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Beta Israel

January 03, 2023

Not to be confused with Bene Israel, Jews from India.

The Beta Israel (Hebrew: בֵּיתֶא יִשְׂרָאֵל, Bēteʾ Yīsrāʾēl; Ge'ez: ቤተ እስራኤል, Beta ʾƏsrāʾel, modern Bēte 'Isrā'ēl, EAE: "Betä Ǝsraʾel", "House of Israel" or "Community of Israel"[5]), also known as Ethiopian Jews (Hebrew: יְהוּדֵי אֶתְיוֹפְּיָה: Yehudey Etyopyah; Ge'ez: የኢትዮጵያ አይሁድዊ, ye-Ityoppya Ayhudi), are a Jewish community that developed and lived for centuries in the area of the Kingdom of Aksum and the Ethiopian Empire, which is currently divided between the modern-day Amhara and Tigray regions of Ethiopia. Most of the Beta Israel community immigrated to Israel in the late 20th century.[6]

Beta Israel:
ביתא ישראל‎
ቤተ እስራኤል
Ethiopian Jews:
יְהוּדֵי אֶתְיוֹפְּיָה‎:
የኢትዮጵያ ይሁዲዎች
Total population
172,000
Regions with significant populations
 Israel 160,500 (end of 2021)[1]
1.75% of the Israeli population, 2.3% of Israeli Jews
 Ethiopia12,000 (2021)[2]
 United States1,000 (2008)[3]
Languages
Historical Jewish languages
Kayla
Qwara
Liturgical languages
Ge'ez
Hebrew (before 17th century)
Lingua franca
Amharic
Tigrinya
Hebrew
Religion
Judaism (Haymanot · Rabbinism) · Christianity (Ethiopian Orthodox – see Falash Mura and Beta Abraham)
Related ethnic groups
Jews and other Semitic speakers[4]
This article contains Ethiopic text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Ethiopic characters.

The Beta Israel lived in northern and northwestern Ethiopia, in more than 500 small villages which were spread over a wide territory, alongside populations that were Muslim and predominantly Christian.[7] Most of them were concentrated mainly on what are today North Gondar Zone, Shire Inda Selassie, Wolqayit, Tselemti, Dembia, Segelt, Quara, and Belesa. They practice a non-Talmudic form of Judaism that is similar in some respects to Karaite Judaism. In Israel, this form of Judaism is referred to as Haymanot. Beta Israel appear to have been isolated from mainstream Jewish communities for at least a millennium. They suffered religious persecution and a significant portion of the community were forced into Christianity during the 19th and 20th centuries; those converted to Christianity came to be known as the Falash Mura. The larger Beta Abraham Christian community is also considered to have historical links to the Beta Israel.

The Beta Israel made contact with other Jewish communities in the later 20th century. Following this, a rabbinic debate ensued over whether or not the Beta Israel were Jews. After halakhic (Jewish law) and constitutional discussions, Israeli officials decided, in 1977, that the Israeli Law of Return was to be applied to the Beta Israel.[8][9] The Israeli and American governments mounted aliyah (immigration to Israel) transport operations.[10][11] These activities included Operation Brothers in Sudan between 1979 and 1990 (this includes the major Operation Moses and Operation Joshua), and in the 1990s from Addis Ababa (which includes Operation Solomon).[12][13]

By the end of 2008, there were 119,300 people of Ethiopian descent in Israel, including nearly 81,000 people born in Ethiopia and about 38,500 native-born Israelis (about 32 percent of the community) with at least one parent born in Ethiopia or Eritrea (formerly part of Ethiopia).[14] At the end of 2019, there were 155,300 people of Ethiopian descent in Israel. Approximately 87,500 were born in Ethiopia, and 67,800 were Israeli-born with fathers born in Ethiopia.[1]

The Ethiopian Jewish community in Israel is mostly composed of Beta Israel (practicing both Haymanot and Rabbinic Judaism) and to a smaller extent of Falash Mura who converted from Christianity to Rabbinic Judaism upon their arrival to Israel.

Terminology

 
Raphael Hadane, the Liqa Kahenat (High priest) of Beta Israel in Israel

Throughout its history, the community has been referred to by numerous names. According to late tradition the Beta Israel (literally, 'house of Israel' in Ge'ez) had their origins in the 4th century CE, when it is claimed that the community refused to convert to Christianity during the rule of Abreha and Atsbeha (identified with Se'azana and Ezana), the monarchs of the Kingdom of Aksum who embraced Christianity.[15]

This name contrasts with Beta Kristiyan (literally, 'house of Christianity', meaning 'church' in Ge'ez).[16][17] Originally, it did not have any negative connotations,[18] and the community has since used Beta Israel as its official name. Since the 1980s, it has also become the official name used in the scholarly and scientific literature to refer to the community.[19] The term Esra'elawi "Israelites" – which is related to the name Beta Israel – is also used by the community to refer to its members.[19]

The name Ayhud ('Jews'), is rarely used in the community, as the Christians had used it as a derogatory term.[18] The community has begun to use it only since strengthening ties with other Jewish communities in the 20th century.[19] The term Ibrawi "Hebrew" was used to refer to the chawa ('free man') in the community, in contrast to barya ('slave').[20] The term Oritawi "Torah-true" was used to refer to the community members; since the 19th century, it has been used in opposition to the term Falash Mura (converts).

The derogatory term Falasha, which means 'landless', 'wanderers', 'associated with monks' was given to the community in the 15th century by the Emperor Yeshaq I, and today its use is avoided because its meaning is offensive. Zagwe, referring to the Agaw people of the Zagwe dynasty, among the original inhabitants of northwest Ethiopia, is considered derogatory, since it incorrectly associates the community with the largely pagan Agaw.[19]

Religion

Main article: Haymanot
 
Beta Israel women in Israel

Haymanot (Ge'ez: ሃይማኖት) is the colloquial term for "faith" which is also used as a term for the Jewish religion by the Beta Israel community,[21] and Ethiopian Orthodox Christians also use it as a term for their own religion.

Texts

Mäṣḥafä Kedus (Holy Scriptures) is the name for their religious literature. The language of the writings is Geʽez, which also is the liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The holiest book is the Orit (meaning "law") or Octateuch: the Five Books of Moses plus Joshua, Judges and Ruth. The rest of the Bible has secondary importance. They possess the Book of Lamentations from the traditional Hebrew canon, and part of the Book of Jeremiah, as in the Orthodox Tewahedo biblical canon.

Deuterocanonical books that also make up part of the canon are Sirach, Judith, Esdras 1 and 2, Meqabyan, Jubilees, Baruch 1 and 4, Tobit, Enoch, and the testaments of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Many of these books differ substantially from the similarly numbered and named texts in Koine Greek and Hebrew (such as "Maccabbees"), though some of the Ge'ez works are clearly dependent on those texts. Others appear to have other ancient literary and oral origins. All of the texts are also used by the Orthodox Christian population as well, though with varying levels of importance between the communities.

Important non-Biblical writings include: Nagara Muse "The Conversation of Moses", Mota Aaron "Death of Aaron", Mota Muse "Death of Moses", Te'ezaza Sanbat "Precepts of the Sabbath", Arde'et "Students", Gorgorios, Mäṣḥafä Sa'atat "Book of Hours", Abba Elias "Father Elijah", Mäṣḥafä Mäla'əkt "Book of Angels", Mäṣḥafä Kahan "Book of the Priest", Dərsanä Abrəham Wäsara Bägabs "Homily on Abraham and Sarah in Egypt", Gadla Sosna "The Acts of Susanna", and Baqadāmi Gabra Egzi'abḥēr "In the Beginning God Created". Zena Āyhud and Fālasfā "Philosophers" are two books that are not considered sacred, but have had great influence.

Prayer houses

Main article: Synagogue
 
Synagogue in the village of Wolleka in Ethiopia
 
Modern Synagogue in the city of Netivot in Israel

The synagogue is called the masgid (place of worship), it is also called the bet maqdas (Holy house) or the ṣalot bet (Prayer house).

Dietary laws

Main article: Kashrut

Beta Israel kashrut law is based mainly on the books of Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and Jubilees. Permitted and forbidden animals and their signs appear in Leviticus 11:3–8 and Deuteronomy 14:4–8. Forbidden birds are listed in Leviticus 11:13–23 and Deuteronomy 14:12–20. Signs of permitted fish are written on Leviticus 11:9–12 and Deuteronomy 14:9–10. Insects and larvae are forbidden according to Leviticus 11:41–42. Gid hanasheh is forbidden per Genesis 32:33. Mixtures of milk and meat are not prepared or eaten, but are not banned either: Haymanot interpreted the verses Exodus 23:19, Exodus 34:26, and Deuteronomy 14:21 "shalt not seethe a kid in its mother's milk" literally, as in Karaite Judaism; whereas, under Rabbinic Judaism, mixing dairy products with meat is banned.

Ethiopian Jews were forbidden to eat the food of non-Jews. A Kahen eats only meat he has slaughtered himself, which his hosts prepare both for him and themselves. Beta Israel who broke these taboos were ostracized, and had to undergo a purification process. Purification included fasting for one or more days, eating only uncooked chickpeas provided by the Kahen, and ritual purification before entering the village.

Unlike other Ethiopians, the Beta Israel do not eat raw meat dishes such as kitfo or gored gored.[22]

Calendar and holidays

The Beta Israel calendar is a lunar calendar of 12 months, each 29 or 30 days alternately. Every four years, there is a leap year which adds a full month (30 days). The calendar is a combination of the ancient calendar of Alexandrian Jewry, Book of Jubilees, Book of Enoch, Abu Shaker, and the Ge'ez calendar.[23][24] The years are counted according to the counting of Kushta: "1571 to Jesus Christ, 7071 to the Gyptians, and 6642 to the Hebrews";[25] according to this counting, the year 5771 (Hebrew: ה'תשע"א) in the Rabbinical Hebrew calendar is the year 7082 in this calendar.

Holidays in the Haymanot (religion)[26] are divided into daily, monthly, and annually. The annual holidays by month are:

 
A Kes celebrating the holiday of Sigd in Jerusalem, 2008
  • Nisan: ba'āl lisan (Nisan holiday – New Year) on 1, ṣomä fāsikā (Passover fast) on 14, fāsikā (Passover) between 15–21, and gadfat (grow fat) or buho (fermented dough) on 22.
  • Iyar: another fāsikā (Second Passover – Pesach Sheni) between 15–21.
  • Sivan: ṣomä mã'rar (Harvest fast) on 11 and mã'rar (Harvest – Shavuot) on 12.
  • Tammuz: ṣomä tomos (Tammuz fast) between 1–10.
  • Av: ṣomä ab (Av fast) between 1–17.
  • Seventh Sabbath: fixed as the fourth Sabbath of the fifth month.[27]
  • Elul: awd amet (Year rotate) on 1, ṣomä lul (Elul fast) between 1–9, anākel astar'i (our atonement) on 10 and asartu wasamantu (eighteenth) on 28.
  • Tishrei: ba'āl Matqe (blowing holiday – Zikhron Trua) on 1, astasreyo (Day of Atonement – Yom Kippur) on 10 and ba'āla maṣallat (Tabernacles holiday – Sukkot) between 15–21.
  • Cheshvan: holiday for the day Moses saw the face of God on 1, holiday for the reception of Moses by the Israelites on 10, fast on 12 and měhlělla (Supplication – Sigd) on 29.
  • Kislev: another ṣomä mã'rar and mã'rar on 11 and 12 respectively.
  • Tevet: ṣomä tibt (Tevet fast) between 1–10.
  • Shevat: wamashi brobu on 1.
  • Adar: ṣomä astēr (Fast of Esther – Ta'anit Ester) between 11–13.

Monthly holidays are mainly memorial days to the annual holiday; these are yačaraqā ba'āl ("new moon festival")[28] on the first day of every month, asärt ("ten") on the tenth day to commemorate Yom Kippur, 'asrã hulat ("twelve") on the twelfth day to commemorate Shavuot, asrã ammest ("fifteen") on the fifteenth day to commemorate Passover and Sukkot, and ṣomä mälěya a fast on the last day of every month.[29] Daily holidays include the ṣomä säňňo (Monday fast), ṣomä amus (Thursday fast), ṣomä 'arb (Friday fast), and the very holy Sanbat (Sabbath).

Culture

Main article: Habesha peoples § Culture

Languages

The Beta Israel once spoke Qwara and Kayla, both of which are Agaw languages. Now, they speak Tigrinya and Amharic, both Semitic languages. Their liturgical language is Geʽez, also Semitic.[30][31] Since the 1950s, they have taught Hebrew in their schools. Those Beta Israel residing in the State of Israel now use Modern Hebrew as a daily language.

Origins

Oral traditions

Contemporary scholars believe that the Beta Israel emerged comparatively recently and formed a distinct ethonational group in the context of historical pressures that came to a head from the 14th to the 16th centuries.[32] Many of the Beta Israel's accounts of their own origins state that they stem from the very ancient migration of some portion of the Tribe of Dan to Ethiopia, were led by the sons of Moses, perhaps at the time of the Exodus. Alternative timelines include the later crises in Judea, e. g., the split of the northern Kingdom of Israel from the southern Kingdom of Judah after the death of King Solomon or the Babylonian Exile.[33] Other Beta Israel take as their basis the Christian account of Menelik's return to Ethiopia.[34] Menelik is considered the first Solomonic Emperor of Ethiopia, and is traditionally believed to be the son of King Solomon of ancient Israel, and Makeda, ancient Queen of Sheba (in modern Ethiopia). Though all the available traditions[35] correspond to recent interpretations, they reflect ancient convictions. According to Jon Abbink, three different versions are to be distinguished among the traditions which were recorded by the priests of the community.[36]

Companions of Menelik from Jerusalem

According to one account, the Beta Israel originated in the kingdom of Israel and they were the contemporaries rather than the descendants of King Solomon and Menelik.[37]

Migrants by the Egyptian route

According to another account, the forefathers of the Beta Israel are supposed to have arrived in Ethiopia by coming from the North, independently from Menelik and his company:

The Falashas [sic] migrated like many of the other sons of Israel to exile in Egypt after the destruction of the First Temple by the Babylonians in 586 BCE the time of the Babylonian exile. This group of people was led by the great priest On. They remained in exile in Egypt for a few hundred years until the reign of Cleopatra. When she was engaged in a war against Augustus Caesar, the Jews supported her. When she was defeated, it became dangerous for the small minorities to remain in Egypt so there was another migration (between approximately 39–31 BCE). Some of the migrants went to South Arabia and settled in Yemen. Some of them went to Sudan and continued to migrate until they reached Ethiopia, where they were helped by Egyptian traders who guided them through the desert. Some of them entered Ethiopia through Quara (near the Sudanese border), and some of them came via Eritrea.[citation needed] ...Later in time, there was an Abyssinian king named Kaleb, who wished to enlarge his kingdom, so he declared war on the Yemen and conquered it. And as a result, another group of Jews, led by Azonos and Phinhas, arrived in Ethiopia during his reign.[38]: 413–414 

Ethiopian national myth

The Ethiopian history described in the Kebra Nagast relates that Ethiopians are descendants of Israelite tribes who came to Ethiopia with Menelik I, alleged to be the son of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba (or Makeda, in the legend) (see 1 Kings 10:1–13 and 2 Chronicles 9:1–12). The legend relates that Menelik, as an adult, returned to his father in Jerusalem, and later resettled in Ethiopia. He took with him the Ark of the Covenant.[39][40]

In the Bible, there is no mention that the Queen of Sheba either married or had any sexual relations with King Solomon (although some identify her with the "black and beautiful" in Song of Songs 1:5).[41] Rather, the narrative records that she was impressed with Solomon's wealth and wisdom, and they exchanged royal gifts, and then she returned to rule her people in Kush. However, the "royal gifts" are interpreted by some as sexual contact. The loss of the Ark is not mentioned in the Bible. Hezekiah later makes reference to the Ark in 2 Kings 19:15.

The Kebra Negast asserts that the Beta Israel are descended from a battalion of men of Judah who fled southward down the Arabian coastal lands from Judea after the breakup of the Kingdom of Israel into two kingdoms in the 10th century BCE (while King Rehoboam reigned over Judah).

Although the Kebra Nagast and some traditional Ethiopian histories have stated that Gudit (or "Yudit", Judith; another name given her was "Esato", Esther), a 10th-century usurping queen, was Jewish, some scholars consider that it is unlikely that this was the case. It is more likely, they say, that she was a pagan southerner[42] or a usurping Christian Aksumite Queen.[43] However, she clearly supported Jews, since she founded the Zagwe dynasty, who governed from around 937 to 1270 CE. According to the Kebra Nagast, Jewish, Christian and pagan kings ruled in harmony at that time. Furthermore, the Zagwe dynasty claimed legitimacy (according to the Kebra Nagast) by saying it was descended from Moses and his Ethiopian wife.[citation needed]

Most of the Beta Israel consider the Kebra Negast to be legend. As its name expresses, "Glory of Kings" (meaning the Christian Aksumite kings), it was written in the 14th century in large part to delegitimize the Zagwe dynasty, to promote instead a rival "Solomonic" claim to authentic Jewish Ethiopian antecedents, and to justify the Christian overthrow of the Zagwe by the "Solomonic" Aksumite dynasty, whose rulers are glorified. The writing of this polemic shows that criticisms of the Aksumite claims of authenticity were current in the 14th century, two centuries after they came to power. Many Beta Israel believe that they are descended from the tribe of Dan.[44] Most reject the "Solomonic" and "Queen of Sheba" legends of the Aksumites[citation needed].

Tribe of Dan

To prove the antiquity and authenticity of their claims, the Beta Israel cite the 9th-century CE testimony of Eldad ha-Dani (the Danite), from a time before the Zagwean dynasty was established. Eldad was a Jewish man of dark skin who appeared in Egypt and created a stir in that Jewish community (and elsewhere in the Mediterranean Jewish communities he visited) with claims that he had come from a Jewish kingdom of pastoralists far to the south. The only language Eldad spoke was a hitherto unknown dialect of Hebrew. Although he strictly followed the Mosaic commandments, his observance differed in some details from Rabbinic halakhah. Some observers thought that he might be a Karaite, although his practice also differed from theirs. He carried Hebrew books that supported his explanations of halakhah. He cited ancient authorities in the scholarly traditions of his own people.[45]

Eldad said that the Jews of his own kingdom descended from the tribe of Dan (which included the Biblical war-hero Samson) who had fled the civil war in the Kingdom of Israel between Solomon's son Rehoboam and Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and resettled in Egypt. From there, they moved southwards up the Nile into Ethiopia. The Beta Israel say this confirms that they are descended from these Danites.[46] Some Beta Israel, however, assert that their Danite origins go back to the time of Moses, when some Danites parted from other Jews right after the Exodus and moved south to Ethiopia. Eldad the Danite speaks of at least three waves of Jewish immigration into his region, creating other Jewish tribes and kingdoms. The earliest wave settled in a remote kingdom of the "tribe of Moses": this was the strongest and most secure Jewish kingdom of all, with farming villages, cities and great wealth.[47] Other Ethiopian Jews who appeared in the Mediterranean world over the succeeding centuries and persuaded rabbinic authorities there that they were of Jewish descent, and so could if slaves be ransomed by Jewish communities, join synagogues, marry other Jews, etc, also referred to the Mosaic and Danite origins of Ethiopian Jewry.[48] The Mosaic claims of the Beta Israel, in any case, like those of the Zagwe dynasty, are ancient.[49]

Other sources tell of many Jews who were brought as prisoners of war from ancient Israel by Ptolemy I and settled on the border of his kingdom with Nubia (Sudan). Another tradition asserts that the Jews arrived either via the old district of Qwara in northwestern Ethiopia, or via the Atbara River, where the Nile tributaries flow into Sudan. Some accounts specify the route taken by their forefathers on their way upriver to the south from Egypt.[50]

Rabbinic views

 
Public appeal of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel to save the Jews of Ethiopia, 1921, signed by Abraham Isaac Kook and Jacob Meir.

