stands as an important testament to the vivacity and tenacity of the Jews of Morocco, and also helps to spread understanding about the community’s influence on Moroccan and Jewish history.

 A good friend of mine who traveled through northern Iraq showed me pictures of an extraordinarily old synagogue he saw during his trip. In his photos were talitot strewn on the ground, walls crumbing, and the entire grounds of the building in terrible disrepair. It was horrible to see a synagogue that once brimmed with life so dilapidated.

 So many historically significant Jewish sites remain underfunded, without any intention to preserve them. By supporting projects like the Moroccan Jewish museum’s renovation, we keep historical sites and memories of Jewish life alive and safe. Just as importantly, or perhaps even more so, Jewish centers, museums, and cultural sites like the one in Casablanca can promote understanding and tolerance by presenting apolitical information on Jewish life to all who visit. Thus, new generations of Moroccans can learn and understand that Jews are not only those who live in Israel today, but were once the neighbors of their parents and grandparents. 

Read article in full

Morocco's Jewish Museum founder Simon Levy dies

Canadian Parliament investigates Jewish refugees

 Jason Kenny, PC MP, a senior minister in the Canadian government, issued a statement


In the most significant development since the 2008 passing of the US Congress Resolution no.185, calling for Jewish refugee rights to be considered whenever Palestinian refugee rights are mentioned, the Canadian Parliament this week began an investigation into Jewish refugees from Arab countries. According to Jason Kenny PC, MP, a senior minister in the Harper government:"The Government of Canada initiated this study to learn more about this little-known, but important part of the Arab-Israeli conflict, which has not been reflected in Canadian policy". (With thanks: Joseph, Eliyahu, Lily):


The Wall St Journal carried the following item:

OTTAWA, ON, May 2, 2013 /CNW/ - Today, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development commenced a study on the experience of Jewish refugees from Arab countries who were displaced as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict. More than 850,000 Jewish refugees fled persecution and violence in Arab countries throughout the Middle East and North Africa, resulting in the extinction of vibrant communities that had thrived for thousands of years. Currently, Canada's official Middle East policy neglects this fact, only accounting for Palestinian refugees. (...)

Shimon Koffler Fogel, CEO of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, will be appearing as a witness to provide expert testimony alongside refugees and representatives from Justice for Jews from Arab Countries, a prominent international organization advocating for refugee rights.

In response to the commencement of the study, David Koschitzky, Chair of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, issued the following statement:

"We applaud the Foreign Affairs committee for examining the situation of Jewish refugees from Arab countries. We encourage Members of Parliament from across the political spectrum to carefully consider the testimonies of experts and refugees, and to join together in recognizing the persecution and displacement of nearly one million Jews throughout the Middle East and North Africa.

"Two refugee populations were created as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict - one Palestinian and the other Jewish. Unfortunately, the plight of Jewish refugees has been completely omitted from Canada's Middle East policy while that of the Palestinians features prominently. It is essential that policymakers correct this inherent imbalance in Canadian policy. Equitable consideration of Jewish refugees from Arab countries is a necessary component for any just and lasting Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement."

Wall St Journal article (subscription required)

JIMENA issued the following press release:

San Francisco - JIMENA, a San Francisco based non-profit organization was invited to present and submit briefs to the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development for their May 7th hearing on Jewish refugees from the Middle East and North Africa. In the briefs, JIMENA calls on the Canadian government to pass legislation ordering Canadian diplomats and leaders to use the voice, vote and influence of the Government of Canada to incorporate the issue of Jewish refugees from the Middle East and North Africa into all discussions and negotiations involving the issue of Middle Eastern refugees.

Gina Waldman, president and co-founder of JIMENA provided testimony at the US Congressional Human Rights Caucus hearing on Jewish refugees once again shared her story with the Canadian Committee on Foreign Affairs. “I’m thrilled that the Canadian government is considering advancing the issue of Jewish refugees from the Middle East and North Africa. The JIMENA community recommends that the Committee of Foreign Affairs and International Development forward a resolution to the House of Commons similar to United States House Resolution 185,” she said.

