Hundreds of Ethiopian Jews have gone on hunger strike to protest against a delay in their relocation to Israel. Posted on 09/21/2005 1:36:04 AM PDT by M. Espinola
Hundreds of Ethiopian Jews have gone on hunger strike to protest against a delay in their relocation to Israel.
Frustrated by an eight-year-long wait, the community has resolved not to eat until the planned move gets under way.
The Falasha Mura, or Beta-Israel as they prefer to be called, are an ancient and isolated group living in the Ethiopian highlands.
Although some were forcibly converted to Christianity, they trace their roots to the biblical King Solomon.
'Grave starvation'
Members of the Falasha Mura community - many wearing Jewish skullcaps - began the hunger strike in their camp in the capital, Addis Ababa, on Tuesday morning.
Our home is Israel Getenet Mengesha Ethiopian Jew
They are protesting against their "long wait" to return to the Promised Land.
Israeli officials say they will all be allowed to travel by the end of 2007.
"Israel is our place. We have been displaced for 2,000 years," said Getenet Mengesha, one of the group's leaders.
The protestors have been listening to lectures by their religious leaders aimed at giving them the heart to endure many days of hunger.
"End our suffering and let us go home," read some of the slogans.
The community believes that by going on hunger strike they will force the Israeli authorities to act fast.
The Falasha Mura lamented their living conditions in a recent letter to the Israeli government.
"We have been suffering for the past eight years in Addis Ababa and Gondar. We are... facing grave starvation... and much hardship," the letter said.
"They [Israeli officials] must respond. Our home is Israel," Mr Getenet said.
The protestors are among the more than 20,000 Ethiopians of Jewish origin remaining in the country.
In November 1984 Israel airlifted 6,300 Ethiopian Jews from refugee camps in Sudan in a move code-named Operation Moses.
Another massive airlift - Operation Solomon - followed in 1991, bringing the number of Ethiopian Jews living today in Israel close to 80,000.
graphics added
Evil Israelis case Jewish Africans to starve
case -> cause
some were forced into Christianity? How were they forced and by whom?
Very good questions.
Christianity spread through the Axum dynasty of Ethiopia in the 4th century CE. By the 7th century, however, Islam had surpassed Christianity and had separated Ethiopia from its Christian African neighbors.
Prior to this, the Beta Israel had enjoyed relative independence through the Middle Ages. Their reign was threatened in the 13th century CE under the Solomonic Empire, and intermittent fighting continuing for the next three centuries with other tribes.
In 1624, the Beta Israel fought what would be their last battle for independent autonomy against Portuguese-backed Ethiopians. A graphic eyewitness account described the battle:
“Falasha men and women fought to the death from the steep heights of their fortress... they threw themselves over the precipice or cut each other's throats rather than be taken prisoner—it was a Falasha Masada. [The rebel leaders] burned all of the Falasha's written history and all of their religious books, it was an attempt to eradicate forever the Judaic memory of Ethiopia” (Righteous Jews Honored by Falasha Supporters, AAEJ Press Release, 1981).
Those Jews captured alive were sold into slavery, forced to be baptized, and denied the right to own land. The independence of the Beta Israel was torn from them just as it was from their Israeli brethren at Masada centuries before.
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The Ethiopian Jews lived primarily in villages in the north and Northwest of the country, far from their Christian neighbors, with separate social and economic institutions and conditions. Their story is a fascinating example of Jewish perseverance and survival despite time, trial and tribulation.
1. The Ethiopian Jews are the descendants of the lost ancient Israelite tribe of Dan.
2. They may be the descendants of Menelik I, the fabled son of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, as set down in the folkloric, biblical and aggadic Ethiopian Kebra Negast.
3. They might be descendants of Jews who left Israel for Egypt following the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BCE.source
Links:
Struggle to Save Ethiopian Jewry
Ethiopian Jews, rich past, rich future
The History of Ethiopian Jews - United Jewish Communities NJ
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