As mentioned above, the 9th-century Jewish traveler Eldad ha-Dani claimed he descended from the tribe of Dan. He also reported other Jewish kingdoms around his own or in East Africa during this time. His writings probably represent the first mention of the Beta Israel in Rabbinic literature. Despite some skeptical critics, his authenticity has been generally accepted in current scholarship. His descriptions were consistent and even the originally doubtful rabbis of his time were finally persuaded.[51] Specific details may be uncertain; one critic has noted Eldad's lack of detailed reference to Ethiopia's geography and any Ethiopian language, although he claimed the area as his homeland.[52]

Eldad's was not the only medieval testimony about Jewish communities living far to the south of Egypt, which strengthens the credibility of his account. Obadiah ben Abraham Bartenura wrote in a letter from Jerusalem in 1488:

I myself saw two of them in Egypt. They are dark-skinned...and one could not tell whether they keep the teaching of the Karaites, or of the Rabbis, for some of their practices resemble the Karaite teaching...but in other things, they appear to follow the instruction of the Rabbis; and they say they are related to the tribe of Dan.[53]

Rabbi David ibn Zimra of Egypt (1479–1573), writing similarly, held the Ethiopian Jewish community to be similar in many ways to the Karaites, writing of them on this wise:

...Lo! the matter is well-known that there are perpetual wars between the kings of Kush, which has three kingdoms; part of which belonging to the Ishmaelites, and part of which to the Christians, and part of which to the Israelites from the tribe of Dan. In all likelihood, they are from the sect of Sadok and Boethus, who are [now] called Karaites, since they know only a few of the biblical commandments, but are unfamiliar with the Oral Law, nor do they light the Sabbath candle. War ceases not from amongst them, and every day they take captives from one another...[54]

In the same responsum, he concludes that if the Ethiopian Jewish community wished to return to rabbinic Judaism, they would be received and welcomed into the fold, just as the Karaites who returned to the teachings of the Rabbanites in the time of Rabbi Abraham ben Maimonides.

Reflecting the consistent assertions made by Ethiopian Jews they dealt with or knew of, and after due investigation of their claims and their own Jewish behaviour, a number of Jewish legal authorities, in previous centuries and in modern times, have ruled halakhically (according to Jewish legal code) that the Beta Israel are indeed Jews, the descendants of the tribe of Dan, one of the Ten Lost Tribes.[55] They believe that these people established a Jewish kingdom that lasted for hundreds of years. With the rise of Christianity and later Islam, schisms arose and three kingdoms competed. Eventually, the Christian and Muslim Ethiopian kingdoms reduced the Jewish kingdom to a small impoverished section. The earliest authority to rule this way was the 16th-century scholar David ibn Zimra (Radbaz), who explained elsewhere in a responsum concerning the status of a Beta Israel slave:

But those Jews who come from the land of Cush are without doubt from the tribe of Dan, and since they did not have in their midst sages who were masters of the tradition, they clung to the simple meaning of the Scriptures. If they had been taught, however, they would not be irreverent towards the words of our sages, so their status is comparable to a Jewish infant taken captive by non-Jews… And even if you say that the matter is in doubt, it is a commandment to redeem them.[56]

In 1973, Ovadia Yosef, the Sephardi chief rabbi of Israel ruled, based on the writings of David ben Solomon ibn Abi Zimra and other accounts, that the Beta Israel were Jews and should be brought to Israel. Two years later this opinion was confirmed by a number of other authorities who made similar rulings, including the Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel Shlomo Goren.[9] In 1977, the law was passed granting the right of return.[8]

Some notable poskim (religious law authorities) from non-Zionist Ashkenazi circles, placed a safek (legal doubt) over the Jewish peoplehood of the Beta Israel. Such dissenting voices include Rabbi Elazar Shach, Rabbi Yosef Shalom Eliashiv, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, and Rabbi Moshe Feinstein.[57][58] Similar doubts were raised within the same circles towards the Bene Israel[59] and to Russian immigrants to Israel during the 1990s Post-Soviet aliyah.

In the 1970s and early 1980s, the Beta Israel were required to undergo a modified conversion ceremony involving immersion in a mikveh (ritual bath), a declaration accepting Rabbinic law, and, for men, a hatafat dam brit (symbolic recircumcision).[60] Avraham Shapira later waived the hatafat dam brit stipulation, which is only a requirement when the halakhic doubt is significant.[61] More recently, Shlomo Amar has ruled that descendants of Ethiopian Jews who were forced to convert to Christianity are "unquestionably Jews in every respect".[62][63] With the consent of Ovadia Yosef, Amar ruled that it is forbidden to question the Jewishness of this community, pejoratively called Falash Mura in reference to their having converted.[64][65]

Genetics

Further information: Genetic studies on Jews

A number of DNA studies have been done on the Beta Israel.[66]

Uniparental lineages

Genealogical DNA testing allows research into paternal (meaning only through fathers) and maternal (meaning only through mothers) ancestry.

According to Cruciani et al. (2002), haplogroup A is the most common paternal lineage among Ethiopian Jews. The clade is carried by around 41% of Beta Israel males, and is primarily associated with Nilo-Saharan and Khoisan-speaking populations. However, the A branches carried by Ethiopians Jews are principally of the A-Y23865 variety, which formed about 10,000 years ago and is localized to the Ethiopian highlands and the Arabian peninsula.[67][68] The difference with the Khoisan is 54,000 years.[69]

Additionally, around 18% of Ethiopian Jews are bearers of E-P2 (xM35, xM2); in Ethiopia, most of such lineages belong to E-M329, which has been found in ancient DNA isolated from a 4,500 year old Ethiopian fossil.[70][71][72] Such haplotypes are frequent in Southwestern Ethiopia, especially among Omotic-speaking populations.[73][74]

The rest of the Beta Israel mainly belong to haplotypes linked with the E-M35 and J-M267 haplogroups, which are more commonly associated with Cushitic and Semitic-speaking populations in Northeast Africa. Further analysis show that the E-M35 carried by Ethiopian Jews is primarily indigenous to the Horn of Africa rather than being of Levantine origin.[67][75] Altogether, this suggests that Ethiopian Jews have diverse patrilineages indicative of indigenous Northeast African, not Middle Eastern, origin.[76]

A 2011 mitochondrial DNA study focused on maternal ancestry sampling 41 Beta Israel found them to carry 51.2% macro-haplogroup L typically found in Africa. The remainder consisted of Eurasian-origin lineages such as 22% R0, 19.5% M1, 5% W, and 2.5% U.[77] However, no identical haplotypes were shared between the Yemenite and Ethiopian Jewish populations, suggesting very little gene flow between the populations and potentially distinct maternal population histories.[77] The maternal ancestral profile of the Beta Israel is similar to those of highland Ethiopian populations.[78][74]

Autosomal ancestry

The Ethiopian Jews' autosomal DNA has been examined in a comprehensive study by Tishkoff et al. (2009) on the genetic affiliations of various populations in Africa. According to Bayesian clustering analysis, the Beta Israel generally grouped with other Cushitic and Ethiosemitic-speaking populations inhabiting the Horn of Africa.[79]

A 2010 study by Behar et al. on the genome-wide structure of Jews observed that "Ethiopian Jews (Beta Israel) and Indian Jews (Bene Israel and Cochini) cluster with neighbouring autochthonous populations in Ethiopia and western India, respectively, despite a clear paternal link between the Bene Israel and the Levant. These results cast light on the variegated genetic architecture of the Middle East, and trace the origins of most Jewish Diaspora communities to the Levant."[80]

The Beta Israel are autosomally closer to other populations from the Horn of Africa than to any other Jewish population, including Yemenite Jews.[79][80] A 2012 study by Ostrer et al. concluded that the Ethiopian Jewish community was founded about 2000 years ago probably by only a relatively small number of Jews from elsewhere with local people joining to the community, causing Beta Israel to become genetically distant from other Jewish groups.[81]

According to a 2020 study by Agranat-Tamir et al., the DNA of the Ethiopian Jews is mostly of East African origin, but about 20% of their genetic makeup is of Middle Eastern semitic people origin and shows similarity to modern Jewish and Arab populations and Bronze Age Canaanites.[82][83]

Scholarly views

Early views

Early secular scholars considered the Beta Israel to be the direct descendant of Jews who lived in ancient Ethiopia, whether they were the descendants of an Israelite tribe, or converted by Jews living in Yemen, or by the Jewish community in southern Egypt at Elephantine.[84] In 1829, Marcus Louis wrote that the ancestors of the Beta Israel related to the Asmach, which were also called Sembritae ("foreigners"), an Egyptian regiment numbering 240,000 soldiers and mentioned by Greek geographers and historians. The Asmach emigrated or were exiled from Elephantine to Kush in the time of Psamtik I or Psamtik II and settled in Sennar and Abyssinia.[85] It is possible that Shebna's party from Rabbinic accounts was part of the Asmach.

In the 1930s, Jones and Monroe argued that the chief Semitic languages of Ethiopia may suggest an antiquity of Judaism in Ethiopia. "There still remains the curious circumstance that a number of Abyssinian words connected with religion, such as the words for Hell, idol, Easter, purification, and alms, are of Hebrew origin. These words must have been derived directly from a Jewish source, for the Abyssinian Church knows the scriptures only in a Ge'ez version made from the Septuagint."[86]

Richard Pankhurst summarized the various theories offered about their origins as of 1950 that the first members of this community were

(1) converted Agaws, (2) Jewish immigrants who intermarried with Agaws, (3) immigrant Yemeni Arabs who had converted to Judaism, (4) immigrant Yemeni Jews, (5) Jews from Egypt, and (6) successive waves of Yemeni Jews. Traditional Ethiopian savants, on the one hand, have declared that 'We were Jews before we were Christians', while more recent, well-documented, Ethiopian hypotheses, notably by two Ethiopian scholars, Dr Taddesse Tamrat and Dr Getachew Haile...put much greater emphasis on the manner in which Christians over the years converted to the Falasha faith, thus showing that the Falashas were culturally an Ethiopian sect, made up of ethnic Ethiopians.[87]

1980s and early 1990s

According to Jacqueline Pirenne, numerous Sabaeans left south Arabia and crossed over the Red Sea to Ethiopia to escape from the Assyrians, who had devastated the kingdoms of Israel and Judah in the 8th and 7th centuries BCE. She says that a second major wave of Sabeans crossed over to Ethiopia in the 6th and 5th centuries BCE to escape Nebuchadnezzar II. This wave also included Jews fleeing from the Babylonian takeover of Judah. In both cases, the Sabeans are assumed to have departed later from Ethiopia to Yemen.[88]

According to Menachem Waldman, a major wave of emigration from the Kingdom of Judah to Kush and Abyssinia dates to the Assyrian Siege of Jerusalem, in the beginning of the 7th century BCE. Rabbinic accounts of the siege assert that only about 110,000 Judeans remained in Jerusalem under King Hezekiah's command, whereas about 130,000 Judeans led by Shebna had joined Sennacherib's campaign against Tirhakah, king of Kush. Sennacherib's campaign failed and Shebna's army was lost "at the mountains of darkness", suggestively identified with the Semien Mountains.[89]

In 1987, Steve Kaplan wrote:

Although we don't have a single fine ethnographic research on Beta Israel, and the recent history of this tribe has received almost no attention by researchers, every one who writes about the Jews of Ethiopia feels obliged to contribute his share to the ongoing debate about their origin. Politicians and journalists, Rabbis and political activists, not a single one of them withstood the temptation to play the role of the historian and invent a solution for this riddle.[90]

Richard Pankhurst summarized the state of knowledge on the subject in 1992 as follows: "The early origins of the Falashas are shrouded in mystery, and, for lack of documentation, will probably remain so for ever."[87]

Recent views

By 1994, modern scholars of Ethiopian history and Ethiopian Jews generally supported one of two conflicting hypotheses for the origin of the Beta Israel, as outlined by Kaplan:[91]

  • An ancient Jewish origin, together with conservation of some ancient Jewish traditions by the Ethiopian Church. Kaplan identifies Simon D. Messing, David Shlush, Michael Corinaldi, Menachem Waldman, Menachem Elon and David Kessler as supporters of this hypothesis.[91]
  • A late ethnogenesis of the Beta Israel between the 14th to 16th centuries, from a sect of Ethiopian Christians who took on Biblical Old Testament practices, and came to identify as Jews. Steven Kaplan supports this hypothesis, and lists with him G. J. Abbink, Kay K. Shelemay, Taddesse Tamrat and James A. Quirin. Quirin differs from his fellow researchers in the weight he assigns to an ancient Jewish element which the Beta Israel have conserved.[91]

History

Main article: History of the Jews in Ethiopia

Immigration to Israel

Main article: Aliyah from Ethiopia
Aliyah from Ethiopia compared to the total Aliyah to Israel[92][93]
Years Ethiopian-born
Immigrants		 Total Immigration
to Israel
1948–51 10 687,624
1952–60 59 297,138
1961–71 98 427,828
1972–79 306 267,580
1980–89 16,965 153,833
1990–99 39,651 956,319
2000–04 14,859 181,505
2005-09 12,586 86,855
2010 1,652 16,633
2011 2,666 16,892
2012 2,432 16,557
2013 450 16,968
 
Migration Map of Beta Israel

Beta Israel Exodus

The emigration of the Beta Israel community to Israel was officially banned by the Communist Derg government of Ethiopia during the 1980s, although it is now known that General Mengistu collaborated with Israel in order to receive money and arms in exchange for granting the Beta Israel safe passage during Operation Moses.[94][95] Other Beta Israel sought alternative ways of immigration, via Sudan or Kenya.

  • Late 1979 – beginning of 1984 – Aliyah activists and Mossad agents operating in Sudan, including Ferede Aklum, called the Jews to come to Sudan where they would eventually be taken to Israel. Posing as Christian Ethiopian refugees from the Ethiopian Civil War, Jews began to arrive in the refugee camps in Sudan. Most Jews came from Tigray and Wolqayt, regions that were controlled by the TPLF, who often escorted them to the Sudanese border.[96] Small groups of Jews were brought out of Sudan in a clandestine operation that continued until an Israeli newspaper exposed the operation and brought it to a halt stranding Beta Israels in the Sudanese camps. In 1981, the Jewish Defense League protested the "lack of action" to rescue Ethiopian Jews by taking over the main offices of HIAS in Manhattan.[97]
  • 1983 – March 28, 1985 – In 1983 the governor of Gondar region, Major Melaku Teferra was ousted, and his successor removed restrictions on travel out of Ethiopia.[98] Ethiopian Jews, many by this time waiting in Addis Ababa, began again to arrive in Sudan in large numbers; and the Mossad had trouble evacuating them quickly. Because of the poor conditions in the Sudanese camps, many Ethiopian refugees, both Christian and Jewish, died of disease and hunger. Among these victims, it is estimated that between 2,000 to 5,000 were Jews.[99] In late 1984, the Sudanese government, following the intervention of the U.S, allowed the emigration of 7,200 Beta Israel refugees to Europe who then went on to Israel. The first of these two immigration waves, between 20 November 1984 and 20 January 1985, was dubbed Operation Moses (original name "The Lion of Judah’s Cub") and brought 6,500 Beta Israel to Israel. This operation was followed by Operation Joshua (also referred to as "Operation Sheba") a few weeks later, which was conducted by the U.S. Air Force, and brought the 494 Jewish refugees remaining in Sudan to Israel. The second operation was mainly carried out due to the critical intervention and pressure from the U.S.

Emigration via Addis Ababa

  • 1990–1991: After losing Soviet military support following the collapse of Communism in Central and Eastern Europe, the Ethiopian government allowed the emigration of 6,000 Beta Israel members to Israel in small groups, mostly in hope of establishing ties with the U.S, the allies of Israel. Many more Beta Israel members crowded into refugee camps on the outskirts of Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, to escape the civil war raging in the north of Ethiopia (their region of origin), and await their turn to immigrate to Israel.
  • May 24–25, 1991 (Operation Solomon):[13] In 1991, the political and economic stability of Ethiopia deteriorated, as rebels mounted attacks against and eventually controlled the capital city of Addis Ababa. Worried about the fate of the Beta Israel during the transition period, the Israeli government, with the help of several private groups, resumed the migration. Over the course of 36 hours, a total of 34 El Al passenger planes, with their seats removed to maximize passenger capacity, flew 14,325 Beta Israel non-stop to Israel. Again, the operation was mainly carried out due to intervention and pressure from the U.S.
  • 1992–1999: During these years, the Qwara Beta Israel immigrated to Israel. Another 4,000 Ethiopian Jews who had failed to reach the assembly centre in Addis Ababa in time, were flown to Israel in subsequent months.
  • 1997–present: In 1997, an irregular emigration began of Falash Mura, which was and still is mainly subject to political developments in Israel.[100]
  • 2018–2020: In August 2018, the Netanyahu government vowed to bring in 1,000 Falasha Jews from Ethiopia.[101]
    In April 2019 an estimated 8,000 Falasha were waiting to leave Ethiopia[102]
    On February 25, 2020, 43 Falasah arrived in Israel from Ethiopia.[103]
  • 2021: On November 14, 2021, Falasha Jews in Israel stage a protest so their relatives left behind in Ethiopia can go to Israel.[104] The same day the Israeli Government decided to permit 9,000 Falasha Jews to go to Israel. On November 29, 2021, the Israeli Government permitted 3,000 Falasha Jews to go to Israel.[105] As of 2021, 1,636 Jews have gone up to Israel from Ethiopia.[106]

The difficulties of the Falash Mura in immigrating to Israel

 
Israeli PM Yitzhak Shamir greets new immigrants from Ethiopia, 1991.

In 1991, the Israeli authorities announced that the emigration of the Beta Israel to Israel was about to conclude, because almost all of the community had been evacuated. Nevertheless, thousands of other Ethiopians began leaving the northern region to take refuge in the government controlled capital, Addis Ababa, who were Jewish converts to Christianity and asking to immigrate to Israel. As a result, a new term arose which was used to refer to this group: "Falash Mura". The Falash Mura, who weren't part of the Beta Israel communities in Ethiopia, were not recognized as Jews by the Israeli authorities, and were therefore not initially allowed to immigrate to Israel, making them ineligible for Israeli citizenship under Israel's Law of Return.

As a result, a lively debate has arisen in Israel about the Falash Mura, mainly between the Beta Israel community in Israel and their supporters and those opposed to a potential massive emigration of the Falash Mura people. The government's position on the matter remained quite restrictive, but it has been subject to numerous criticisms, including criticisms by some clerics who want to encourage these people's return to Judaism.

During the 1990s, the Israeli government finally allowed most of those who fled to Addis Ababa to immigrate to Israel.[107] Some did so through the Law of Return, which allows an Israeli parent of a non-Jew to petition for his/her son or daughter to be allowed to immigrate to Israel. Others were allowed to immigrate to Israel as part of a humanitarian effort.

The Israeli government hoped that admitting these Falash Mura would finally bring emigration from Ethiopia to a close, but instead prompted a new wave of Falash Mura refugees fleeing to Addis Ababa and wishing to immigrate to Israel. This led the Israeli government to harden its position on the matter in the late 1990s.