The US Congress passed legislation in 2008 known as House Resolution 185 declaring that for any comprehensive Middle East peace agreement to be credible and enduring, the agreement must address and resolve all outstanding issues relating to the legitimate rights of all refugees, including Jews, Christians and other populations, displaced from countries in the Middle East.

The JIMENA briefs include passages from the personal narratives of JIMENA members from seven different Arab countries collected over the course of JIMENA’s Oral History and Digital Experience Project.

Dr David Bensoussan, The Moroccan-born leader of the Sephardi community of Quebec, was invited to submit a report to the Foreign Affairs Committee. For a copy of his eight-page report (French) please email bataween@gmail.com

The House of Commons committee will hear witness testimonies on 7 May.  

Transcripts of hearings: 2 May; 7 May here and here 

The mysterious case of Ft Lt Lloyd Sassoon

The 2011 ceremony in Jerusalem honouring Ft Lt Lloyd Sassoon (photo: N Moses)

 Point of No Return exclusive

Yesterday, an Indian prisoner in a Pakistani jail died from the effects of a severe beating. Whatever the exact circumstances of his death, the case of Sarabjit Singh highlights the plight of dozens of Indians captured and jailed by Pakistan. Some of these are PoWs from the 1971 Indo-Pakistan war.

One such prisoner is a Jew, Flight Lieutenant Lloyd Sassoon, a Bene Israel officer pilot of the Indian Air Force born in 1942.

Nissim Moses, of the Indian Jewish Heritage Center in Israel, together with Sassoon's wife Sybia and family, now living in Israel, made several inquiries into the fate of Flt. Lt. Lloyd Sassoon, without any results.

 On 21 July 2011 a memorial ceremony for Flt. Lt. Lloyd Sassoon Kandlekar was held at the Wall of Warriors on Ammunition Hill in Jerusalem. This wall honours Jewish soldiers who served in the armed forces of other nations.

However, no conclusive proof that Sassoon had died in action was ever produced. As a pilot, he would have been able to bail out, although his navigator would not have been equipped with a parachute. After his airplane was shot down,  Sassoon was apparently paraded as a captured PoW on TV by the Pakistanis, and recognised by Indian colleagues.

Says Nissim Moses: "Yet at the end of the war the Pakistanis declared him missing in action, fate unknown. Other sources say he was killed in action and apparently there are two graves of the persons killed on that mission, but nothing official and concrete".


Jas Uppal, a human rights campaigner for Indian prisoners in Pakistani jails, says: "The problem with the Indian PoW issue is that despite evidence that these PoWs were captured by Pakistani security forces, the Pakistani authorities continue to deny their existence. "

BBC distorts Tunisian-Jewish history

 A pilgrim lights a candle at the Ghriba synagogue on Djerba (Reuters)

The annual Lag Ba'Omer pilgrimage to Djerba has provided the international media with more opportunity to distort the recent history of Jews in Tunisia, whose numbers are down from 100, 000 in 1948 to  1, 500 today.

The BBC Arabic service's Ahmed Maher is the latest to downplay the  antisemitism whuch led to the mass Jewish exodus. The tactic is to quote the words of 'dhimmi' Jews, such as one Mr Izra, who for whatever reason feel they must defend Tunisia's record. But what is most disturbing is that the reporter acts as a mouthpiece for the Tunisian government, denying inconvenient but documented evidence that the Jewish community feels increasingly threatened by the rise of Islamists in Tunisia.

The reporter interviews a succession of 'dhimmi' Jews. 'Dhimmi' Jews have a long tradition of saying what their Arab Muslim masters want to hear.

"They (Tunisian Jews) have never complained of discrimination, oppression or racism, as reported in the media" (..) . added Mr Izra.

"All Jews in Djerba and those who left it are not rootless. Tunisia gives us all a sense of identity."

Maher quotes Perez Trabelsi, without disclosing that Mr Trabelsi has a large stake in projecting a a positive image of Tunisia in order to best serve his extensive business interests in Djerba tourism. Indeed, his son Rene was a candidate to be minister of Tourism in the current government.

