Yemen's Last Jews Threatened and Banished
Pastor Dale Morgan
Yemen's Last Jews Threatened and Banished*
12:28 Jan 26, '07 / 4 Shevat 5767
by Hillel Fendel
Jews in Yemen have been abruptly targeted by a local sheikh, told they
were "moral destroyers," and ordered to "leave or else" - and some have.
Jewish "sages" have been killed, one woman reports.
Only some 50 Jewish families remain in virulently anti-Israel Yemen, but
after years of being largely ignored by the local population and
authorities, they have now been targeted by Moslem extremists.
Some of the families, in the Yemeni capital Sanaa, were confronted by
masked men who told them that if they do not leave within ten days,
"things will be bad for you." Other Jews were told that the Moslems
don't want to see even one Jew left in the region.
Reports of Killings
In a phone call engineered by Voice of Israel Radio on Monday, a Jewish
woman living in Yemen said that the Moslems "have already killed the
wise men." No confirmation of this has been received from other quarters
- though news from Yemen does not flow freely.
The stated explanation for the Moslem anti-Semitism, according to a
letter circulated by local Sheikh Yahya Sad Al Khudhair, is that the
Jews are "associated with groups and activities that primarily serve
global Zionism that works actively to corrupt the people and cause them
to abandon their ethical values and religion and disseminate all types
of abominations... Our religion has ordered us to fight the corrupt
people and expel them.”
In the Voice of Israel phone call, Masoud - a Yemenite Jew who moved to
Israel six years ago and now lives in Be'er Sheva - spoke with a woman
relative in Yemen. The conversation was held in Hebrew-spiced Arabic.
"Kif halak?" Masoud asked in Arabic, meaning, "How are you?", and the
response came in Hebrew, "Baurich Hashem," "Blessed be G-d."
The woman told Masoud, "On Friday [11 days ago], they received letters
saying that whoever doesn't leave will get killed or have his children
taken away or I don't know what... Now they saw these [threatening]
letters and are scared; what can they do? They took everything they had,
with the children, and left, and now they're in a hotel." Some 45 Jews
are now reportedly in the Paris Tower Hotel in Saana.
Asked why the remaining Jews do not come to Israel, Masoud said simply
that they are currently not interested in that option.
Earlier last week, according to the Yemen Observer, local authorities
and tribal sheikhs held meetings to discuss the complaints from the
Yemeni Jews - but they resulted only in oral reassurances for the Jews,
who were told to ignore the threats and go back to their villages. "Yes,
they received threats," the area's Deputy Governor said Monday about the
Jews, "and they are now here in the hotel, but I can assure you that the
problem will be solved today, and the Jews will return to their villages."
Yemenite Jews Converted to Islam
Dr. Moshe Nachum, of the Israeli Federation of Yemenite Jews, accuses
modern Israel of having led indirectly to many thousands of Jewish
converts to Islam. He told Arutz-7 that 56,000 Jews - roughly 2/3 of the
Jewish population in Yemen - were brought over to Israel during
Operation Magic Carpet (also known as Operation Eagles' Wings) in
1949-50, following murderous Muslim riots. A trickle of migration was
allowed to continue until 1954, at which point it stopped. In 1962,
another 2,300 Jews were allowed to immigrate, but many families were
then left split between Israel and Yemen.
"I went to Yemen in 1977," Nachum said, "at which time I learned that
there were between 25,000 and 28,000 Jews there. No one was allowed to
leave until 1993, at which time a trickle began, leading to a total of
900 or 1,000 Jews coming to Israel. A few hundred now remain there."
A-7: "What happened to the 25-28,000 Jews you said were there in 1977
and before?"
Dr. Nachum: "Very simple - they converted to Islam. Because of uncaring
behavior on the part of the officials here in Israel, we lost thousands
of Jews... I started to actively lobby to have Israel bring the
remaining Yemenite Jews to Israel, but in response, the officials
released statements that there were no Jews left in Yemen."
Dr. Nachum also blames the Satmarer Hassidim for trying to bring
Yemenite Jews to New York or to Europe or even to return to Yemen -
"anywhere but Israel."