In February 2003, the Israeli government decided to accept Orthodox religious conversions in Ethiopia of Falash Mura by Israeli Rabbis, after which they can then immigrate to Israel as Jews. Although the new position is more open, and although the Israeli governmental authorities and religious authorities should in theory allow emigration to Israel of most of the Falash Mura wishing to do so (who are now acknowledged to be descendants of the Beta Israel community), in practice, however, that immigration remains slow, and the Israeli government continued to limit, from 2003 to 2006, immigration of Falash Mura to about 300 per month.[citation needed]

In April 2005, The Jerusalem Post stated that it had conducted a survey in Ethiopia, after which it was concluded that tens of thousands of Falash Mura still lived in rural northern Ethiopia.[citation needed]

On 14 November 2010, the Israeli cabinet approved a plan to allow an additional 8,000 Falash Mura to immigrate to Israel.[108][109]

On November 16, 2015, the Israeli cabinet unanimously voted in favor of allowing the last group of Falash Mura to immigrate over the next five years, but their acceptance will be conditional on a successful Jewish conversion process, according to the Interior Ministry.[110] In April 2016, they announced that a total of 10,300 people would be included in the latest round of Aliyah, over the following 5 years.[111] By May 2021 300 Falasha had been brought to Israel joining 1,700 who had already immigrated; an estimated 12,000 more are in Ethiopia[2]

Population

Ethiopian Jews in Israel

Main articles: Ethiopian Jews in Israel and Racism in Israel § Beta Israel
 
Israeli Border Policeman

The Ethiopian Beta Israel community in Israel today comprises more than 159,500 people.[112][1] This is a little more than 1 percent of the Israeli population.[113] Most of this population are the descendants and the immigrants who came to Israel during Operation Moses (1984) and Operation Solomon (1991).[114] Civil war and famine in Ethiopia prompted the Israeli government to mount these dramatic rescue operations. The rescues were within the context of Israel's national mission to gather diaspora Jews and bring them to the Jewish homeland. Some immigration has continued up until the present day. Today 81,000 Ethiopian Israelis were born in Ethiopia, while 38,500 or 32% of the community are native born Israelis.[14]

Over time, the Ethiopian Jews in Israel moved out of the government owned mobile home camps which they initially lived in and settled in various cities and towns throughout Israel, with the encouragement of the Israeli authorities who grant new immigrants generous government loans or low-interest mortgages.[citation needed]

Similarly to other groups of immigrant Jews who made aliyah to Israel, the Ethiopian Jews have had to overcome obstacles to integrate into Israeli society.[115] Initially the main challenges faced by the Ethiopian Jewish community in Israel arose from communication difficulties (most of the Ethiopian population could not read nor write in Hebrew, and many of the older members could not hold a simple conversation in Hebrew), and discrimination, including manifestations of racism, from some parts of Israeli society.[116] Unlike Russian immigrants, many of whom arrived educated and skilled, Ethiopian immigrants[117] came from an impoverished agrarian country, and were ill-prepared to work in an industrialized country.

 
A bride and groom in Jerusalem

Over the years, there has been significant progress in the integration of young Beta Israels into Israeli society, primarily resulting from serving in the Israeli Defense Forces, alongside other Israelis their age. This has led to an increase in opportunities for Ethiopian Jews after they are discharged from the army.[118]

Despite progress, Ethiopian Jews are still not well assimilated into Israeli-Jewish society. They remain, on average, on a lower economic and educational level than average Israelis. The rate of Ethiopians who have dropped out of school has increased dramatically as well as the rate of juvenile delinquency, and there are high incidences of suicide and depression among this community.[113] Also, while marriages between Jews of different backgrounds are very common in Israel, marriages between Ethiopians and non-Ethiopians are not very common. According to a 2009 study, 90% of Ethiopian-Israelis – 93% of men and 85% of women, are married to other Ethiopian-Israelis. A survey found that 57% of Israelis consider a daughter marrying an Ethiopian unacceptable and 39% consider a son marrying an Ethiopian to be unacceptable. Barriers to intermarriage have been attributed to sentiments in both the Ethiopian community and Israeli society generally.[119] A 2011 study showed that only 13% of high school students of Ethiopian origin felt "fully Israeli".[120]

In 1996, an event called the "blood bank affair" took place that demonstrated the discrimination and racism against Ethiopians in Israeli society. Blood banks would not use Ethiopian blood out of the fear of HIV being generated from their blood.[113] Discrimination and racism against Israeli Ethiopians is still perpetuated. In May 2015, Israeli Ethiopians demonstrated in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem against racism, after a video was released, showing an Israeli soldier of Ethiopian descent that was brutally beaten up by the Israeli police. Interviewed students of Ethiopian origin affirm that they do not feel accepted in Israeli society, due to a very strong discrimination towards them.[121] Many scholars such as Ben-Eliezer have been exploring how the discrimination, cultural racism, and exclusion have resulted in metaphorically sending many of the new generation of Ethiopian Jews "back to Africa". They say this because many of the new generation have been reclaiming their traditional Ethiopian names, Ethiopian language, Ethiopian culture, and Ethiopian music.[113]

Converts

Falash Mura

Main article: Falash Mura

Falash Mura is the name given to those of the Beta Israel community in Ethiopia who converted to Christianity under pressure from the mission during the 19th century and the 20th century. This term consists of Jews who did not adhere to Jewish law, as well as Jewish converts to Christianity, who did so either voluntarily or who were forced to do so.[citation needed]

Many Ethiopian Jews whose ancestors converted to Christianity have been returning to the practice of Judaism. The Israeli government can thus set quotas on their immigration and make citizenship dependent on their conversion to Orthodox Judaism.[citation needed]

Beta Abraham

Main article: Beta Abraham

Slaves

Main articles: Judaism and slavery and Slavery in Ethiopia

Slavery was practiced in Ethiopia as in much of Africa until it was formally abolished in 1942. After the slave was bought by a Jew, he went through conversion (giyur), and became property of his master.[122]

In popular culture

  • The 2005 Israeli-French film "Go, Live, and Become" (Hebrew: תחייה ותהייה), directed by Romanian-born Radu Mihăileanu focuses on Operation Moses. The film tells the story of an Ethiopian Christian child whose mother has him pass as Jewish so he can immigrate to Israel and escape the famine looming in Ethiopia. The film was awarded the 2005 Best Film Award at the Copenhagen International Film Festival.[123]
  • Several prominent musicians and rappers are of Ethiopian origin.[124]
  • The plot of the 2019 American film Uncut Gems opens with Ethiopian Jewish miners retrieving an opal in Africa.[125]
  • The 2019 film The Red Sea Diving Resort is loosely based on the events of Operation Moses and Operation Joshua in 1984-1985, in which the Mossad covertly evacuated Jewish Ethiopian refugees to Israel using a base at the once-abandoned holiday resort of Arous Village on the Red Sea coast of Sudan.
  • Israeli-born singer Eden Alene was set to represent Israel at the Eurovision Song Contest 2020 in Rotterdam, Netherlands.[126] The chorus of her song "Feker Libi" featured lyrics in Amharic, Arabic and Hebrew. Due to the 2020 contest's cancellation, she represented Israel again in 2021 with the song "Set Me Free", placing 17th out of 26 in the final.

Monuments

 
The Beta Israel Memorial Aliya in Kiryat Gat

National memorials to the Ethiopian Jews who died on their way to Israel are located in Kiryat Gat, and at the National Civil Cemetery of the State of Israel in Mount Herzl in Jerusalem.

Ethiopian Heritage Museum

In 2009, plans to establish an Ethiopian Heritage Museum dedicated to the heritage and culture of the Ethiopian Jewish community were unveiled in Rehovot. The museum will include a model of an Ethiopian village, an artificial stream, a garden, classrooms, an amphitheater, and a memorial to Ethiopian Zionist activists and Ethiopian Jews who died en route to Israel.[127]

Café Shahor Hazak

Strong Black Coffee ("Café Shahor Hazak"; קפה שחור חזק) is an Ethiopian-Israeli hip hop duo.[128][129][130][131] The duo were a nominee for the 2015 MTV Europe Music Awards Best Israeli Act award.

Falash Mura

Falash Mura is the name given to those of the Beta Israel community in Ethiopia who converted to Christianity as a consequence of proselytization during the 19th and 20th centuries. This term consists of Beta Israel who did not adhere to Israelite law, as well as converts to Christianity, who did so either voluntarily or who were forced to do so. .

 
Missionary Henry Aaron Stern preaches Christianity to Beta Israel.

They derive from the Beta Israel of Ethiopia, however, the Falash Mura converted to Christianity and are not considered under the Israeli Law of Return. Some have made it to Israel but many still reside in camps in Gondar and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, waiting their status for Aliyah. Some Falash Mura have reverted to Judaism.[132]

 
Falash Mura woman making Injera in Gondar in 1996.
 
Falash Mura child, 2005

Terminology

See also: Beta Israel § Terminology

The original term that the Beta Israel gave to the converts was "Faras Muqra" ("horse of the raven") in which the word "horse" refers to the converts and the word "raven" refers to the missionary Martin Flad who used to wear black clothes.[133] This term derived the additional names Falas Muqra, Faras Mura and Falas Mura. In Hebrew the term "Falash Mura" (or "Falashmura") is probably a result of confusion over the use of the term "Faras Muqra" and its derivatives and on the basis of false cognate it was given the Hebrew meaning Falashim Mumarim ("converted Falashas").

The actual term "Falash Mura" has no clear origin. It is believed that the term may come from the Agaw and means "someone who changes their faith."[134]

History

In 1860, Henry Aaron Stern, a Jewish convert to Christianity, traveled to Ethiopia in an attempt to convert the Beta Israel community to Christianity.

Conversion to Christianity

For years, Ethiopian Jews were unable to own land and were often persecuted by the Christian majority of Ethiopia. Ethiopian Jews were afraid to touch non-Jews because they believed non-Jews were not pure. They were also ostracized by their Christian neighbors. For this reason, many Ethiopian Jews converted to Christianity to seek a better life in Ethiopia. The Jewish Agency's Ethiopia emissary, Asher Seyum, says the Falash Mura "converted in the 19th and 20th century, when Jewish relations with Christian rulers soured. Regardless, many kept ties with their Jewish brethren and were never fully accepted into the Christian communities. When word spread about the aliyah, many thousands of Falash Mura left their villages for Gondar and Addis Ababa, assuming they counted."[135]

In the Achefer woreda of the Mirab Gojjam Zone, roughly 1,000–2,000 families of Beta Israel were found.[136] There may be other such regions in Ethiopia with significant Jewish enclaves, which would raise the total population to more than 50,000 people.[137][citation needed]

Return to Judaism

The Falash Mura did not refer to themselves as members of the Beta Israel, the name for the Ethiopian Jewish community, until after the first wave of immigration to Israel. Beta Israel by ancestry, the Falash Mura believe they have just as much of a right to return to Israel as the Beta Israel themselves. Rabbi Ovadiah Yosef, a major player in the first wave of Beta Israel immigration to Israel, declared in 2002 that the Falash Mura had converted out of fear and persecution and therefore should be considered Jews.[134]

Aliyah to Israel

Today, Falash Mura who move to Israel must undergo conversion on arrival, making it increasingly more difficult for them to get situated into Israeli society. The Beta Israel who immigrated and made Aliyah through Operation Moses and Operation Solomon were not required to undergo conversion because they were accepted as Jews under the Law of Return.

On February 16, 2003, the Israeli government applied Resolution 2958 to the Falash Mura, which grants maternal descendants of Beta Israel the right to immigrate to Israel under the Israeli Law of Return and to obtain citizenship if they convert to Judaism.[138]

Controversy

Today, both Israeli and Ethiopian groups dispute the Falash Mura's religious and political status.[135] The Israeli government fears that these people are just using Judaism as an excuse to leave Ethiopia in efforts to improve their lives in a new country. Right-wing member of the Israeli Knesset Bezalel Smotrich was quoted saying, "This practice will develop into a demand to bring more and more family members not included in the Law of Return. It will open the door to an endless extension of a family chain from all over the world," he wrote, according to Kan. "How can the state explain in the High Court the distinction it makes between the Falashmura and the rest of the world?"[139] Although the government has threatened to stop all efforts to bring these people to Israel, they have still continued to address the issue. In 2018, the Israeli government allowed 1,000 Falash Mura to immigrate to Israel. However, members of the Ethiopian community say the process for immigration approval is poorly executed and inaccurate, dividing families. At least 80 percent of the tribe members in Ethiopia say they have first-degree relatives living in Israel, and some have been waiting for 20 years to immigrate.[139]

Notable Beta Israelis

Affiliated groups

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c Israel Central Bureau of Statistics: The Ethiopian Community in Israel
  2. ^ a b Rudee, Eliana (May 24, 2021). "Work goes on: Efforts to bring last of Ethiopian Jews to Israel". JNS.org.
  3. ^ Mozgovaya, Natasha (2008-04-02). . Haaretz.com. Archived from the original on 2010-02-05. Retrieved 2010-12-25.
  4. ^ "The genome-wide structure of the Jewish people".
  5. ^ For the meaning of the word "Beta" in the context of social/religious is "community", see James Quirin, The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews, 2010, p. xxi
  6. ^ Weil, Shalva (1997) "Collective Designations and Collective Identity of Ethiopian Jews", in Shalva Weil (ed.) Ethiopian Jews in the Limelight, Jerusalem: NCJW Research Institute for Innovation in Education, Hebrew University, pp. 35–48. (Hebrew)
  7. ^ Weil, Shalva. (2012) "Ethiopian Jews: the Heterogeneity of a Group", in Grisaru, Nimrod and Witztum, Eliezer. Cultural, Social and Clinical Perspectives on Ethiopian Immigrants in Israel, Beersheba: Ben-Gurion University Press, pp. 1–17.
  8. ^ a b Rosen, Jonathan Weber; Zieve, Tamara (April 19, 2018). "Jewish community in Ethiopia celebrates 70 years in solidarity with Israel". The Jerusalem Post.
  9. ^ a b van de Kamp-Wright, Annette (September 17, 2015). "Iron Lions of Zion: The Origin of Beta Israel". Jewish Press Omaha.
  10. ^ Weil, Shalva. (2008) "Zionism among Ethiopian Jews", in Hagar Salamon (ed.) Jewish Communities in the 19th and 20th Centuries: Ethiopia, Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute, pp. 187–200. (Hebrew)
  11. ^ Weil, Shalva 2012 "Longing for Jerusalem Among the Beta Israel of Ethiopia", in Edith Bruder and Tudor Parfitt (eds.) African Zion: Studies in Black Judaism, Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp. 204–217.
  12. ^ The Rescue of Ethiopian Jews 1978–1990 (Hebrew); "Ethiopian Immigrants and the Mossad Met 2013-12-03 at the Wayback Machine" (Hebrew)
  13. ^ a b Weil, Shalva. (2011) "Operation Solomon 20 Years On", International Relations and Security Network (ISN).http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Current-Affairs/ISN-Insights/Detail?ord538=grp1&ots591=eb06339b-2726-928e-0216-1b3f15392dd8&lng=en&id=129480&contextid734=129480&contextid735=129244&tabid=129244
  14. ^ a b [1] 2010-02-25 at the Wayback Machine, Ha'aretz
  15. ^ James Bruce, Travels To Discover The Source Of The Nile in the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 (in five Volumes), Vol. II, Printed by J. Ruthven for G. G. J. and J. Robinson, 1790, p. 485
  16. ^ Malchijah-MRC. "Home". www.himchurch.org. Retrieved 2016-07-14.
  17. ^ Hagar Salamon, The Hyena People – Ethiopian Jews in Christian Ethiopia, University of California Press, 1999, p. 21
  18. ^ a b Dege-Müller, Sophia (2018-04-17). "Between Heretics and Jews: Inventing Jewish Identities in Ethiopia". Entangled Religions. 6: 247–308. doi:10.46586/er.v6.2018.247-308. ISSN 2363-6696.
  19. ^ a b c d Quirun, The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews, pp. 11–15; Aešcoly, Book of the Falashas, pp. 1–3; Hagar Salamon, Beta Israel and their Christian neighbors in Ethiopia: Analysis of key concepts at different levels of cultural embodiment, Hebrew University, 1993, pp. 69–77 (Hebrew); Shalva Weil, "Collective Names and Collective Identity of Ethiopian Jews" in Ethiopian Jews in the Limelight, Hebrew University, 1997, pp. 35–48
  20. ^ Salamon, Beta Israel, p. 135, n. 20 (Hebrew)
  21. ^ Weil, Shalva. (1989) The Religious Beliefs and Practices of Ethiopian Jews in Israel, 2nd edn, Jerusalem: NCJW Research Institute forInnovation in Education, Hebrew University. (Hebrew)
  22. ^ Shelemay, Music, p. 42
  23. ^ Quirun 1992, p. 71
  24. ^ Weil, Shalva 1998 'Festivals and Cyclical Events of theYear', (149–160) and 'Elementary School', (174–177) in John Harrison, Rishona Wolfert and Ruth Levitov (eds) Culture – Differences in the World and in Israel: A Reader in Sociology for Junior High Schools, University of Tel-Aviv: Institute of Social Research and Ministry of Education, PedagogicAdministration. (Hebrew)
  25. ^ Aešcoly, Book of the Falashas, p. 56
  26. ^ Aešcoly, Book of the Falashas, pp. 62–70 (Hebrew); Shelemay, Music, Ritual, and Falasha History, pp. 44–57; Leslau, Falasha Anthology, pp. xxviii–xxxvi; Quirun, The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews, pp. 146–150
  27. ^ Devens, M. S. 'The Liturgy of the Seventh Sabbath: A Betä Israel (Falasha) Text', p. xx/4.4 (Introduction), Wiesbaden, 1995.
  28. ^ see Rosh Chodesh
  29. ^ see also Yom Kippur Katan
  30. ^ Spolsky, Bernard (2014). The Languages of the Jews: A Sociolinguistic History. Cambridge University Press. p. 92. ISBN 978-1-107-05544-5.
  31. ^ Weil, Shalva 1987 'An Elegy in Amharic on Dr. Faitlovitch' Pe’amim33: 125–127. (Hebrew)
  32. ^ Steve Kaplan, The Invention of Ethiopian Jews: Three Models, Cahiers d'Études Africaines , 1993, Vol. 33, pp. 645-658, p.347:'From a cultural perspective there appears to be little question that the Beta Israel must be understood as the product of processes that took place in Ethiopia between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries.'
  33. ^ Wolf Leslau, "Introduction", to his Falasha Anthology, Translated from Ethiopic Sources (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1951), p. xliii. Also see Steven Kaplan, "A Brief History of the Beta Israel", in The Jews of Ethiopia: A People in Transition (Tel Aviv and New York: Beth Hatefutsoth and The Jewish Museum, 1986), p. 11. Kaplan writes that, "Scholars remain divided (about the Beta Israel's origins) ... It has been suggested, for example, that the Jews of Ethiopia are descendants of (1) of the Ten Lost Tribes, especially the tribe of Dan; (2) Ethiopian Christians and pagans who assumed a Jewish identity; (3) Jewish immigrants from South Arabia (Yemen) who intermarried with the local population; or (4) Jewish immigrants from Egypt who intermarried with the local population." For more on the Mosaic and Danite claims of traditionalist Beta Israel, see Salo Baron, Social and Religious History of the Jews, Second Edition (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, and New York: Columbia University Press, 1983) Vol. XVIII: p. 373.
  34. ^ Budge, Queen of Sheba, Kebra Negast, §§ 38–64.
  35. ^ Weil, Shalva. 1991 The Changing Religious Tradition of Ethiopian Jews in Israel: a Teachers’ Guide, Jerusalem: The Ministry of Education & Culture & NCJW Research Institute for Innovation in Education, Hebrew University. (Hebrew)
  36. ^ Abbink, "The Enigma of Esra'el Ethnogenesis: An Anthro-Historical Study", Cahiers d'Etudes africaines, 120, XXX-4, 1990, pp. 412–420.
  37. ^ Jankowski, Königin von Saba, 65–71.
  38. ^ Schoenberger, M. (1975). The Falashas of Ethiopia: An Ethnographic Study (Cambridge: Clare Hall, Cambridge University). Quoted in Abbink, Jon (1990). "The Enigma of Beta Esra'el Ethnogenesis. An Anthro-Historical Study". Cahiers d'Études africaines. 30 (120): 397–449. doi:10.3406/cea.1990.1592. hdl:1887/9021.
  39. ^ Budge, Queen of Sheba, Kebra Negast, chap. 61.
  40. ^ Weil, Shalva. 1989 Beta Israel: A House Divided. Binghamton State University of New York, Binghamton, New York.
  41. ^ The complete guide to the Bible by Stephan M. Miller, p. 175
  42. ^ Taddesse Tamrat, Church and State in Ethiopia: 1270–1527 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972), pp. 38–39
  43. ^ Knud Tage Andersen, "The Queen of Habasha in Ethiopian History, Tradition and Chronology", Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 63, No. 1 (2000), p. 20.
  44. ^ Wolf Leslau, "Introduction", to his Falasha Anthology, Translated from Ethiopic Sources (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1951), p. xliii. Also see Steven Kaplan, "A Brief History of the Beta Israel", in The Jews of Ethiopia: A People in Transition (Tel Aviv and New York: Beth Hatefutsoth and The Jewish Museum, 1986), p. 11.
  45. ^ This helped persuade rabbinic authorities of the day regarding the validity of his practices, even if they differed from their own traditional teachings. On this, also see the remarkable testimony of Hasdai ibn Shaprut, the Torah scholar and princely Jew of Cordoba, concerning Eldad's learning, in his letter to Joseph, King of the Khazars, around 960 CE., reproduced in Franz Kobler, ed., Letters of Jews Through the Ages, Second Edition (London: East and West Library, 1953), vol. 1: p. 105.
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Further reading