The head of the Jewish community in Tunisia, Perez Trebelsi, however, questions the narrative of some Western historians that Jews were also persecuted under Tunisian President Habib Bourguiba, the founder of the republic after independence from France in 1956.

"Bourguiba put all Tunisians on an equal footing, excluded nationalists, and annulled Sharia-compliant articles in the constitution like the ones related to polygamy and inheritance," Mr Trebelsi says.

He insists that "socialist policies, especially in the key agricultural sector, forced many Jewish businessmen to emigrate to Europe for better economic landscapes".

Mr Trabelsi's view is at odds with that expressed by Tunisian-born Jean-Pierre Allali, author of the book 'Les refugies echanges' : 

Allali believes that Bourguiba pursued a strategy of deception, stringing the Jews along as long as Tunisia needed their skills, yet all the while intending to get rid of them. (...)

Bourguiba's socialism had no respect for pluralism. He no longer wanted any distinction made between Muslim and Jewish Tunisians. Kashrut and endogamy had no place, he told Charles Haddad and other shocked Jewish leaders in December 1956. Rabbinic courts were an aberration. Aid from the American Joint Distribution Committee to Tunisia's Jewish institutions should go to the entire nation, he raged.

With the 18th century Jewish cemetery requisitioned to make way for a park in central Tunis - bulldozers overturned Jewish graves before they could be exhumed - the razing of the old Jewish quarter and the dissolution of the Jewish Community Council, thousands of Jews chose exile, fleeing with half a dinar in their pockets. People were arrested for trying to smuggle out jewellery and other valuables.

The regime's socialism targeted mainly Jews. Those who remained could not run a business except in partnership with a Muslim. Import licences and official permits were handed out parsimoniously.

When Tunisia became independent there were few trained Muslim civil servants and technicians. The French went home to France and Bourguiba bought time, appointing Jews, until the Muslims were ready to take over.

In the BBC article, Trabelsi is  at pains to play down the state's role in inciting anti-Jewish attacks following the Six-Day War. "Some [Tunisian] Jews came under attack but from mobs. It was individual practices really, not systematic".

Whether the government sanctioned the rioting or not was immaterial for 1967 refugee Sylvain Hayoun. He witnessed the burning of the great synagogue in Tunis. His mother ran to escape the mob. "To my disappointment, I saw some neighbors pointing out to the mob Jewish stores and cars to be burned," he recalls. "When you are a target for repression, even when not openly state-sponsored, you don’t see any peaceful future for you and your kids, you don’t have much choice than to try to leave the country."

Certainly, the state did nothing to encourage him to stay:

"When my parents made this choice in October, 1967, we couldn’t take more than one suitcase and 50 Dinars (probably equivalent to $100). Necklaces or anything in gold was confiscated at the port of departure. We closed our apartment door leaving everything in it."

The BBC article by Ahmed Maher  quotes Khodir Hanyna, a native Djerba businessman, who wants to dispel the sensationalist articles on Tunisian Jewry."The way Tunisian Jews are portrayed in the media is greatly exaggerated," he insists.

Then the BBC reporter Maher pens this gobsmacking passage:

"Several media reports spoke about YouTube videos that showed radical Islamists threatening Tunisian Jews. Despite searching extensively, I did not find any of them."

How bizarre. Thirty seconds on Google is all it took to unearth this :



The video shows supporters of Gaza Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, an official guest of the Tunisian government on a three-day visit in January 2012, greeting him at Tunis airport with cries of 'Death to the Jews! It is our duty." At the time, the event sent shivers down local Jewish spines.

The reporter Maher feels it  OK to mention that some Tunisian Islamists vowed support to the late al-Qaeda leader, Osama Bin Laden (the bombing of the Djerba synagogue in 2002, which claimed the lives of 21 tourists, was blamed on Al Qaeda) but he sweeps under the carpet the  anti-Jewish sentiment propagated by the Islamists of the Ennahda-led government.

Clearly, the Haniyeh visit is an episode that the Tunisian government, eager to attract the tourist dinars of visiting Jewish pilgrims to Djerba, would rather erase from memory - with the connivance of the BBC.

BBC Watch report

BBC asks: will 'Arab Jews' return?