PRESS DIGEST
Israel orchestrates another mass exodus of Ethiopians
AAP Information Services
January 27, 1998
JERUSALEM – Israel has quietly orchestrated its third mass exodus of Ethiopians, overcoming questions about whether they are really Jews and giving them a right to Israeli citizenship.
Since October, Israeli’s Minister of Information confirmed in an interview, an estimated 1,200 Ethiopians known as Falashmura have left their huts in Addis Abeba to fly to new homes in Israel, with the blessing of both the Ethiopian and Israeli governments. Another 2,400 are set to arrive before the summer.
This latest exodus is extraordinary because it marks the end of a long dispute in Israel over the Falashmura’s right to citizenship in the Jewish state.
The Israeli government has kept the Falashmura immigration quiet so as not to ignite further controversy nor jeopardize a deal with the Ethiopian government to allow 400 Falashmura to leave each month. The Falashmura say their ancestors were forced to convert from Judaism to Christianity, but they insist they are Jews.
According to Avi Granot, Israeli ambassador to Ethiopia, Ethiopia would not allow a mass airlift similar to Operations Moses and Solomon, which they believe hurt Ethiopia’s image abroad.
In 1984, Operation Moses brought 7,000 from camps in Sudan. And in 1991, Operation Solomon airlifted 14,163 Ethiopians over 36 hours, after Israel paid a US$30 million ransom and then-U.S. President George Bush sent a personal letter of appeal.
But in Operation Solomon, the Falashmura were left behind. Then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir said he didn’t learn of them until a day before the airlift, which was too late.
So, the Falashmura settled in Addis Abeba around a community centre and synagogue, praying for the day they would go to Israel. Several hundred of them made their way to Israel over the years, but the current effort aims to close the Addis Abeba compound and possibly end the immigration of Ethiopians to Israel.
“We are so happy now,” said Ageru Kassa, 28, one of the Ethiopian newcomers. “To understand, you must know to arrive in Israel means it is a dream come true, a dream we have had for 2,500 years.”
The immigration issue is controversial in Israel and in the United States, pitting secular and religious Jews against each other and encompassing the question of whether American Reform and Conservative Jews are entitled to the same privileges as ultra-Orthodox in Israel.
The logistics of the Falashmura immigration to Israel might be less dramatic than Operations Moses and Solomon but the issues raised by their “aliya” are no less stunning.
According to the Bible, Ethiopians were driven from Jerusalem about 2,500 years ago, following Menelik, the son of the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon, up the Nile River to modern-day Ethiopia. There, they lost contact with the Jewish world for 2,400 years.
In 1973, Israel opened its doors to Ethiopian Jews after a chief rabbi ruled in their favor. The Israeli government had fervently argued that they were not Jews because their ancestors converted to Christianity and Israeli law demands that at least one grandparent be a Jew.
Ethiopian Jews in Israel believe that the policy was racist and that the Falashmura were subjected to harsher standards than the tide of immigrants from the former Soviet Union— 840,000 over the decade, including many who turned out to be Christian.
Last summer, the Israeli Cabinet decided to bring in all the Falashmura on the basis of reuniting families, reversing a seven-year policy to deny them entry. The cabinet agreed on a compromise that would allow the Falashmura to convert to Judaism after their immigration.
Still there was resistance in the government, but by late October, the Falashmura were boarding weekly Ethiopian Air flights, bound for Tel Aviv. “It is important for us to turn this rather unfortunate story of the compound in Addis Abeba into a successful story of aliya,” said Immigration and Absorption Minister Yuli Edelstein.
Edelstein, who initially opposed immigration of the Falashmura, said some still doubt the newcomers are Jews. “But there is no doubt that this issue of the compound was our responsibility,” he said. “Instead of continuing to look at the compound and say, ‘Wow, what are we going to do about it’, we decided to take them.”
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