General

  • Michael Corinaldi, Jewish identity: the case of Ethiopian Jewry, Magnes Press, 1998, ISBN 9652239933
  • Daniel Frieilmann, "The Case of the Falas Mura" in Tudor Parfitt & Emanuela Trevisan Semi (Editors), The Beta Israel in Ethiopia and Israel: Studies on Ethiopian Jews, Routledge, 1999, ISBN 9780700710928
  • Steven Kaplan & Shoshana Ben-Dor (1988). Ethiopian Jewry: An Annotated Bibliography. Ben-Zvi Institute.
  • Don Seeman, One People, One Blood: Ethiopian-Israelis and the Return to Judaism, Rutgers University Press, 2010, ISBN 9780813549361

Early accounts

History

  • Abbink, Jon (1990). "The Enigma of Esra'el Ethnogenesis: An Anthro-Historical Study". Cahiers d'Etudes africaines, 120, XXX-4, pp. 393–449.
  • Avner, Yossi (1986). The Jews of Ethiopia: A People in Transition. Beth Hatefutsoth. ISBN 0-87334-039-6
  • Salo Wittmayer Baron (1983). A Social and Religious History of the Jews. Volume XVIII. ISBN 0-231-08855-8
  • Budge, E. A. Wallis (1932). The Queen of Sheba and her only son Menelik, London.
  • Herman, Marilyn. "Relating Bet Israel history in its Ethiopian context: Defining, Creating, Constructing Identity". Review article of Quirin (1992) and Kaplan (1992). "Journal of the Anthropological Society of Oxford". Hilary 1996. 27:1. 47–59
  • Hess, Robert L. (1969). "Toward a History of the Falasha". Eastern African history. Praeger.
  • Isaac, Ephraim (1974). The Falasha: Black Jews of Ethiopia. Dillard University Scholar Statesman Lecture Series.
  • Jankowski, Alice (1987). Die Königin von Saba und Salomo, Hamburg, H. Buske Vlg.
  • Steven Kaplan (1987), "The Beta Israel (Falasha) Encounter with Protestant Missionaries: 1860-1905", Jewish Social Studies 49 (1), pp. 27–42
  • Kaplan, Steven (1995). The Beta Israel (Falasha) in Ethiopia: From Earliest Times to the Twentieth Century. New York University Press. ISBN 0-8147-4664-0
  • Kessler, David (1985). The Falashas: the Forgotten Jews of Ethiopia. Schocken Books. ISBN 0-8052-0791-0
  • Kessler, David (1996). The Falashas: a short history of the Ethiopian Jews. Frank Cass. ISBN 0-7146-4646-6
  • Marcus, Louis (1829). "Notice sur l'époque de l'établissement des Juifs dans l'Abyssinie". Journal Asiatique, 3.
  • Messing, Simon D. (1982). The Story of the Falashas "Black Jews of Ethiopia". Brooklyn. ISBN 0-9615946-9-1
  • Eric Payne (1972), Ethiopian Jews: the story of a mission, Olive Press.
  • Rapoport, Louis (1980). The Lost Jews: Last of the Ethiopian Falashas. Stein and Day. ISBN 0-8128-2720-1
  • Quirin, James A. (1992). The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews: a History of the Beta Israel (Falasha) to 1920. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 0-8122-3116-3
  • Don Seeman, "The Question of Kinship: Bodies and Narratives in the Beta Israel-European Encounter (1860-1920)", Journal of Religion in Africa, Vol. 30, Fasc. 1 (Feb., 2000), pp. 86–120
  • Shapiro, Mark (1987). "The Falasha of Ethiopia". The World and I. Washington Times Corp.
  • Weil, Shalva (2008) 'Jews in Ethiopia', in M.A. Erlich (ed.) Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora, Santa Barbara, CA: ABC CLIO, 2: 467–475.
  • Weil, Shalva (2011) 'Ethiopian Jews' (165–166) in Judith Baskin (ed.) Cambridge Dictionary of Judaism and Jewish Culture, New York: Cambridge University Press

Religion

  • Jeffrey Lewis Halper (1966). The Falashas: An Analysis of Their History, Religion and Transitional Society. University of Minnesota. 1966
  • Kay Kaufman Shelemay (1989). Music, Ritual, and Falasha History . Michigan State University Press. ISBN 0-87013-274-1
  • Michael Corinaldi (1988). Jewish Identity: The Case of Ethiopian Jewry. The Magnes Press. ISBN 965-223-993-3
  • Menahem Valdman (1985). The Jews of Ethiopia: the Beta Israel community. Ami-Shav.
  • Wolf Leslau (1951). Falasha Anthology. Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-03927-1
  • Menachem Elon (1987). The Ethiopian Jews : a case study in the functioning of the Jewish legal system. New York University
  • Steven Kaplan (1988). "Falasha religion: ancient Judaism or evolving Ethiopian tradition?". Jewish Quarterly Review LXXXIX. Center for Advanced Judaic Studies, University of Pennsylvania.
  • Emanuela Trevisan Semi, "The Conversion of the Beta Israel in Ethiopia: A Reversible "Rite of Passage"", Journal of Modern Jewish Studies 1 (1), 2002, pp. 90–103
  • Edward Ullendorff (1968). Ethiopia and the Bible. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-726076-4

Aliyah

  • Jerry L. Weaver and Howard M. Lenhoff (2007). Black Jews, Jews, and Other Heroes: How Grassroots Activism Led to the Rescue of the Ethiopian Jews. Gefen Publishing House Ltd. ISBN 978-965-229-365-7
  • Tudor Parfitt (1986). Operation Moses: the untold story of the secret exodus of the Falasha Jews from Ethiopia. Stein and Day. ISBN 0-8128-3059-8
  • Claire Safran (1987). Secret exodus: the story of Operation Moses. Reader's Digest.
  • Stephen Spector (2005). Operation Solomon: The Daring Rescue of the Ethiopian Jews. Oxford University Press US. ISBN 0-19-517782-7
  • Shmuel Yilma (1996). From Falasha to Freedom: An Ethiopian Jew's Journey to Jerusalem. Gefen Publishing. House. ISBN 965-229-169-2
  • Alisa Poskanzer (2000). Ethiopian exodus: a practice journal. Gefen Publishing House. ISBN 965-229-217-6
  • Baruch Meiri (2001). The Dream Behind Bars: the Story of the Prisoners of Zion from Ethiopia. Gefen Publishing House. ISBN 965-229-221-4
  • Asher Naim (2003). Saving the lost tribe: the rescue and redemption of the Ethiopian Jews. Ballantine Books. ISBN 0-345-45081-7
  • Micha Odenheimer& Ricki Rosen (2006). Transformations: From Ethiopia to Israel. Reality Check Productions. ISBN 965-229-377-6
  • Gad Shimron (2007). Mossad Exodus: The Daring Undercover Rescue of the Lost Jewish Tribe. Gefen Publishing House. ISBN 965-229-403-9
  • Gadi Ben-Ezer (2002). The Ethiopian Jewish exodus: narratives of the migration journey to Israel, 1977–1985. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-27363-3
  • Weil, Shalva 2012 "Longing for Jerusalem Among the Beta Israel of Ethiopia", in Edith Bruder and Tudor Parfitt (eds.) African Zion: Studies in Black Judaism, Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp. 204–17.

Society

  • Marilyn Herman (2012). "Gondar's Child: Songs, Honor and Identity Among Ethiopian Jews in Israel". Red Sea Press. ISBN 1-56902-328-X
  • Hagar Salamon (1999). The Hyena People: Ethiopian Jews in Christian Ethiopia. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-21901-5
  • Kay Kaufman Shelemay & Steven Kaplan (2010). "Creating the Ethiopian Diaspora". Special issue of Diaspora – A Journal of Transnational Studies.
  • Daniel Summerfield (2003). From Falashas to Ethiopian Jews: the external influences for change c. 1860–1960. Routledge. ISBN 0-7007-1218-6
  • Esther Hertzog (1999). Immigrants and bureaucrats: Ethiopians in an Israeli absorption center. Berghahn Books. ISBN 1-57181-941-X
  • Ruth Karola Westheimer & Steven Kaplan (1992). Surviving salvation: the Ethiopian Jewish family in transition. NYU Press. ISBN 0-8147-9253-7
  • Tanya Schwarz (2001). Ethiopian Jewish immigrants in Israel: the homeland postponed. Routledge. ISBN 0-7007-1238-0
  • Girma Berhanu (2001). Learning In Context: An Ethnographic Investigation of Meditated Learning Experiences Among Ethiopian Jews in Israel. Goteborg University Press. ISBN 91-7346-411-2
  • Teshome G. Wagaw (1993). For our soul: Ethiopian Jews in Israel. Wayne State University Press. ISBN 0-8143-2458-4
  • Michael Ashkenazi & Alex Weingrod (1987). Ethiopian Jews and Israel. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 0-88738-133-2
  • Tudor Parfitt & Emanuela Trevisan Semi (1999). The Beta Israel in Ethiopia and Israel: studies on Ethiopian Jews. Routledge. ISBN 0-7007-1092-2
  • Tudor Parfitt & Emanuela Trevisan Semi (2005). Jews of Ethiopia: the birth of an elite. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-31838-6
  • Emanuela Trevisan Semi & Shalva Weil (2011). Beta Israel: the Jews of Ethiopia and beyond History, Identity and Borders. Libreria Editrice Cafoscarina. ISBN 978-88-7543-286-7
  • Weil, Shalva 2012 'I am a teacher and beautiful: the feminization of the teaching profession in the Ethiopian community in Israel', in Pnina Morag- Talmon and Yael Atzmon (eds) Immigrant Women in Israeli Society, Jerusalem: Bialik Institute, pp. 207–23. (Hebrew)

Other reading

  • Jewish Encyclopedia

External links

 
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Beta Israel.
 
Wikisource has the text of the 1905 New International Encyclopedia article "Falashas".
  • Ethiopian in the Net
  • Israel Association for Ethiopian Jews
  • Chassida Shmella – Ethiopian Jewish Community of North America
  • Jewish Agency for Israel

