BUT, will they be welcomed home by the Israeli apartheid government?
It was one of the most daring operations in
Ethiopian history: Israel’s 1991 airlift of Ethiopian Jews, when nearly
15,000 people were crammed into a series of non-stop flights lasting 36
hours.
Clutching only a few belongings, in planes with seats removed to make more space, they left a nation their ancestors had called home for two millennia for a land they knew only from scripture.
More than two decades later, some 2,000 descendants and relatives of those Israel had identified as original Jews are set to join them in the Holy Land.
All that’s left of Ethiopia’s Jewish population, called the Falash Mura, or “wanderers” in Ethiopia’s Amharic language — is expected to move to Israel over the next 18 months, the end of an ancient chapter of Ethiopian history.
“It is God’s promise to us to go to the Promised Land and fulfill his prophecy… but that doesn’t change the fact that I am Ethiopian,” said Gasho Abenet, 25.
Ethiopia’s remaining Falash Mura live in Gondar in the north of the country, supported by the Jerusalem-based organisation The Jewish Agency for Israel, where many have waited for years to complete bureaucratic hurdles and win approval to move.
Many say they feel frozen in limbo, not quite at home in Ethiopia, eager to become Israeli, and suffering from a long separation from family members who have already left.
“Once… you’re in this halfway status of being internal refugees, you’re certainly better off in Israel than being internal refugees in Ethiopia,” said Steven Kaplan, professor of religion and African studies at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University.
More
Clutching only a few belongings, in planes with seats removed to make more space, they left a nation their ancestors had called home for two millennia for a land they knew only from scripture.
More than two decades later, some 2,000 descendants and relatives of those Israel had identified as original Jews are set to join them in the Holy Land.
All that’s left of Ethiopia’s Jewish population, called the Falash Mura, or “wanderers” in Ethiopia’s Amharic language — is expected to move to Israel over the next 18 months, the end of an ancient chapter of Ethiopian history.
“It is God’s promise to us to go to the Promised Land and fulfill his prophecy… but that doesn’t change the fact that I am Ethiopian,” said Gasho Abenet, 25.
Ethiopia’s remaining Falash Mura live in Gondar in the north of the country, supported by the Jerusalem-based organisation The Jewish Agency for Israel, where many have waited for years to complete bureaucratic hurdles and win approval to move.
Many say they feel frozen in limbo, not quite at home in Ethiopia, eager to become Israeli, and suffering from a long separation from family members who have already left.
“Once… you’re in this halfway status of being internal refugees, you’re certainly better off in Israel than being internal refugees in Ethiopia,” said Steven Kaplan, professor of religion and African studies at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University.
More