January 03, 2023
beta, israel, confused, with, bene, israel, jews, from, india, hebrew, ית, bēteʾ, yīsrāʾēl, ቤተ, እስራኤል, beta, ʾəsrāʾel, modern, bēte, isrā, betä, Ǝsraʾel, house, israel, community, israel, also, known, ethiopian, jews, hebrew, הו, יו, yehudey, etyopyah, የኢትዮጵያ,. Not to be confused with Bene Israel Jews from India The Beta Israel Hebrew ב ית א י ש ר א ל Beteʾ Yisraʾel Ge ez ቤተ እስራኤል Beta ʾEsraʾel modern Bete Isra el EAE Beta Ǝsraʾel House of Israel or Community of Israel 5 also known as Ethiopian Jews Hebrew י הו ד י א ת יו פ י ה Yehudey Etyopyah Ge ez የኢትዮጵያ አይሁድዊ ye Ityoppya Ayhudi are a Jewish community that developed and lived for centuries in the area of the Kingdom of Aksum and the Ethiopian Empire which is currently divided between the modern day Amhara and Tigray regions of Ethiopia Most of the Beta Israel community immigrated to Israel in the late 20th century 6 Beta Israel ביתא ישראל ቤተ እስራኤል Ethiopian Jews י הו ד י א ת יו פ י ה የኢትዮጵያ ይሁዲዎችTotal population172 000Regions with significant populations Israel 160 500 end of 2021 1 1 75 of the Israeli population 2 3 of Israeli Jews Ethiopia12 000 2021 2 United States1 000 2008 3 LanguagesHistorical Jewish languages Kayla QwaraLiturgical languages Ge ez Hebrew before 17th century Lingua franca Amharic Tigrinya HebrewReligionJudaism Haymanot Rabbinism Christianity Ethiopian Orthodox see Falash Mura and Beta Abraham Related ethnic groupsJews and other Semitic speakers 4 This article contains Ethiopic text Without proper rendering support you may see question marks boxes or other symbols instead of Ethiopic characters The Beta Israel lived in northern and northwestern Ethiopia in more than 500 small villages which were spread over a wide territory alongside populations that were Muslim and predominantly Christian 7 Most of them were concentrated mainly on what are today North Gondar Zone Shire Inda Selassie Wolqayit Tselemti Dembia Segelt Quara and Belesa They practice a non Talmudic form of Judaism that is similar in some respects to Karaite Judaism In Israel this form of Judaism is referred to as Haymanot Beta Israel appear to have been isolated from mainstream Jewish communities for at least a millennium They suffered religious persecution and a significant portion of the community were forced into Christianity during the 19th and 20th centuries those converted to Christianity came to be known as the Falash Mura The larger Beta Abraham Christian community is also considered to have historical links to the Beta Israel The Beta Israel made contact with other Jewish communities in the later 20th century Following this a rabbinic debate ensued over whether or not the Beta Israel were Jews After halakhic Jewish law and constitutional discussions Israeli officials decided in 1977 that the Israeli Law of Return was to be applied to the Beta Israel 8 9 The Israeli and American governments mounted aliyah immigration to Israel transport operations 10 11 These activities included Operation Brothers in Sudan between 1979 and 1990 this includes the major Operation Moses and Operation Joshua and in the 1990s from Addis Ababa which includes Operation Solomon 12 13 By the end of 2008 there were 119 300 people of Ethiopian descent in Israel including nearly 81 000 people born in Ethiopia and about 38 500 native born Israelis about 32 percent of the community with at least one parent born in Ethiopia or Eritrea formerly part of Ethiopia 14 At the end of 2019 there were 155 300 people of Ethiopian descent in Israel Approximately 87 500 were born in Ethiopia and 67 800 were Israeli born with fathers born in Ethiopia 1 The Ethiopian Jewish community in Israel is mostly composed of Beta Israel practicing both Haymanot and Rabbinic Judaism and to a smaller extent of Falash Mura who converted from Christianity to Rabbinic Judaism upon their arrival to Israel Contents 1 Terminology 2 Religion 2 1 Texts 2 2 Prayer houses 2 3 Dietary laws 2 4 Calendar and holidays 3 Culture 3 1 Languages 4 Origins 4 1 Oral traditions 4 1 1 Companions of Menelik from Jerusalem 4 1 2 Migrants by the Egyptian route 4 2 Ethiopian national myth 4 3 Tribe of Dan 4 4 Rabbinic views 4 5 Genetics 4 5 1 Uniparental lineages 4 5 2 Autosomal ancestry 4 6 Scholarly views 4 6 1 Early views 4 6 2 1980s and early 1990s 4 6 3 Recent views 5 History 6 Immigration to Israel 6 1 Beta Israel Exodus 6 2 Emigration via Addis Ababa 6 3 The difficulties of the Falash Mura in immigrating to Israel 7 Population 7 1 Ethiopian Jews in Israel 7 2 Converts 7 2 1 Falash Mura 7 2 2 Beta Abraham 7 3 Slaves 8 In popular culture 8 1 Monuments 8 2 Ethiopian Heritage Museum 8 3 Cafe Shahor Hazak 9 Falash Mura 9 1 Terminology 9 2 History 9 3 Conversion to Christianity 9 4 Return to Judaism 9 5 Aliyah to Israel 9 6 Controversy 10 Notable Beta Israelis 11 Affiliated groups 12 See also 13 References 14 Further reading 14 1 Other reading 15 External linksTerminology Edit Raphael Hadane the Liqa Kahenat High priest of Beta Israel in Israel Throughout its history the community has been referred to by numerous names According to late tradition the Beta Israel literally house of Israel in Ge ez had their origins in the 4th century CE when it is claimed that the community refused to convert to Christianity during the rule of Abreha and Atsbeha identified with Se azana and Ezana the monarchs of the Kingdom of Aksum who embraced Christianity 15 This name contrasts with Beta Kristiyan literally house of Christianity meaning church in Ge ez 16 17 Originally it did not have any negative connotations 18 and the community has since used Beta Israel as its official name Since the 1980s it has also become the official name used in the scholarly and scientific literature to refer to the community 19 The term Esra elawi Israelites which is related to the name Beta Israel is also used by the community to refer to its members 19 The name Ayhud Jews is rarely used in the community as the Christians had used it as a derogatory term 18 The community has begun to use it only since strengthening ties with other Jewish communities in the 20th century 19 The term Ibrawi Hebrew was used to refer to the chawa free man in the community in contrast to barya slave 20 The term Oritawi Torah true was used to refer to the community members since the 19th century it has been used in opposition to the term Falash Mura converts The derogatory term Falasha which means landless wanderers associated with monks was given to the community in the 15th century by the Emperor Yeshaq I and today its use is avoided because its meaning is offensive Zagwe referring to the Agaw people of the Zagwe dynasty among the original inhabitants of northwest Ethiopia is considered derogatory since it incorrectly associates the community with the largely pagan Agaw 19 Religion EditMain article Haymanot Beta Israel women in Israel Haymanot Ge ez ሃይማኖት is the colloquial term for faith which is also used as a term for the Jewish religion by the Beta Israel community 21 and Ethiopian Orthodox Christians also use it as a term for their own religion Texts Edit Maṣḥafa Kedus Holy Scriptures is the name for their religious literature The language of the writings is Geʽez which also is the liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church The holiest book is the Orit meaning law or Octateuch the Five Books of Moses plus Joshua Judges and Ruth The rest of the Bible has secondary importance They possess the Book of Lamentations from the traditional Hebrew canon and part of the Book of Jeremiah as in the Orthodox Tewahedo biblical canon Deuterocanonical books that also make up part of the canon are Sirach Judith Esdras 1 and 2 Meqabyan Jubilees Baruch 1 and 4 Tobit Enoch and the testaments of Abraham Isaac and Jacob Many of these books differ substantially from the similarly numbered and named texts in Koine Greek and Hebrew such as Maccabbees though some of the Ge ez works are clearly dependent on those texts Others appear to have other ancient literary and oral origins All of the texts are also used by the Orthodox Christian population as well though with varying levels of importance between the communities Important non Biblical writings include Nagara Muse The Conversation of Moses Mota Aaron Death of Aaron Mota Muse Death of Moses Te ezaza Sanbat Precepts of the Sabbath Arde et Students Gorgorios Maṣḥafa Sa atat Book of Hours Abba Elias Father Elijah Maṣḥafa Mala ekt Book of Angels Maṣḥafa Kahan Book of the Priest Dersana Abreham Wasara Bagabs Homily on Abraham and Sarah in Egypt Gadla Sosna The Acts of Susanna and Baqadami Gabra Egzi abḥer In the Beginning God Created Zena Ayhud and Falasfa Philosophers are two books that are not considered sacred but have had great influence Prayer houses Edit Main article Synagogue Synagogue in the village of Wolleka in Ethiopia Modern Synagogue in the city of Netivot in Israel The synagogue is called the masgid place of worship it is also called the bet maqdas Holy house or the ṣalot bet Prayer house Dietary laws Edit Main article Kashrut Beta Israel kashrut law is based mainly on the books of Leviticus Deuteronomy and Jubilees Permitted and forbidden animals and their signs appear in Leviticus 11 3 8 and Deuteronomy 14 4 8 Forbidden birds are listed in Leviticus 11 13 23 and Deuteronomy 14 12 20 Signs of permitted fish are written on Leviticus 11 9 12 and Deuteronomy 14 9 10 Insects and larvae are forbidden according to Leviticus 11 41 42 Gid hanasheh is forbidden per Genesis 32 33 Mixtures of milk and meat are not prepared or eaten but are not banned either Haymanot interpreted the verses Exodus 23 19 Exodus 34 26 and Deuteronomy 14 21 shalt not seethe a kid in its mother s milk literally as in Karaite Judaism whereas under Rabbinic Judaism mixing dairy products with meat is banned Ethiopian Jews were forbidden to eat the food of non Jews A Kahen eats only meat he has slaughtered himself which his hosts prepare both for him and themselves Beta Israel who broke these taboos were ostracized and had to undergo a purification process Purification included fasting for one or more days eating only uncooked chickpeas provided by the Kahen and ritual purification before entering the village Unlike other Ethiopians the Beta Israel do not eat raw meat dishes such as kitfo or gored gored 22 Calendar and holidays Edit The Beta Israel calendar is a lunar calendar of 12 months each 29 or 30 days alternately Every four years there is a leap year which adds a full month 30 days The calendar is a combination of the ancient calendar of Alexandrian Jewry Book of Jubilees Book of Enoch Abu Shaker and the Ge ez calendar 23 24 The years are counted according to the counting of Kushta 1571 to Jesus Christ 7071 to the Gyptians and 6642 to the Hebrews 25 according to this counting the year 5771 Hebrew ה תשע א in the Rabbinical Hebrew calendar is the year 7082 in this calendar Holidays in the Haymanot religion 26 are divided into daily monthly and annually The annual holidays by month are A Kes celebrating the holiday of Sigd in Jerusalem 2008 Nisan ba al lisan Nisan holiday New Year on 1 ṣoma fasika Passover fast on 14 fasika Passover between 15 21 and gadfat grow fat or buho fermented dough on 22 Iyar another fasika Second Passover Pesach Sheni between 15 21 Sivan ṣoma ma rar Harvest fast on 11 and ma rar Harvest Shavuot on 12 Tammuz ṣoma tomos Tammuz fast between 1 10 Av ṣoma ab Av fast between 1 17 Seventh Sabbath fixed as the fourth Sabbath of the fifth month 27 Elul awd amet Year rotate on 1 ṣoma lul Elul fast between 1 9 anakel astar i our atonement on 10 and asartu wasamantu eighteenth on 28 Tishrei ba al Matqe blowing holiday Zikhron Trua on 1 astasreyo Day of Atonement Yom Kippur on 10 and ba ala maṣallat Tabernacles holiday Sukkot between 15 21 Cheshvan holiday for the day Moses saw the face of God on 1 holiday for the reception of Moses by the Israelites on 10 fast on 12 and mehlella Supplication Sigd on 29 Kislev another ṣoma ma rar and ma rar on 11 and 12 respectively Tevet ṣoma tibt Tevet fast between 1 10 Shevat wamashi brobu on 1 Adar ṣoma aster Fast of Esther Ta anit Ester between 11 13 Monthly holidays are mainly memorial days to the annual holiday these are yacaraqa ba al new moon festival 28 on the first day of every month asart ten on the tenth day to commemorate Yom Kippur asra hulat twelve on the twelfth day to commemorate Shavuot asra ammest fifteen on the fifteenth day to commemorate Passover and Sukkot and ṣoma maleya a fast on the last day of every month 29 Daily holidays include the ṣoma sanno Monday fast ṣoma amus Thursday fast ṣoma arb Friday fast and the very holy Sanbat Sabbath Culture EditMain article Habesha peoples Culture Languages Edit The Beta Israel once spoke Qwara and Kayla both of which are Agaw languages Now they speak Tigrinya and Amharic both Semitic languages Their liturgical language is Geʽez also Semitic 30 31 Since the 1950s they have taught Hebrew in their schools Those Beta Israel residing in the State of Israel now use Modern Hebrew as a daily language Origins EditOral traditions Edit Contemporary scholars believe that the Beta Israel emerged comparatively recently and formed a distinct ethonational group in the context of historical pressures that came to a head from the 14th to the 16th centuries 32 Many of the Beta Israel s accounts of their own origins state that they stem from the very ancient migration of some portion of the Tribe of Dan to Ethiopia were led by the sons of Moses perhaps at the time of the Exodus Alternative timelines include the later crises in Judea e g the split of the northern Kingdom of Israel from the southern Kingdom of Judah after the death of King Solomon or the Babylonian Exile 33 Other Beta Israel take as their basis the Christian account of Menelik s return to Ethiopia 34 Menelik is considered the first Solomonic Emperor of Ethiopia and is traditionally believed to be the son of King Solomon of ancient Israel and Makeda ancient Queen of Sheba in modern Ethiopia Though all the available traditions 35 correspond to recent interpretations they reflect ancient convictions According to Jon Abbink three different versions are to be distinguished among the traditions which were recorded by the priests of the community 36 Companions of Menelik from Jerusalem Edit According to one account the Beta Israel originated in the kingdom of Israel and they were the contemporaries rather than the descendants of King Solomon and Menelik 37 Migrants by the Egyptian route Edit According to another account the forefathers of the Beta Israel are supposed to have arrived in Ethiopia by coming from the North independently from Menelik and his company The Falashas sic migrated like many of the other sons of Israel to exile in Egypt after the destruction of the First Temple by the Babylonians in 586 BCE the time of the Babylonian exile This group of people was led by the great priest On They remained in exile in Egypt for a few hundred years until the reign of Cleopatra When she was engaged in a war against Augustus Caesar the Jews supported her When she was defeated it became dangerous for the small minorities to remain in Egypt so there was another migration between approximately 39 31 BCE Some of the migrants went to South Arabia and settled in Yemen Some of them went to Sudan and continued to migrate until they reached Ethiopia where they were helped by Egyptian traders who guided them through the desert Some of them entered Ethiopia through Quara near the Sudanese border and some of them came via Eritrea citation needed Later in time there was an Abyssinian king named Kaleb who wished to enlarge his kingdom so he declared war on the Yemen and conquered it And as a result another group of Jews led by Azonos and Phinhas arrived in Ethiopia during his reign 38 413 414 Ethiopian national myth Edit The Ethiopian history described in the Kebra Nagast relates that Ethiopians are descendants of Israelite tribes who came to Ethiopia with Menelik I alleged to be the son of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba or Makeda in the legend see 1 Kings 10 1 13 and 2 Chronicles 9 1 12 The legend relates that Menelik as an adult returned to his father in Jerusalem and later resettled in Ethiopia He took with him the Ark of the Covenant 39 40 In the Bible there is no mention that the Queen of Sheba either married or had any sexual relations with King Solomon although some identify her with the black and beautiful in Song of Songs 1 5 41 Rather the narrative records that she was impressed with Solomon s wealth and wisdom and they exchanged royal gifts and then she returned to rule her people in Kush However the royal gifts are interpreted by some as sexual contact The loss of the Ark is not mentioned in the Bible Hezekiah later makes reference to the Ark in 2 Kings 19 15 The Kebra Negast asserts that the Beta Israel are descended from a battalion of men of Judah who fled southward down the Arabian coastal lands from Judea after the breakup of the Kingdom of Israel into two kingdoms in the 10th century BCE while King Rehoboam reigned over Judah Although the Kebra Nagast and some traditional Ethiopian histories have stated that Gudit or Yudit Judith another name given her was Esato Esther a 10th century usurping queen was Jewish some scholars consider that it is unlikely that this was the case It is more likely they say that she was a pagan southerner 42 or a usurping Christian Aksumite Queen 43 However she clearly supported Jews since she founded the Zagwe dynasty who governed from around 937 to 1270 CE According to the Kebra Nagast Jewish Christian and pagan kings ruled in harmony at that time Furthermore the Zagwe dynasty claimed legitimacy according to the Kebra Nagast by saying it was descended from Moses and his Ethiopian wife citation needed Most of the Beta Israel consider the Kebra Negast to be legend As its name expresses Glory of Kings meaning the Christian Aksumite kings it was written in the 14th century in large part to delegitimize the Zagwe dynasty to promote instead a rival Solomonic claim to authentic Jewish Ethiopian antecedents and to justify the Christian overthrow of the Zagwe by the Solomonic Aksumite dynasty whose rulers are glorified The writing of this polemic shows that criticisms of the Aksumite claims of authenticity were current in the 14th century two centuries after they came to power Many Beta Israel believe that they are descended from the tribe of Dan 44 Most reject the Solomonic and Queen of Sheba legends of the Aksumites citation needed Tribe of Dan Edit To prove the antiquity and authenticity of their claims the Beta Israel cite the 9th century CE testimony of Eldad ha Dani the Danite from a time before the Zagwean dynasty was established Eldad was a Jewish man of dark skin who appeared in Egypt and created a stir in that Jewish community and elsewhere in the Mediterranean Jewish communities he visited with claims that he had come from a Jewish kingdom of pastoralists far to the south The only language Eldad spoke was a hitherto unknown dialect of Hebrew Although he strictly followed the Mosaic commandments his observance differed in some details from Rabbinic halakhah Some observers thought that he might be a Karaite although his practice also differed from theirs He carried Hebrew books that supported his explanations of halakhah He cited ancient authorities in the scholarly traditions of his own people 45 Eldad said that the Jews of his own kingdom descended from the tribe of Dan which included the Biblical war hero Samson who had fled the civil war in the Kingdom of Israel between Solomon s son Rehoboam and Jeroboam the son of Nebat and resettled in Egypt From there they moved southwards up the Nile into Ethiopia The Beta Israel say this confirms that they are descended from these Danites 46 Some Beta Israel however assert that their Danite origins go back to the time of Moses when some Danites parted from other Jews right after the Exodus and moved south to Ethiopia Eldad the Danite speaks of at least three waves of Jewish immigration into his region creating other Jewish tribes and kingdoms The earliest wave settled in a remote kingdom of the tribe of Moses this was the strongest and most secure Jewish kingdom of all with farming villages cities and great wealth 47 Other Ethiopian Jews who appeared in the Mediterranean world over the succeeding centuries and persuaded rabbinic authorities there that they were of Jewish descent and so could if slaves be ransomed by Jewish communities join synagogues marry other Jews etc also referred to the Mosaic and Danite origins of Ethiopian Jewry 48 The Mosaic claims of the Beta Israel in any case like those of the Zagwe dynasty are ancient 49 Other sources tell of many Jews who were brought as prisoners of war from ancient Israel by Ptolemy I and settled on the border of his kingdom with Nubia Sudan Another tradition asserts that the Jews arrived either via the old district of Qwara in northwestern Ethiopia or via the Atbara River where the Nile tributaries flow into Sudan Some accounts specify the route taken by their forefathers on their way upriver to the south from Egypt 50 Rabbinic views Edit Public appeal of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel to save the Jews of Ethiopia 1921 signed by Abraham Isaac Kook and Jacob Meir As mentioned above the 9th century Jewish traveler Eldad ha Dani claimed he descended from the tribe of Dan He also reported other Jewish kingdoms around his own or in East Africa during this time His writings probably represent the first mention of the Beta Israel in Rabbinic literature Despite some skeptical critics his authenticity has been generally accepted in current scholarship His descriptions were consistent and even the originally doubtful rabbis of his time were finally persuaded 51 Specific details may be uncertain one critic has noted Eldad s lack of detailed reference to Ethiopia s geography and any Ethiopian language although he claimed the area as his homeland 52 Eldad s was not the only medieval testimony about Jewish communities living far to the south of Egypt which strengthens the credibility of his account Obadiah ben Abraham Bartenura wrote in a letter from Jerusalem in 1488 I myself saw two of them in Egypt They are dark skinned and one could not tell whether they keep the teaching of the Karaites or of the Rabbis for some of their practices resemble the Karaite teaching but in other things they appear to follow the instruction of the Rabbis and they say they are related to the tribe of Dan 53 Rabbi David ibn Zimra of Egypt 1479 1573 writing similarly held the Ethiopian Jewish community to be similar in many ways to the Karaites writing of them on this wise Lo the matter is well known that there are perpetual wars between the kings of Kush which has three kingdoms part of which belonging to the Ishmaelites and part of which to the Christians and part of which to the Israelites from the tribe of Dan In all likelihood they are from the sect of Sadok and Boethus who are now called Karaites since they know only a few of the biblical commandments but are unfamiliar with the Oral Law nor do they light the Sabbath candle War ceases not from amongst them and every day they take captives from one another 54 In the same responsum he concludes that if the Ethiopian Jewish community wished to return to rabbinic Judaism they would be received and welcomed into the fold just as the Karaites who returned to the teachings of the Rabbanites in the time of Rabbi Abraham ben Maimonides Reflecting the consistent assertions made by Ethiopian Jews they dealt with or knew of and after due investigation of their claims and their own Jewish behaviour a number of Jewish legal authorities in previous centuries and in modern times have ruled halakhically according to Jewish legal code that the Beta Israel are indeed Jews the descendants of the tribe of Dan one of the Ten Lost Tribes 55 They believe that these people established a Jewish kingdom that lasted for hundreds of years With the rise of Christianity and later Islam schisms arose and three kingdoms competed Eventually the Christian and Muslim Ethiopian kingdoms reduced the Jewish kingdom to a small impoverished section The earliest authority to rule this way was the 16th century scholar David ibn Zimra Radbaz who explained elsewhere in a responsum concerning the status of a Beta Israel slave But those Jews who come from the land of Cush are without doubt from the tribe of Dan and since they did not have in their midst sages who were masters of the tradition they clung to the simple meaning of the Scriptures If they had been taught however they would not be irreverent towards the words of our sages so their status is comparable to a Jewish infant taken captive by non Jews And even if you say that the matter is in doubt it is a commandment to redeem them 56 In 1973 Ovadia Yosef the Sephardi chief rabbi of Israel ruled based on the writings of David ben Solomon ibn Abi Zimra and other accounts that the Beta Israel were Jews and should be brought to Israel Two years later this opinion was confirmed by a number of other authorities who made similar rulings including the Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel Shlomo Goren 9 In 1977 the law was passed granting the right of return 8 Some notable poskim religious law authorities from non Zionist Ashkenazi circles placed a safek legal doubt over the Jewish peoplehood of the Beta Israel Such dissenting voices include Rabbi Elazar Shach Rabbi Yosef Shalom Eliashiv Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach and Rabbi Moshe Feinstein 57 58 Similar doubts were raised within the same circles towards the Bene Israel 59 and to Russian immigrants to Israel during the 1990s Post Soviet aliyah In the 1970s and early 1980s the Beta Israel were required to undergo a modified conversion ceremony involving immersion in a mikveh ritual bath a declaration accepting Rabbinic law and for men a hatafat dam brit symbolic recircumcision 60 Avraham Shapira later waived the hatafat dam brit stipulation which is only a requirement when the halakhic doubt is significant 61 More recently Shlomo Amar has ruled that descendants of Ethiopian Jews who were forced to convert to Christianity are unquestionably Jews in every respect 62 63 With the consent of Ovadia Yosef Amar ruled that it is forbidden to question the Jewishness of this community pejoratively called Falash Mura in reference to their having converted 64 65 Genetics Edit Further information Genetic studies on Jews A number of DNA studies have been done on the Beta Israel 66 Uniparental lineages Edit Genealogical DNA testing allows research into paternal meaning only through fathers and maternal meaning only through mothers ancestry According to Cruciani et al 2002 haplogroup A is the most common paternal lineage among Ethiopian Jews The clade is carried by around 41 of Beta Israel males and is primarily associated with Nilo Saharan and Khoisan speaking populations However the A branches carried by Ethiopians Jews are principally of the A Y23865 variety which formed about 10 000 years ago and is localized to the Ethiopian highlands and the Arabian peninsula 67 68 The difference with the Khoisan is 54 000 years 69 Additionally around 18 of Ethiopian Jews are bearers of E P2 xM35 xM2 in Ethiopia most of such lineages belong to E M329 which has been found in ancient DNA isolated from a 4 500 year old Ethiopian fossil 70 71 72 Such haplotypes are frequent in Southwestern Ethiopia especially among Omotic speaking populations 73 74 The rest of the Beta Israel mainly belong to haplotypes linked with the E M35 and J M267 haplogroups which are more commonly associated with Cushitic and Semitic speaking populations in Northeast Africa Further analysis show that the E M35 carried by Ethiopian Jews is primarily indigenous to the Horn of Africa rather than being of Levantine origin 67 75 Altogether this suggests that Ethiopian Jews have diverse patrilineages indicative of indigenous Northeast African not Middle Eastern origin 76 A 2011 mitochondrial DNA study focused on maternal ancestry sampling 41 Beta Israel found them to carry 51 2 macro haplogroup L typically found in Africa The remainder consisted of Eurasian origin lineages such as 22 R0 19 5 M1 5 W and 2 5 U 77 However no identical haplotypes were shared between the Yemenite and Ethiopian Jewish populations suggesting very little gene flow between the populations and potentially distinct maternal population histories 77 The maternal ancestral profile of the Beta Israel is similar to those of highland Ethiopian populations 78 74 Autosomal ancestry Edit The Ethiopian Jews autosomal DNA has been examined in a comprehensive study by Tishkoff et al 2009 on the genetic affiliations of various populations in Africa According to Bayesian clustering analysis the Beta Israel generally grouped with other Cushitic and Ethiosemitic speaking populations inhabiting the Horn of Africa 79 A 2010 study by Behar et al on the genome wide structure of Jews observed that Ethiopian Jews Beta Israel and Indian Jews Bene Israel and Cochini cluster with neighbouring autochthonous populations in Ethiopia and western India respectively despite a clear paternal link between the Bene Israel and the Levant These results cast light on the variegated genetic architecture of the Middle East and trace the origins of most Jewish Diaspora communities to the Levant 80 The Beta Israel are autosomally closer to other populations from the Horn of Africa than to any other Jewish population including Yemenite Jews 79 80 A 2012 study by Ostrer et al concluded that the Ethiopian Jewish community was founded about 2000 years ago probably by only a relatively small number of Jews from elsewhere with local people joining to the community causing Beta Israel to become genetically distant from other Jewish groups 81 According to a 2020 study by Agranat Tamir et al the DNA of the Ethiopian Jews is mostly of East African origin but about 20 of their genetic makeup is of Middle Eastern semitic people origin and shows similarity to modern Jewish and Arab populations and Bronze Age Canaanites 82 83 Scholarly views Edit Early views Edit Early secular scholars considered the Beta Israel to be the direct descendant of Jews who lived in ancient Ethiopia whether they were the descendants of an Israelite tribe or converted by Jews living in Yemen or by the Jewish community in southern Egypt at Elephantine 84 In 1829 Marcus Louis wrote that the ancestors of the Beta Israel related to the Asmach which were also called Sembritae foreigners an Egyptian regiment numbering 240 000 soldiers and mentioned by Greek geographers and historians The Asmach emigrated or were exiled from Elephantine to Kush in the time of Psamtik I or Psamtik II and settled in Sennar and Abyssinia 85 It is possible that Shebna s party from Rabbinic accounts was part of the Asmach In the 1930s Jones and Monroe argued that the chief Semitic languages of Ethiopia may suggest an antiquity of Judaism in Ethiopia There still remains the curious circumstance that a number of Abyssinian words connected with religion such as the words for Hell idol Easter purification and alms are of Hebrew origin These words must have been derived directly from a Jewish source for the Abyssinian Church knows the scriptures only in a Ge ez version made from the Septuagint 86 Richard Pankhurst summarized the various theories offered about their origins as of 1950 that the first members of this community were 1 converted Agaws 2 Jewish immigrants who intermarried with Agaws 3 immigrant Yemeni Arabs who had converted to Judaism 4 immigrant Yemeni Jews 5 Jews from Egypt and 6 successive waves of Yemeni Jews Traditional Ethiopian savants on the one hand have declared that We were Jews before we were Christians while more recent well documented Ethiopian hypotheses notably by two Ethiopian scholars Dr Taddesse Tamrat and Dr Getachew Haile put much greater emphasis on the manner in which Christians over the years converted to the Falasha faith thus showing that the Falashas were culturally an Ethiopian sect made up of ethnic Ethiopians 87 1980s and early 1990s Edit According to Jacqueline Pirenne numerous Sabaeans left south Arabia and crossed over the Red Sea to Ethiopia to escape from the Assyrians who had devastated the kingdoms of Israel and Judah in the 8th and 7th centuries BCE She says that a second major wave of Sabeans crossed over to Ethiopia in the 6th and 5th centuries BCE to escape Nebuchadnezzar II This wave also included Jews fleeing from the Babylonian takeover of Judah In both cases the Sabeans are assumed to have departed later from Ethiopia to Yemen 88 According to Menachem Waldman a major wave of emigration from the Kingdom of Judah to Kush and Abyssinia dates to the Assyrian Siege of Jerusalem in the beginning of the 7th century BCE Rabbinic accounts of the siege assert that only about 110 000 Judeans remained in Jerusalem under King Hezekiah s command whereas about 130 000 Judeans led by Shebna had joined Sennacherib s campaign against Tirhakah king of Kush Sennacherib s campaign failed and Shebna s army was lost at the mountains of darkness suggestively identified with the Semien Mountains 89 In 1987 Steve Kaplan wrote Although we don t have a single fine ethnographic research on Beta Israel and the recent history of this tribe has received almost no attention by researchers every one who writes about the Jews of Ethiopia feels obliged to contribute his share to the ongoing debate about their origin Politicians and journalists Rabbis and political activists not a single one of them withstood the temptation to play the role of the historian and invent a solution for this riddle 90 Richard Pankhurst summarized the state of knowledge on the subject in 1992 as follows The early origins of the Falashas are shrouded in mystery and for lack of documentation will probably remain so for ever 87 Recent views Edit By 1994 modern scholars of Ethiopian history and Ethiopian Jews generally supported one of two conflicting hypotheses for the origin of the Beta Israel as outlined by Kaplan 91 An ancient Jewish origin together with conservation of some ancient Jewish traditions by the Ethiopian Church Kaplan identifies Simon D Messing David Shlush Michael Corinaldi Menachem Waldman Menachem Elon and David Kessler as supporters of this hypothesis 91 A late ethnogenesis of the Beta Israel between the 14th to 16th centuries from a sect of Ethiopian Christians who took on Biblical Old Testament practices and came to identify as Jews Steven Kaplan supports this hypothesis and lists with him G J Abbink Kay K Shelemay Taddesse Tamrat and James A Quirin Quirin differs from his fellow researchers in the weight he assigns to an ancient Jewish element which the Beta Israel have conserved 91 History EditMain article History of the Jews in EthiopiaImmigration to Israel EditMain article Aliyah from Ethiopia Aliyah from Ethiopia compared to the total Aliyah to Israel 92 93 Years Ethiopian bornImmigrants Total Immigration to Israel1948 51 10 687 6241952 60 59 297 1381961 71 98 427 8281972 79 306 267 5801980 89 16 965 153 8331990 99 39 651 956 3192000 04 14 859 181 5052005 09 12 586 86 8552010 1 652 16 6332011 2 666 16 8922012 2 432 16 5572013 450 16 968 Migration Map of Beta Israel Beta Israel Exodus Edit The emigration of the Beta Israel community to Israel was officially banned by the Communist Derg government of Ethiopia during the 1980s although it is now known that General Mengistu collaborated with Israel in order to receive money and arms in exchange for granting the Beta Israel safe passage during Operation Moses 94 95 Other Beta Israel sought alternative ways of immigration via Sudan or Kenya Late 1979 beginning of 1984 Aliyah activists and Mossad agents operating in Sudan including Ferede Aklum called the Jews to come to Sudan where they would eventually be taken to Israel Posing as Christian Ethiopian refugees from the Ethiopian Civil War Jews began to arrive in the refugee camps in Sudan Most Jews came from Tigray and Wolqayt regions that were controlled by the TPLF who often escorted them to the Sudanese border 96 Small groups of Jews were brought out of Sudan in a clandestine operation that continued until an Israeli newspaper exposed the operation and brought it to a halt stranding Beta Israels in the Sudanese camps In 1981 the Jewish Defense League protested the lack of action to rescue Ethiopian Jews by taking over the main offices of HIAS in Manhattan 97 1983 March 28 1985 In 1983 the governor of Gondar region Major Melaku Teferra was ousted and his successor removed restrictions on travel out of Ethiopia 98 Ethiopian Jews many by this time waiting in Addis Ababa began again to arrive in Sudan in large numbers and the Mossad had trouble evacuating them quickly Because of the poor conditions in the Sudanese camps many Ethiopian refugees both Christian and Jewish died of disease and hunger Among these victims it is estimated that between 2 000 to 5 000 were Jews 99 In late 1984 the Sudanese government following the intervention of the U S allowed the emigration of 7 200 Beta Israel refugees to Europe who then went on to Israel The first of these two immigration waves between 20 November 1984 and 20 January 1985 was dubbed Operation Moses original name The Lion of Judah s Cub and brought 6 500 Beta Israel to Israel This operation was followed by Operation Joshua also referred to as Operation Sheba a few weeks later which was conducted by the U S Air Force and brought the 494 Jewish refugees remaining in Sudan to Israel The second operation was mainly carried out due to the critical intervention and pressure from the U S Emigration via Addis Ababa Edit 1990 1991 After losing Soviet military support following the collapse of Communism in Central and Eastern Europe the Ethiopian government allowed the emigration of 6 000 Beta Israel members to Israel in small groups mostly in hope of establishing ties with the U S the allies of Israel Many more Beta Israel members crowded into refugee camps on the outskirts of Addis Ababa the capital of Ethiopia to escape the civil war raging in the north of Ethiopia their region of origin and await their turn to immigrate to Israel May 24 25 1991 Operation Solomon 13 In 1991 the political and economic stability of Ethiopia deteriorated as rebels mounted attacks against and eventually controlled the capital city of Addis Ababa Worried about the fate of the Beta Israel during the transition period the Israeli government with the help of several private groups resumed the migration Over the course of 36 hours a total of 34 El Al passenger planes with their seats removed to maximize passenger capacity flew 14 325 Beta Israel non stop to Israel Again the operation was mainly carried out due to intervention and pressure from the U S 1992 1999 During these years the Qwara Beta Israel immigrated to Israel Another 4 000 Ethiopian Jews who had failed to reach the assembly centre in Addis Ababa in time were flown to Israel in subsequent months 1997 present In 1997 an irregular emigration began of Falash Mura which was and still is mainly subject to political developments in Israel 100 2018 2020 In August 2018 the Netanyahu government vowed to bring in 1 000 Falasha Jews from Ethiopia 101 In April 2019 an estimated 8 000 Falasha were waiting to leave Ethiopia 102 On February 25 2020 43 Falasah arrived in Israel from Ethiopia 103 2021 On November 14 2021 Falasha Jews in Israel stage a protest so their relatives left behind in Ethiopia can go to Israel 104 The same day the Israeli Government decided to permit 9 000 Falasha Jews to go to Israel On November 29 2021 the Israeli Government permitted 3 000 Falasha Jews to go to Israel 105 As of 2021 1 636 Jews have gone up to Israel from Ethiopia 106 The difficulties of the Falash Mura in immigrating to Israel Edit Israeli PM Yitzhak Shamir greets new immigrants from Ethiopia 1991 In 1991 the Israeli authorities announced that the emigration of the Beta Israel to Israel was about to conclude because almost all of the community had been evacuated Nevertheless thousands of other Ethiopians began leaving the northern region to take refuge in the government controlled capital Addis Ababa who were Jewish converts to Christianity and asking to immigrate to Israel As a result a new term arose which was used to refer to this group Falash Mura The Falash Mura who weren t part of the Beta Israel communities in Ethiopia were not recognized as Jews by the Israeli authorities and were therefore not initially allowed to immigrate to Israel making them ineligible for Israeli citizenship under Israel s Law of Return As a result a lively debate has arisen in Israel about the Falash Mura mainly between the Beta Israel community in Israel and their supporters and those opposed to a potential massive emigration of the Falash Mura people The government s position on the matter remained quite restrictive but it has been subject to numerous criticisms including criticisms by some clerics who want to encourage these people s return to Judaism During the 1990s the Israeli government finally allowed most of those who fled to Addis Ababa to immigrate to Israel 107 Some did so through the Law of Return which allows an Israeli parent of a non Jew to petition for his her son or daughter to be allowed to immigrate to Israel Others were allowed to immigrate to Israel as part of a humanitarian effort The Israeli government hoped that admitting these Falash Mura would finally bring emigration from Ethiopia to a close but instead prompted a new wave of Falash Mura refugees fleeing to Addis Ababa and wishing to immigrate to Israel This led the Israeli government to harden its position on the matter in the late 1990s In February 2003 the Israeli government decided to accept Orthodox religious conversions in Ethiopia of Falash Mura by Israeli Rabbis after which they can then immigrate to Israel as Jews Although the new position is more open and although the Israeli governmental authorities and religious authorities should in theory allow emigration to Israel of most of the Falash Mura wishing to do so who are now acknowledged to be descendants of the Beta Israel community in practice however that immigration remains slow and the Israeli government continued to limit from 2003 to 2006 immigration of Falash Mura to about 300 per month citation needed In April 2005 The Jerusalem Post stated that it had conducted a survey in Ethiopia after which it was concluded that tens of thousands of Falash Mura still lived in rural northern Ethiopia citation needed On 14 November 2010 the Israeli cabinet approved a plan to allow an additional 8 000 Falash Mura to immigrate to Israel 108 109 On November 16 2015 the Israeli cabinet unanimously voted in favor of allowing the last group of Falash Mura to immigrate over the next five years but their acceptance will be conditional on a successful Jewish conversion process according to the Interior Ministry 110 In April 2016 they announced that a total of 10 300 people would be included in the latest round of Aliyah over the following 5 years 111 By May 2021 300 Falasha had been brought to Israel joining 1 700 who had already immigrated an estimated 12 000 more are in Ethiopia 2 Population EditEthiopian Jews in Israel Edit Main articles Ethiopian Jews in Israel and Racism in Israel Beta Israel Israeli Border Policeman The Ethiopian Beta Israel community in Israel today comprises more than 159 500 people 112 1 This is a little more than 1 percent of the Israeli population 113 Most of this population are the descendants and the immigrants who came to Israel during Operation Moses 1984 and Operation Solomon 1991 114 Civil war and famine in Ethiopia prompted the Israeli government to mount these dramatic rescue operations The rescues were within the context of Israel s national mission to gather diaspora Jews and bring them to the Jewish homeland Some immigration has continued up until the present day Today 81 000 Ethiopian Israelis were born in Ethiopia while 38 500 or 32 of the community are native born Israelis 14 Over time the Ethiopian Jews in Israel moved out of the government owned mobile home camps which they initially lived in and settled in various cities and towns throughout Israel with the encouragement of the Israeli authorities who grant new immigrants generous government loans or low interest mortgages citation needed Similarly to other groups of immigrant Jews who made aliyah to Israel the Ethiopian Jews have had to overcome obstacles to integrate into Israeli society 115 Initially the main challenges faced by the Ethiopian Jewish community in Israel arose from communication difficulties most of the Ethiopian population could not read nor write in Hebrew and many of the older members could not hold a simple conversation in Hebrew and discrimination including manifestations of racism from some parts of Israeli society 116 Unlike Russian immigrants many of whom arrived educated and skilled Ethiopian immigrants 117 came from an impoverished agrarian country and were ill prepared to work in an industrialized country A bride and groom in Jerusalem Over the years there has been significant progress in the integration of young Beta Israels into Israeli society primarily resulting from serving in the Israeli Defense Forces alongside other Israelis their age This has led to an increase in opportunities for Ethiopian Jews after they are discharged from the army 118 Despite progress Ethiopian Jews are still not well assimilated into Israeli Jewish society They remain on average on a lower economic and educational level than average Israelis The rate of Ethiopians who have dropped out of school has increased dramatically as well as the rate of juvenile delinquency and there are high incidences of suicide and depression among this community 113 Also while marriages between Jews of different backgrounds are very common in Israel marriages between Ethiopians and non Ethiopians are not very common According to a 2009 study 90 of Ethiopian Israelis 93 of men and 85 of women are married to other Ethiopian Israelis A survey found that 57 of Israelis consider a daughter marrying an Ethiopian unacceptable and 39 consider a son marrying an Ethiopian to be unacceptable Barriers to intermarriage have been attributed to sentiments in both the Ethiopian community and Israeli society generally 119 A 2011 study showed that only 13 of high school students of Ethiopian origin felt fully Israeli 120 In 1996 an event called the blood bank affair took place that demonstrated the discrimination and racism against Ethiopians in Israeli society Blood banks would not use Ethiopian blood out of the fear of HIV being generated from their blood 113 Discrimination and racism against Israeli Ethiopians is still perpetuated In May 2015 Israeli Ethiopians demonstrated in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem against racism after a video was released showing an Israeli soldier of Ethiopian descent that was brutally beaten up by the Israeli police Interviewed students of Ethiopian origin affirm that they do not feel accepted in Israeli society due to a very strong discrimination towards them 121 Many scholars such as Ben Eliezer have been exploring how the discrimination cultural racism and exclusion have resulted in metaphorically sending many of the new generation of Ethiopian Jews back to Africa They say this because many of the new generation have been reclaiming their traditional Ethiopian names Ethiopian language Ethiopian culture and Ethiopian music 113 Converts Edit Falash Mura Edit Main article Falash Mura Falash Mura is the name given to those of the Beta Israel community in Ethiopia who converted to Christianity under pressure from the mission during the 19th century and the 20th century This term consists of Jews who did not adhere to Jewish law as well as Jewish converts to Christianity who did so either voluntarily or who were forced to do so citation needed Many Ethiopian Jews whose ancestors converted to Christianity have been returning to the practice of Judaism The Israeli government can thus set quotas on their immigration and make citizenship dependent on their conversion to Orthodox Judaism citation needed Beta Abraham Edit Main article Beta Abraham Slaves Edit Main articles Judaism and slavery and Slavery in Ethiopia Slavery was practiced in Ethiopia as in much of Africa until it was formally abolished in 1942 After the slave was bought by a Jew he went through conversion giyur and became property of his master 122 In popular culture EditThe 2005 Israeli French film Go Live and Become Hebrew תחייה ותהייה directed by Romanian born Radu Mihăileanu focuses on Operation Moses The film tells the story of an Ethiopian Christian child whose mother has him pass as Jewish so he can immigrate to Israel and escape the famine looming in Ethiopia The film was awarded the 2005 Best Film Award at the Copenhagen International Film Festival 123 Several prominent musicians and rappers are of Ethiopian origin 124 The plot of the 2019 American film Uncut Gems opens with Ethiopian Jewish miners retrieving an opal in Africa 125 The 2019 film The Red Sea Diving Resort is loosely based on the events of Operation Moses and Operation Joshua in 1984 1985 in which the Mossad covertly evacuated Jewish Ethiopian refugees to Israel using a base at the once abandoned holiday resort of Arous Village on the Red Sea coast of Sudan Israeli born singer Eden Alene was set to represent Israel at the Eurovision Song Contest 2020 in Rotterdam Netherlands 126 The chorus of her song Feker Libi featured lyrics in Amharic Arabic and Hebrew Due to the 2020 contest s cancellation she represented Israel again in 2021 with the song Set Me Free placing 17th out of 26 in the final Monuments Edit The Beta Israel Memorial Aliya in Kiryat Gat National memorials to the Ethiopian Jews who died on their way to Israel are located in Kiryat Gat and at the National Civil Cemetery of the State of Israel in Mount Herzl in Jerusalem Ethiopian Heritage Museum Edit In 2009 plans to establish an Ethiopian Heritage Museum dedicated to the heritage and culture of the Ethiopian Jewish community were unveiled in Rehovot The museum will include a model of an Ethiopian village an artificial stream a garden classrooms an amphitheater and a memorial to Ethiopian Zionist activists and Ethiopian Jews who died en route to Israel 127 Cafe Shahor Hazak Edit Strong Black Coffee Cafe Shahor Hazak קפה שחור חזק is an Ethiopian Israeli hip hop duo 128 129 130 131 The duo were a nominee for the 2015 MTV Europe Music Awards Best Israeli Act award Falash Mura EditFalash Mura is the name given to those of the Beta Israel community in Ethiopia who converted to Christianity as a consequence of proselytization during the 19th and 20th centuries This term consists of Beta Israel who did not adhere to Israelite law as well as converts to Christianity who did so either voluntarily or who were forced to do so Missionary Henry Aaron Stern preaches Christianity to Beta Israel They derive from the Beta Israel of Ethiopia however the Falash Mura converted to Christianity and are not considered under the Israeli Law of Return Some have made it to Israel but many still reside in camps in Gondar and Addis Ababa Ethiopia waiting their status for Aliyah Some Falash Mura have reverted to Judaism 132 Falash Mura woman making Injera in Gondar in 1996 Falash Mura child 2005 Terminology Edit See also Beta Israel TerminologyThe original term that the Beta Israel gave to the converts was Faras Muqra horse of the raven in which the word horse refers to the converts and the word raven refers to the missionary Martin Flad who used to wear black clothes 133 This term derived the additional names Falas Muqra Faras Mura and Falas Mura In Hebrew the term Falash Mura or Falashmura is probably a result of confusion over the use of the term Faras Muqra and its derivatives and on the basis of false cognate it was given the Hebrew meaning Falashim Mumarim converted Falashas The actual term Falash Mura has no clear origin It is believed that the term may come from the Agaw and means someone who changes their faith 134 History Edit In 1860 Henry Aaron Stern a Jewish convert to Christianity traveled to Ethiopia in an attempt to convert the Beta Israel community to Christianity Conversion to Christianity Edit For years Ethiopian Jews were unable to own land and were often persecuted by the Christian majority of Ethiopia Ethiopian Jews were afraid to touch non Jews because they believed non Jews were not pure They were also ostracized by their Christian neighbors For this reason many Ethiopian Jews converted to Christianity to seek a better life in Ethiopia The Jewish Agency s Ethiopia emissary Asher Seyum says the Falash Mura converted in the 19th and 20th century when Jewish relations with Christian rulers soured Regardless many kept ties with their Jewish brethren and were never fully accepted into the Christian communities When word spread about the aliyah many thousands of Falash Mura left their villages for Gondar and Addis Ababa assuming they counted 135 In the Achefer woreda of the Mirab Gojjam Zone roughly 1 000 2 000 families of Beta Israel were found 136 There may be other such regions in Ethiopia with significant Jewish enclaves which would raise the total population to more than 50 000 people 137 citation needed Return to Judaism Edit The Falash Mura did not refer to themselves as members of the Beta Israel the name for the Ethiopian Jewish community until after the first wave of immigration to Israel Beta Israel by ancestry the Falash Mura believe they have just as much of a right to return to Israel as the Beta Israel themselves Rabbi Ovadiah Yosef a major player in the first wave of Beta Israel immigration to Israel declared in 2002 that the Falash Mura had converted out of fear and persecution and therefore should be considered Jews 134 Aliyah to Israel Edit Today Falash Mura who move to Israel must undergo conversion on arrival making it increasingly more difficult for them to get situated into Israeli society The Beta Israel who immigrated and made Aliyah through Operation Moses and Operation Solomon were not required to undergo conversion because they were accepted as Jews under the Law of Return On February 16 2003 the Israeli government applied Resolution 2958 to the Falash Mura which grants maternal descendants of Beta Israel the right to immigrate to Israel under the Israeli Law of Return and to obtain citizenship if they convert to Judaism 138 Controversy Edit Today both Israeli and Ethiopian groups dispute the Falash Mura s religious and political status 135 The Israeli government fears that these people are just using Judaism as an excuse to leave Ethiopia in efforts to improve their lives in a new country Right wing member of the Israeli Knesset Bezalel Smotrich was quoted saying This practice will develop into a demand to bring more and more family members not included in the Law of Return It will open the door to an endless extension of a family chain from all over the world he wrote according to Kan How can the state explain in the High Court the distinction it makes between the Falashmura and the rest of the world 139 Although the government has threatened to stop all efforts to bring these people to Israel they have still continued to address the issue In 2018 the Israeli government allowed 1 000 Falash Mura to immigrate to Israel However members of the Ethiopian community say the process for immigration approval is poorly executed and inaccurate dividing families At least 80 percent of the tribe members in Ethiopia say they have first degree relatives living in Israel and some have been waiting for 20 years to immigrate 139 Notable Beta Israelis EditSeble Wongel Queen mother of the Abyssinian Empire Pnina Tamano Shata Minister of Aliyah and Integration in thirty sixth government of Israel Eli Dasa Israeli professional footballer 140 Sharon Shalom Israeli Rabbi lecturer and writerAffiliated groups EditFaras Muqra 133 Maryam Wodet The Lovers of Mary 133 Shamane 133 Muslims 133 Beta Abraham 133 Eritrean people 133 See also Edit Judaism portal Israel portal Africa portalAbayudaya a Jewish community that lives in Uganda Ethiopia Israel relations Groups claiming affiliation with Israelites History of the Jews in Africa House of Israel Ghana Igbo Jews Nigeria Israeli Jews Jewish diaspora Jewish ethnic divisions Jews of Bilad el Sudan Lemba people a Jewish community that lives in Southern Africa Qemant people a small subgroup of the Agaw people in Ethiopia who traditionally practiced an early Hebraic religionReferences Edit a b c Israel Central Bureau of Statistics The Ethiopian Community in Israel a b Rudee Eliana May 24 2021 Work goes on Efforts to bring last of Ethiopian Jews to Israel JNS org Mozgovaya Natasha 2008 04 02 Focus U S A Israel News Haaretz Israeli News source Haaretz com Archived from the original on 2010 02 05 Retrieved 2010 12 25 The genome wide structure of the Jewish people For the meaning of the word Beta in the context of social religious is community see James Quirin The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews 2010 p xxi Weil Shalva 1997 Collective Designations and Collective Identity of Ethiopian Jews in Shalva Weil ed Ethiopian Jews in the Limelight Jerusalem NCJW Research Institute for Innovation in Education Hebrew University pp 35 48 Hebrew Weil Shalva 2012 Ethiopian Jews the Heterogeneity of a Group in Grisaru Nimrod and Witztum Eliezer Cultural Social and Clinical Perspectives on Ethiopian Immigrants in Israel Beersheba Ben Gurion University Press pp 1 17 a b Rosen Jonathan Weber Zieve Tamara April 19 2018 Jewish community in Ethiopia celebrates 70 years in solidarity with Israel The Jerusalem Post a b van de Kamp Wright Annette September 17 2015 Iron Lions of Zion The Origin of Beta Israel Jewish Press Omaha Weil Shalva 2008 Zionism among Ethiopian Jews in Hagar Salamon ed Jewish Communities in the 19th and 20th Centuries Ethiopia Jerusalem Ben Zvi Institute pp 187 200 Hebrew Weil Shalva 2012 Longing for Jerusalem Among the Beta Israel of Ethiopia in Edith Bruder and Tudor Parfitt eds African Zion Studies in Black Judaism Cambridge Cambridge Scholars Publishing pp 204 217 The Rescue of Ethiopian Jews 1978 1990 Hebrew Ethiopian Immigrants and the Mossad Met Archived 2013 12 03 at the Wayback Machine Hebrew a b Weil Shalva 2011 Operation Solomon 20 Years On International Relations and Security Network ISN http www isn ethz ch isn Current Affairs ISN Insights Detail ord538 grp1 amp ots591 eb06339b 2726 928e 0216 1b3f15392dd8 amp lng en amp id 129480 amp contextid734 129480 amp contextid735 129244 amp tabid 129244 a b 1 Archived 2010 02 25 at the Wayback Machine Ha aretz James Bruce Travels To Discover The Source Of The Nile in the Years 1768 1769 1770 1771 1772 and 1773 in five Volumes Vol II Printed by J Ruthven for G G J and J Robinson 1790 p 485 Malchijah MRC Home www himchurch org Retrieved 2016 07 14 Hagar Salamon The Hyena People Ethiopian Jews in Christian Ethiopia University of California Press 1999 p 21 a b Dege Muller Sophia 2018 04 17 Between Heretics and Jews Inventing Jewish Identities in Ethiopia Entangled Religions 6 247 308 doi 10 46586 er v6 2018 247 308 ISSN 2363 6696 a b c d Quirun The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews pp 11 15 Aescoly Book of the Falashas pp 1 3 Hagar Salamon Beta Israel and their Christian neighbors in Ethiopia Analysis of key concepts at different levels of cultural embodiment Hebrew University 1993 pp 69 77 Hebrew Shalva Weil Collective Names and Collective Identity of Ethiopian Jews in Ethiopian Jews in the Limelight Hebrew University 1997 pp 35 48 Salamon Beta Israel p 135 n 20 Hebrew Weil Shalva 1989 The Religious Beliefs and Practices of Ethiopian Jews in Israel 2nd edn Jerusalem NCJW Research Institute forInnovation in Education Hebrew University Hebrew Shelemay Music p 42 Quirun 1992 p 71 Weil Shalva 1998 Festivals and Cyclical Events of theYear 149 160 and Elementary School 174 177 in John Harrison Rishona Wolfert and Ruth Levitov eds Culture Differences in the World and in Israel A Reader in Sociology for Junior High Schools University of Tel Aviv Institute of Social Research and Ministry of Education PedagogicAdministration Hebrew Aescoly Book of the Falashas p 56 Aescoly Book of the Falashas pp 62 70 Hebrew Shelemay Music Ritual and Falasha History pp 44 57 Leslau Falasha Anthology pp xxviii xxxvi Quirun The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews pp 146 150 Devens M S The Liturgy of the Seventh Sabbath A Beta Israel Falasha Text p xx 4 4 Introduction Wiesbaden 1995 see Rosh Chodesh see also Yom Kippur Katan Spolsky Bernard 2014 The Languages of the Jews A Sociolinguistic History Cambridge University Press p 92 ISBN 978 1 107 05544 5 Weil Shalva 1987 An Elegy in Amharic on Dr Faitlovitch Pe amim33 125 127 Hebrew Steve Kaplan The Invention of Ethiopian Jews Three Models Cahiers d Etudes Africaines 1993 Vol 33 pp 645 658 p 347 From a cultural perspective there appears to be little question that the Beta Israel must be understood as the product of processes that took place in Ethiopia between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries Wolf Leslau Introduction to his Falasha Anthology Translated from Ethiopic Sources New Haven Yale University Press 1951 p xliii Also see Steven Kaplan A Brief History of the Beta Israel in The Jews of Ethiopia A People in Transition Tel Aviv and New York Beth Hatefutsoth and The Jewish Museum 1986 p 11 Kaplan writes that Scholars remain divided about the Beta Israel s origins It has been suggested for example that the Jews of Ethiopia are descendants of 1 of the Ten Lost Tribes especially the tribe of Dan 2 Ethiopian Christians and pagans who assumed a Jewish identity 3 Jewish immigrants from South Arabia Yemen who intermarried with the local population or 4 Jewish immigrants from Egypt who intermarried with the local population For more on the Mosaic and Danite claims of traditionalist Beta Israel see Salo Baron Social and Religious History of the Jews Second Edition Philadelphia Jewish Publication Society of America and New York Columbia University Press 1983 Vol XVIII p 373 Budge Queen of Sheba Kebra Negast 38 64 Weil Shalva 1991 The Changing Religious Tradition of Ethiopian Jews in Israel a Teachers Guide Jerusalem The Ministry of Education amp Culture amp NCJW Research Institute for Innovation in Education Hebrew University Hebrew Abbink The Enigma of Esra el Ethnogenesis An Anthro Historical Study Cahiers d Etudes africaines 120 XXX 4 1990 pp 412 420 Jankowski Konigin von Saba 65 71 Schoenberger M 1975 The Falashas of Ethiopia An Ethnographic Study Cambridge Clare Hall Cambridge University Quoted in Abbink Jon 1990 The Enigma of Beta Esra el Ethnogenesis An Anthro Historical Study Cahiers d Etudes africaines 30 120 397 449 doi 10 3406 cea 1990 1592 hdl 1887 9021 Budge Queen of Sheba Kebra Negast chap 61 Weil Shalva 1989 Beta Israel A House Divided Binghamton State University of New York Binghamton New York The complete guide to the Bible by Stephan M Miller p 175 Taddesse Tamrat Church and State in Ethiopia 1270 1527 Oxford Oxford University Press 1972 pp 38 39 Knud Tage Andersen The Queen of Habasha in Ethiopian History Tradition and Chronology Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies University of London Vol 63 No 1 2000 p 20 Wolf Leslau Introduction to his Falasha Anthology Translated from Ethiopic Sources New Haven Yale University Press 1951 p xliii Also see Steven Kaplan A Brief History of the Beta Israel in The Jews of Ethiopia A People in Transition Tel Aviv and New York Beth Hatefutsoth and The Jewish Museum 1986 p 11 This helped persuade rabbinic authorities of the day regarding the validity of his practices even if they differed from their own traditional teachings On this also see the remarkable testimony of Hasdai ibn Shaprut the Torah scholar and princely Jew of Cordoba concerning Eldad s learning in his letter to Joseph King of the Khazars around 960 CE reproduced in Franz Kobler ed Letters of Jews Through the Ages Second Edition London East and West Library 1953 vol 1 p 105 See in Eldad s letter recounting his experiences in Elkan N Adler ed Jewish Travellers in the Middle Ages 19 Firsthand Accounts New York Dover 1987 p 9 Eldad s letter recounting his experiences in Elkan N Adler ed Jewish Travellers in the Middle Ages 19 Firsthand Accounts New York Dover 1987 pp 12 14 See Salo Baron Social and Religious History of the Jews Second Edition Philadelphia Jewish Publication Society of America 1983 Vol XVIII 372 Also see the testimony of James Bruce Travels in Abyssinia 1773 which repeats these accounts of Mosaic antiquity for the Beta Israel 2 Archived August 20 2005 at the Wayback Machine See also the reference already cited from Hasdai ibn Shaprut above Steven Kaplan Eldad Ha Dani in Siegbert von Uhlig ed Encyclopaedia Aethiopica D Ha Wiesbaden Harrassowitz Verlag 2005 p 252 Medieval travellers accounts typically are vague in such matters and are not presented as geographical treatises moreover Ethiopians Sudanese and Somalians do not all know all the tribal languages around them In earlier times the different ethnic groups would have been even more insular In any case the Letter of Eldad the Danite summarized his experiences Avraham Ya ari Igrot Eretz Yisrael Ramat Gan 1971 Ibn Abi Zimra David 1882 Aharon Wolden ed The Responsa of the Radbaz in Hebrew Vol 2 Warsaw s v Part VII responsum 9 first printed in Livorno 1652 reprinted in Israel n d OCLC 233235313 Weil Shalva 1991 Beyond the Sambatyon the Myth of the Ten Lost Tribes Tel Aviv Beth Hatefutsoth the Nahum Goldman Museum of the Jewish Diaspora Responsum of the Radbaz on the Falasha Slave Part 7 No 5 cited in Corinaldi 1998 196 Rabbi Eliezer Waldenberg Tzitz Eliezer Volume 17 subject 48 page 105 Michael Ashkenazi Alex Weingrod Ethiopian Jews and Israel Transaction Publishers 1987 p 30 footnote 4 Rabbi Eliezer Waldenberg Tzitz Eliezer p 104 Ruth Karola Westheimer Steven Kaplan Surviving Salvation The Ethiopian Jewish Family in Transition NYU Press 1992 pp 38 39 איינאו פרדה סנבטו Operation Moshe Archived 2008 01 22 at the Wayback Machine מוסף Haaretz 11 3 2006 Israel Association for Ethiopian Jews דו ח מעקב סוגיית זכאותם לעלייה של בני הפלשמורה Archived 2012 11 09 at the Wayback Machine Archived copy PDF Archived from the original PDF on 2012 11 09 Retrieved 2009 02 16 a href Template Cite web html title Template Cite web cite web a CS1 maint archived copy as title link 21 January 2008 p 9 Netta Sela הרב עמאר הלוואי ויעלו מיליוני אתיופים לארץ ynet 16 January 2008 Emanuela Trevisan Semi Tudor Parfitt Jews of Ethiopia The Birth of an Elite Routledge 2005 p 139 Lovell A Moreau C Yotova V Xiao F Bourgeois S Gehl D Bertranpetit J Schurr E Labuda D 2005 Ethiopia Between Sub Saharan Africa and Western Eurasia Annals of Human Genetics 69 3 275 287 doi 10 1046 J 1469 1809 2005 00152 x S2CID 90214561 Luis J Rowold D Regueiro M Caeiro B Cinnioglu C Roseman C Underhill P Cavallisforza L Herrera R 2004 The Levant versus the Horn of Africa Evidence for Bidirectional Corridors of Human Migrations The American Journal of Human Genetics 74 3 532 44 doi 10 1086 382286 PMC 1182266 PMID 14973781 Kivisild T Reidla M Metspalu E et al November 2004 Ethiopian Mitochondrial DNA Heritage Tracking Gene Flow Across and Around the Gate of Tears Am J Hum Genet 75 5 752 70 doi 10 1086 425161 PMC 1182106 PMID 15457403 Behar Doron M Shlush Liran I Maor Carcom Lorber Margalit Skorecki Karl 2006 Absence of HIV Associated Nephropathy in Ethiopians American Journal of Kidney Diseases 47 1 88 94 doi 10 1053 j ajkd 2005 09 023 PMID 16377389 Tzur Shay Rosset Saharon Shemer Revital Yudkovsky Guennady Selig Sara Tarekegn Ayele Bekele Endashaw Bradman Neil et al 2010 Missense mutations in the APOL1 gene are highly associated with end stage kidney disease risk previously attributed to the MYH9 gene Human Genetics 128 3 345 50 doi 10 1007 s00439 010 0861 0 PMC 2921485 PMID 20635188 Zoossmann Diskin Avshalom 2010 The origin of Eastern European Jews revealed by autosomal sex chromosomal and mtDNA polymorphisms Biology Direct 5 57 doi 10 1186 1745 6150 5 57 PMC 2964539 PMID 20925954 a b D Atanasio Eugenia Trombetta Beniamino Bonito Maria Finocchio Andrea Di Vito Genny Seghizzi Mara Romano Rita Russo Gianluca Paganotti Giacomo Maria 2018 02 12 The peopling of the last Green Sahara revealed by high coverage resequencing of trans Saharan patrilineages Genome Biology 19 1 20 doi 10 1186 s13059 018 1393 5 ISSN 1474 760X PMC 5809971 PMID 29433568 A Y23865 YTree www yfull com Retrieved 2018 12 23 A Y20629 YTree yfull com Trombetta Beniamino Cruciani Fulvio Sellitto Daniele Scozzari Rosaria 2011 01 06 A new topology of the human Y chromosome haplogroup E1b1 E P2 revealed through the use of newly characterized binary polymorphisms PLOS ONE 6 1 e16073 Bibcode 2011PLoSO 616073T doi 10 1371 journal pone 0016073 ISSN 1932 6203 PMC 3017091 PMID 21253605 E M329 YTree Llorente M Gallego Jones E R Eriksson A Siska V Arthur K W Arthur J W Curtis M C Stock J T Coltorti M 2015 11 13 Ancient Ethiopian genome reveals extensive Eurasian admixture in Eastern Africa Science 350 6262 820 822 Bibcode 2015Sci 350 820L doi 10 1126 science aad2879 ISSN 0036 8075 PMID 26449472 Plaster et al Y DNA E subclades predicted by Passa Google Docs a b C A Plaster 2011 09 28 Variation in Y chromosome mitochondrial DNA and labels of identity on Ethiopia discovery ucl ac uk Doctoral Retrieved 2018 06 27 E FGC14382 YTree www yfull com Retrieved 2019 07 16 Cruciani F Santolamazza P Shen P et al May 2002 A back migration from Asia to sub Saharan Africa is supported by high resolution analysis of human Y chromosome haplotypes American Journal of Human Genetics 70 5 1197 214 doi 10 1086 340257 PMC 447595 PMID 11910562 a b Non Amy L Al Meeri Ali Raaum Ryan L Sanchez Luisa F Mulligan Connie J 2010 12 09 Mitochondrial DNA reveals distinct evolutionary histories for Jewish populations in Yemen and Ethiopia American Journal of Physical Anthropology 144 1 1 10 doi 10 1002 ajpa 21360 ISSN 0002 9483 PMID 20623605 Kivisild Toomas Reidla Maere Metspalu Ene Rosa Alexandra Brehm Antonio Pennarun Erwan Parik Juri Geberhiwot Tarekegn Usanga Esien November 2004 Ethiopian Mitochondrial DNA Heritage Tracking Gene Flow Across and Around the Gate of Tears American Journal of Human Genetics 75 5 752 770 doi 10 1086 425161 ISSN 0002 9297 PMC 1182106 PMID 15457403 a b Tishkoff S A Reed F A Friedlaender F R Ehret C Ranciaro A Froment A Hirbo J B Awomoyi A A et al 2009 The Genetic Structure and History of Africans and African Americans PDF Science 324 5930 1035 44 Bibcode 2009Sci 324 1035T doi 10 1126 science 1172257 PMC 2947357 PMID 19407144 Archived from the original PDF on 2017 08 08 Retrieved 2017 08 18 We incorporated geographic data into a Bayesian clustering analysis assuming no admixture TESS software 25 and distinguished six clusters within continental Africa Fig 5A Another geographically contiguous cluster extends across northern Africa blue into Mali the Dogon Ethiopia and northern Kenya With the exception of the Dogon these populations speak an Afroasiatic language Also see Supplementary Data a b Doron M Behar Bayazit Yunusbayev Mait Metspalu Ene Metspalu et al July 2010 The genome wide structure of the Jewish people Nature 466 7303 238 42 Bibcode 2010Natur 466 238B doi 10 1038 nature09103 PMID 20531471 S2CID 4307824 a href Template Cite journal html title Template Cite journal cite journal a CS1 maint multiple names authors list link Sharon Begley Genetic study offers clues to history of North Africa s Jews Reuters August 7 2012 Agranat Tamir Lily Waldman Shamam Martin Mario A S Gokhman David Mishol Nadav Eshel Tzilla Cheronet Olivia Rohland Nadin Mallick Swapan Adamski Nicole Lawson Ann Marie 2020 05 28 The Genomic History of the Bronze Age Southern Levant Cell 181 5 1146 1157 e11 doi 10 1016 j cell 2020 04 024 ISSN 0092 8674 PMID 32470400 Jews and Arabs share genetic link to ancient Canaanites study finds Haaretz Retrieved 2021 03 05 For a discussion of this theory see Edward Ullendorff Ethiopia and the Bible Oxford University Press for the British Academy 1968 pp 16ff 117 According to Ullendorff individuals who believed in this origin included President Yitzhak Ben Zvi of Israel Louis Marcus Notice sur l epoque de l etablissement des Juifs dans l Abyssinie Journal Asiatique 3 1829 see also Herodotus Histories Book II Chap 30 Strabo Geographica Book XVI Chap 4 and Book XVII Chap 1 Pliny the Elder Natural History Book VI Chap 30 A H M Jones and Elizabeth Monroe A History of Ethiopia Oxford Clarendon Press 1935 p 40 a b Richard Pankhurst The Falashas or Judaic Ethiopians in Their Christian Ethiopian Setting African Affairs 91 October 1992 pp 567 582 at p 567 Pirenne La Grece et Saba apres 32 ans de nouvelles recherches L Arabie preislamique et son environnement historique et culturel Colloquium Univ of Strasbourg 1987 cf Stuart Munro Hay Aksum An African Civilization of Late Antiquity Edinburgh University Press 1991 p 65 Menachem Waldman גולים ויורדים מארץ יהודה אל פתרוס וכוש לאור המקרא ומדרשי חז ל Megadim E 1992 pp 39 44 Steven Kaplan The Origins of the Beta Israel Five Methodological Cautions Archived 2011 07 21 at the Wayback Machine Pe amim 33 1987 pp 33 49 Hebrew a b c Steven Kaplan On the Changes in the Research of Ethiopian Jewry Archived 2011 07 21 at the Wayback Machine Pe amim 58 1994 pp 137 150 Hebrew Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics Immigrants by Period of Immigration Country of Birth and Last Country of Residence Archived 2007 11 24 at the Wayback Machine from the Statistical Abstract of Israel 2007 No 58 Total Immigration from Ethiopia 1948 Present www jewishvirtuallibrary org Airlift Culminates 17 Years of Secret Israeli Links to Mengistu Government Ethiopia Virtual Jewish Tour Gerrit Jan Abbink The Falashas In Ethiopia And Israel The Problem of Ethnic Assimilation Nijmegen Institute for Cultural and Social Anthropology 1984 p 114 Jdl Stages Protests at Hias Jewish Agency Offices Claiming lack of Action to Rescue Falashas Jewish Telegraphic Agency New York September 9 1981 Mitchell G Bard From Tragedy to Triumph The Politics Behind the Rescue of Ethiopian Jewry Greenwood Publishing Group 2002 p 137 Bard From Tragedy to Triumph p 139 The Jewish Community of Ethiopia Beit Hatfutsot Open Databases Project The Museum of the Jewish People at Beit Hatfutsot Israel vows to take in 1 000 Falasha Jews from Ethiopia Anadolu Agency 2018 10 08 Archived from the original on 2018 10 09 Retrieved 2022 01 15 Dichek Bernard 5 April 2019 Rabbi of 8 000 stranded Ethiopian Jews fights to complete their exodus The Times of Israel Archived from the original on 2019 04 07 Retrieved 2022 01 15 Yaron Lee February 25 2020 Forty three Falashmura Arrive in Israel Accompanied by Likud Lawmakers Haaretz Retrieved 2022 01 15 Hundreds in Israel protest for rescue of Ethiopia Jews Al Arabiya English 2021 11 14 Retrieved 2022 01 15 Israel Will Bring 3 000 Ethiopians Of Questionable Heritage To Israel The Yeshiva World 2021 11 29 Archived from the original on 2021 11 29 Retrieved 2022 01 15 Jewish immigration to Israel up by 30 compared to last year Ynetnews 2021 12 22 Retrieved 2022 01 15 Stephen Spector Operation Solomon the daring rescue of the Ethiopian Jews p 190 Israel to allow in 8 000 Falash Mura from Ethiopia BBC News 2010 11 14 Retrieved 12 September 2015 8 000 more Falash Mura to come to Israel JTA Jewish amp Israel News 2010 11 18 Archived from the original on 2010 11 18 Retrieved 2020 10 13 Reuters November 16 2015 Coalition crisis averted 9000 Ethiopian immigrants to be brought to Israel over 5 years Israel News Jerusalem Post www jpost com The Population of Ethiopian Origin in Israel Selected Data Published on the Occasion of the Sigd Festival 2021 a b c d Walsh Sophie D Tuval Mashiach Rivka 2011 Ethiopian Emerging Adult Immigrants in Israel Youth amp Society 44 49 75 doi 10 1177 0044118X10393484 S2CID 145674713 Weil Shalva 2004 Saving the Lost Tribe The Rescue andRedemption of the Ethiopian Jews by Asher Naim reviewed in Studies inContemporary Jewry An Annual New York and Oxford OxfordUniversity Press 20 385 87 Weil Shalva 1994 The Cultural Background of the Ethiopian Immigrantsand the Transfer to Israeli Society in Gila Noam ed Achievements andChallenges in the Absorption of Ethiopian Immigrants the Contribution ofResearch to the Evaluation of the Process of Absorption Lectures andDiscussions from a National Conference 8 9 November 1993 Jerusalem Hebrew Weil Shalva 1999 Collective Rights and PerceivedInequality The Case of Ethiopian Jews in Israel in Tim Allen and John Eade eds Divided Europeans Understanding Ethnicities in Conflict The Hague London and Boston Kluwer Law International pp 127 44 Weil Shalva 1991 One Parent Families among EthiopianImmigrants in Israel Jerusalem NCJW Research Institute for Innovation inEducation Hebrew University Hebrew Ethiopian Jews struggle in Israel BBC News 1999 11 17 Retrieved 2010 05 05 Survey 90 of Ethiopian Israelis Resist Interracial Marriage Haaretz com 2009 11 16 Retrieved 12 September 2015 Study Children of Soviet Immigrants Fully Assimilated Into Israeli Society Haaretz com 2011 12 26 Retrieved 12 September 2015 Fanack 13 May 2015 Black and Jewish Young Ethiopian Israelis Fight for Equality Fanack com Retrieved 19 May 2015 Hagar Salamon Reflections of Ethiopian Cultural Patterns on the Beta Israel Absorption in Israel The Barya case in Steven Kaplan Tudor Parfitt amp Emnuela Trevisan Semi Editors Between Africa and Zion Proceedings of the First International Congress of the Society for the Study of Ethiopian Jewry Ben Zvi Institute 1995 ISBN 978 965 235 058 9 pp 126 27 Five of the Most Celebrated French Language African Films GlobalVoices Weil Shalva 2012 Kalkidan Meshashe An Ethiopian Israeli Rapper Culver City California Roberts and Tilton in catalogue for Kehinde Wiley The WorldStage Israel exhibition New York Jewish Museum Uncut Gems puts age old Jewish stereotypes front and center The Jerusalem Post JPost com Retrieved 2020 04 05 Eurovision Song Contest Rotterdam 2020 Participants Retrieved 2021 03 06 Sanbetu Ayanawu Farada July 13 2005 Museum on history of Ethiopian Jewry to be built in Rehovot Haaretz Retrieved March 25 2009 Marissa Stern November 22 2016 But First Strong Black Coffee The Jewish Exponent permanent dead link Andrew Warner November 8 2016 Bruins for Israel and Hillel partner with Jerusalem U for Israeli event Daily Bruin Lea Speyer November 8 2016 New Campus Initiative Aims to Counteract Anti Israel Movement s Trite One Sided Rhetoric by Showing Jewish State s Human Face Algemeiner Journal הראל עמוס January 22 2014 קפה שחור חזק הראפרים שלא מתביישים להיות מאושרים Haaretz The Falash Mura www jewishvirtuallibrary org Retrieved 2020 05 27 a b c d e f g Abbink Gerrit Jan 1984 The Falashas in Ethiopia and Israel the problem of ethnic assimilation Institute for Cultural and Social Anthropology pp 81 82 ISBN 9789090008202 Can also be found here and archived here a b The Falash Mura Jewish Virtual Library Retrieved 2018 12 01 a b Berger Miriam August 9 2013 The Last Jews of Ethiopia ProQuest 1474180933 a href Template Cite journal html title Template Cite journal cite journal a Cite journal requires journal help Can also be found here and archived here Abbink Jon 1990 The Enigma of Beta Esra el Ethnogenesis An Anthro Historical Study Cahiers d etudes africaines 30 120 397 449 doi 10 3406 cea 1990 1592 hdl 1887 9021 ISSN 0008 0055 The Plight of Ethiopian Jews www culturalsurvival org Retrieved 2020 05 26 Falashmura aliyah follow up report PDF in Hebrew Israeli Association for Ethiopian Jews Archived from the original PDF on March 5 2009 a b Cabinet approves immigration of 1 000 Ethiopian Falashmura to Israel Times of Israel Retrieved 2018 12 01 Give football a chance to break the cycle of violence blogs timesofisrael com Further reading EditGeneral Michael Corinaldi Jewish identity the case of Ethiopian Jewry Magnes Press 1998 ISBN 9652239933 Daniel Frieilmann The Case of the Falas Mura in Tudor Parfitt amp Emanuela Trevisan Semi Editors The Beta Israel in Ethiopia and Israel Studies on Ethiopian Jews Routledge 1999 ISBN 9780700710928 Steven Kaplan amp Shoshana Ben Dor 1988 Ethiopian Jewry An Annotated Bibliography Ben Zvi Institute Don Seeman One People One Blood Ethiopian Israelis and the Return to Judaism Rutgers University Press 2010 ISBN 9780813549361Early accounts James Bruce 1790 Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile Johann Martin Flad The Falashas Jews of Abyssinia W Macintosh 1869 Samuel Gobat Journal of a three years residence in Abyssinia in furtherance of the objects of the Church Missionary Society Hatchard amp Son and Seeley amp Sons 1834 Henry Aaron Stern Wanderings among the Falashas in Abyssinia Together with Descriptions of the Country and Its Various Inhabitants Wertheim Macintosh and Hunt 1862 Carl Rathjens 1921 Die Juden in Abessinien W Gente History Abbink Jon 1990 The Enigma of Esra el Ethnogenesis An Anthro Historical Study Cahiers d Etudes africaines 120 XXX 4 pp 393 449 Avner Yossi 1986 The Jews of Ethiopia A People in Transition Beth Hatefutsoth ISBN 0 87334 039 6 Salo Wittmayer Baron 1983 A Social and Religious History of the Jews Volume XVIII ISBN 0 231 08855 8 Budge E A Wallis 1932 The Queen of Sheba and her only son Menelik London Herman Marilyn Relating Bet Israel history in its Ethiopian context Defining Creating Constructing Identity Review article of Quirin 1992 and Kaplan 1992 Journal of the Anthropological Society of Oxford Hilary 1996 27 1 47 59 Hess Robert L 1969 Toward a History of the Falasha Eastern African history Praeger Isaac Ephraim 1974 The Falasha Black Jews of Ethiopia Dillard University Scholar Statesman Lecture Series Jankowski Alice 1987 Die Konigin von Saba und Salomo Hamburg H Buske Vlg Steven Kaplan 1987 The Beta Israel Falasha Encounter with Protestant Missionaries 1860 1905 Jewish Social Studies 49 1 pp 27 42 Kaplan Steven 1995 The Beta Israel Falasha in Ethiopia From Earliest Times to the Twentieth Century New York University Press ISBN 0 8147 4664 0 Kessler David 1985 The Falashas the Forgotten Jews of Ethiopia Schocken Books ISBN 0 8052 0791 0 Kessler David 1996 The Falashas a short history of the Ethiopian Jews Frank Cass ISBN 0 7146 4646 6 Marcus Louis 1829 Notice sur l epoque de l etablissement des Juifs dans l Abyssinie Journal Asiatique 3 Messing Simon D 1982 The Story of the Falashas Black Jews of Ethiopia Brooklyn ISBN 0 9615946 9 1 Eric Payne 1972 Ethiopian Jews the story of a mission Olive Press Rapoport Louis 1980 The Lost Jews Last of the Ethiopian Falashas Stein and Day ISBN 0 8128 2720 1 Quirin James A 1992 The Evolution of the Ethiopian Jews a History of the Beta Israel Falasha to 1920 University of Pennsylvania Press ISBN 0 8122 3116 3 Don Seeman The Question of Kinship Bodies and Narratives in the Beta Israel European Encounter 1860 1920 Journal of Religion in Africa Vol 30 Fasc 1 Feb 2000 pp 86 120 Shapiro Mark 1987 The Falasha of Ethiopia The World and I Washington Times Corp Weil Shalva 2008 Jews in Ethiopia in M A Erlich ed Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora Santa Barbara CA ABC CLIO 2 467 475 Weil Shalva 2011 Ethiopian Jews 165 166 in Judith Baskin ed Cambridge Dictionary of Judaism and Jewish Culture New York Cambridge University PressReligion Jeffrey Lewis Halper 1966 The Falashas An Analysis of Their History Religion and Transitional Society University of Minnesota 1966 Kay Kaufman Shelemay 1989 Music Ritual and Falasha History Michigan State University Press ISBN 0 87013 274 1 Michael Corinaldi 1988 Jewish Identity The Case of Ethiopian Jewry The Magnes Press ISBN 965 223 993 3 Menahem Valdman 1985 The Jews of Ethiopia the Beta Israel community Ami Shav Wolf Leslau 1951 Falasha Anthology Yale University Press ISBN 0 300 03927 1 Menachem Elon 1987 The Ethiopian Jews a case study in the functioning of the Jewish legal system New York University Steven Kaplan 1988 Falasha religion ancient Judaism or evolving Ethiopian tradition Jewish Quarterly Review LXXXIX Center for Advanced Judaic Studies University of Pennsylvania Emanuela Trevisan Semi The Conversion of the Beta Israel in Ethiopia A Reversible Rite of Passage Journal of Modern Jewish Studies 1 1 2002 pp 90 103 Edward Ullendorff 1968 Ethiopia and the Bible Oxford University Press ISBN 0 19 726076 4Aliyah Jerry L Weaver and Howard M Lenhoff 2007 Black Jews Jews and Other Heroes How Grassroots Activism Led to the Rescue of the Ethiopian Jews Gefen Publishing House Ltd ISBN 978 965 229 365 7 Tudor Parfitt 1986 Operation Moses the untold story of the secret exodus of the Falasha Jews from Ethiopia Stein and Day ISBN 0 8128 3059 8 Claire Safran 1987 Secret exodus the story of Operation Moses Reader s Digest Stephen Spector 2005 Operation Solomon The Daring Rescue of the Ethiopian Jews Oxford University Press US ISBN 0 19 517782 7 Shmuel Yilma 1996 From Falasha to Freedom An Ethiopian Jew s Journey to Jerusalem Gefen Publishing House ISBN 965 229 169 2 Alisa Poskanzer 2000 Ethiopian exodus a practice journal Gefen Publishing House ISBN 965 229 217 6 Baruch Meiri 2001 The Dream Behind Bars the Story of the Prisoners of Zion from Ethiopia Gefen Publishing House ISBN 965 229 221 4 Asher Naim 2003 Saving the lost tribe the rescue and redemption of the Ethiopian Jews Ballantine Books ISBN 0 345 45081 7 Micha Odenheimer amp Ricki Rosen 2006 Transformations From Ethiopia to Israel Reality Check Productions ISBN 965 229 377 6 Gad Shimron 2007 Mossad Exodus The Daring Undercover Rescue of the Lost Jewish Tribe Gefen Publishing House ISBN 965 229 403 9 Gadi Ben Ezer 2002 The Ethiopian Jewish exodus narratives of the migration journey to Israel 1977 1985 Routledge ISBN 0 415 27363 3 Weil Shalva 2012 Longing for Jerusalem Among the Beta Israel of Ethiopia in Edith Bruder and Tudor Parfitt eds African Zion Studies in Black Judaism Cambridge Cambridge Scholars Publishing pp 204 17 Society Marilyn Herman 2012 Gondar s Child Songs Honor and Identity Among Ethiopian Jews in Israel Red Sea Press ISBN 1 56902 328 X Hagar Salamon 1999 The Hyena People Ethiopian Jews in Christian Ethiopia University of California Press ISBN 0 520 21901 5 Kay Kaufman Shelemay amp Steven Kaplan 2010 Creating the Ethiopian Diaspora Special issue of Diaspora A Journal of Transnational Studies Daniel Summerfield 2003 From Falashas to Ethiopian Jews the external influences for change c 1860 1960 Routledge ISBN 0 7007 1218 6 Esther Hertzog 1999 Immigrants and bureaucrats Ethiopians in an Israeli absorption center Berghahn Books ISBN 1 57181 941 X Ruth Karola Westheimer amp Steven Kaplan 1992 Surviving salvation the Ethiopian Jewish family in transition NYU Press ISBN 0 8147 9253 7 Tanya Schwarz 2001 Ethiopian Jewish immigrants in Israel the homeland postponed Routledge ISBN 0 7007 1238 0 Girma Berhanu 2001 Learning In Context An Ethnographic Investigation of Meditated Learning Experiences Among Ethiopian Jews in Israel Goteborg University Press ISBN 91 7346 411 2 Teshome G Wagaw 1993 For our soul Ethiopian Jews in Israel Wayne State University Press ISBN 0 8143 2458 4 Michael Ashkenazi amp Alex Weingrod 1987 Ethiopian Jews and Israel Transaction Publishers ISBN 0 88738 133 2 Tudor Parfitt amp Emanuela Trevisan Semi 1999 The Beta Israel in Ethiopia and Israel studies on Ethiopian Jews Routledge ISBN 0 7007 1092 2 Tudor Parfitt amp Emanuela Trevisan Semi 2005 Jews of Ethiopia the birth of an elite Routledge ISBN 0 415 31838 6 Emanuela Trevisan Semi amp Shalva Weil 2011 Beta Israel the Jews of Ethiopia and beyond History Identity and Borders Libreria Editrice Cafoscarina ISBN 978 88 7543 286 7 Weil Shalva 2012 I am a teacher and beautiful the feminization of the teaching profession in the Ethiopian community in Israel in Pnina Morag Talmon and Yael Atzmon eds Immigrant Women in Israeli Society Jerusalem Bialik Institute pp 207 23 Hebrew Other reading Edit Construction of Beta Israel Identity Jewish Encyclopedia The Jews of Ethiopia and their Names Abstract of the Lucotte Smets article History of Ethiopian Jews A New Light for Ethiopian Jews at Tel Aviv UniversityExternal links Edit Wikimedia Commons has media related to Beta Israel Wikisource has the text of the 1905 New International Encyclopedia article Falashas Beta Israel Society and Culture Ethiopian Jews Ethiopian in the Net Yopi The Ethiopian Portal Israel Association for Ethiopian Jews Chassida Shmella Ethiopian Jewish Community of North America Jewish Agency for Israel Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Beta Israel amp oldid 1130441614, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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