The immigration of the Jews of Ethiopia to Israel, 1948-1985

א.1 | World Jewry "discovers" the Jews of Ethiopia

Since the 9th century, fragments of information about Jews living in Ethiopia reached Jewish communities around the world, but no real contact was made with them. The community was almost entirely isolated from the Jewish world. However, since the end of the 18th century and especially in the 19th century, during the colonial period, interest in the Beta Israel community (their preferred name) increased. At the time they were known as “Falashas”, a derogatory term still found in many of the early archival files. In the 1860s, European Jews began to call for the spiritual-religious salvation of the Ethiopian Jews, many of whom had converted to Christianity. The first emissary from the Alliance Israélite Universelle, Joseph Halévy, visited the villages of the “Falashas” in 1867. Ties were strengthened at the beginning of the 20th century, when Halevy’s student, Dr. Jaques Faitlovitch, worked to deepen the connection between Ethiopian Jews and the Jewish people and to introduce them to mainstream rabbinic Jewish law. He established a Jewish school in Addis Ababa, and other emissaries came to Ethiopia over the years and maintained contact with the community.

(See more on Faitlovitch’s work in President Yitzhak Ben-Zvi’s files on the Ethiopian Jews – PRES-10/9, PRES-10/10, PRES-10/11)

The area of Jewish settlement in Ethiopia, Wikipedia

א.2 | First steps, 1948-1953

“I have come to the conclusion that it is not at all clear to us, as Jews and as a state, how to treat the Falasha community. We search around, get a little closer and then further away, one hand pushes away or dislikes the possibility that they will be considered Jews and the other hand seems to bring it nearer.” 

This statement by the Deputy Speaker of the Knesset, Israel Yeshayahu, after a visit to Ethiopia in 1958 (File PRES-10/10, p. 34) seems to sum up the first chapter of Israel’s treatment of the Jewish community in Ethiopia, in which it failed to make a clear decision on the question, as demanded by Yeshayahu and many others.

Members of the Beta Israel community received the news of the establishment of the state with enthusiasm and hoped to immigrate to Israel. In the first years after 1948, however, there was little interest in immigration from Ethiopia. There were several main reasons for this:

• Israel faced the challenge of absorption of mass immigration from Europe and the Arab countries;
• The Chief Rabbinate did not recognize the Beta Israel community as Jews, and therefore they could not enter the country under the Law of Return;
• The regime of Emperor Haile Selassie opposed the emigration of its subjects, and it was impossible to leave Ethiopia without an exit permit;
• Many saw Beta Israel members as a group that would be difficult to absorb in Israel, due to differences in background and culture.

At that time, a perception of Western cultural superiority was widespread in Israel. The authorities, who were already finding it difficult to absorb immigrants from less developed countries in Asia and North Africa, did not want to take on responsibility for an unfamiliar community in Ethiopia. The fact that the community was familiar only with the written Torah aroused suspicion among some rabbis that they were of Karaite origin (The Karaites are a heretical sect which deny the validity of the Oral Law). However the chief rabbi of Egypt, David ben Zimra, accepted the Ethiopian community as Jews as early as the 16th century. Only a few in Israel were interested in the question, but there were some tireless activists who raised it again and again. Among them was the second president, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, who researched Jewish communities far from the centres of Jewish life and published a book about them. In 1942, Ben-Zvi wrote to Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Halevi Herzog that members of the community should be accepted as Jews because they did not reject the Oral Law in principle. In any case, he added, it was not a ruling on their Judaism which was required, but recognition of the need to reach out to them (see the ISA’s Commemorative Volume on Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (in Hebrew), edited by Hagai Tsoref, pp. 303-304). Ben-Zvi was concerned about the danger of missionary activity to the Jewish identity of the community and wanted to work for their immigration to Israel, or at least for the immigration of some members. He later said that he had approached Levi Eshkol, the head of the Jewish Agency’s settlement department, who opposed the idea.

There is evidence that Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion also opposed immigration from Ethiopia. Apparently he also objected to the plan to bring a small number of young people to Israel proposed by Dr. Alexander Rosenfeld, one of the leaders of the “World Hebrew Alliance” which worked to expand Hebrew education in the Diaspora. In File G-5558/10, “Aliyah from Ethiopia”, we find a request from the Prime Minister to consult with him before any action to organize such immigration (Government Secretary Zeev Sherf to the Jewish Agency, January 4, 1950, ibid., P. 29). ). We do not know what the basis for the opposition was, but other letters in the file suggest that it may have been inspired by the Ministry of Health’s concern that immigration from Africa would lead to the spread of tropical diseases. Dr. Haim Sheba, director general of the Ministry, who was asked for his opinion in 1952, warned that he had received reports on the poor physical and mental condition of Ethiopian Jews. He added that no research had yet been done on the subject.

א.3 | The Jewish Agency's educational programme and the youth group at Kfar Batya

In January 1951 Faitlovitch published a call in the press for a “Magic Carpet” (like the operation to rescue the Jews of Yemen) for Ethiopian Jewry. On Faitlovitch’s initiative, Dr. Rosenfeld visited Ethiopia and was impressed, like many visitors  over the years, both by the deep religious devotion of the Jews and their desire to reach “Jerusalem” (as they called the Land of Israel) and by their miserable living conditions. Beta Israel made a living from herding and growing grain but were forbidden to own land and were considered sharecroppers. They also engaged in handicrafts, an occupation considered inferior by the Christian inhabitants. In a report he wrote on his return, Rosenfeld proposed a programme for Hebrew education in Ethiopia, setting up a settlement in Israel and bringing a group of young people to Israel (File G-5558/10, p. 22). Rosenfeld sent a copy of the report to the Prime Minister’s Office, adding a request from the kessim (priests and community leaders) he met for photographs of Ben-Gurion.

Rosenfeld also reported on his visit to Rabbi Ze’ev Gold, director of the Jewish Agency’s Department of Torah Culture and Education, which had been given responsibility for a new field of activity among remote communities, including the Marranos in Portugal, the Bnei Yisrael in India – and the Ethiopian Jews. At the beginning of 1953, Rosenfeld approached President Ben-Zvi  again about bringing young people to Israel. Ben-Zvi reminded him  that this idea had already been raised, but Ben-Gurion had opposed it. Ben-Zvi promised to investigate the question.

Following discussions with the Jewish Agency, it was decided to invite a group of young people to Israel and give them agricultural training. It was also decided that the Torah Culture and Education Department would send an emissary to Ethiopia to establish a college for teachers in the villages. A few months later Rabbi Shmuel Beeri left for Ethiopia. Beeri established a training college in Asmara in Eritrea, then federated with Ethiopia. Asmara was farther away from the eye of the authorities in Addis Ababa and had a Jewish community of Yemenite and Adeni origin. Beeri worked together with Yona Bugala, a student of Faitlovitch who had studied in Europe and previously served as a teacher at the school in Addis Ababa. Bugala gave up his position in the Ethiopian Ministry of Education in favour of activities in the Jewish community. A copy of a letter he sent to Dr. Rosenfeld on the establishment of the school, supporting its establishment in Asmara, and not in Gondar where most of the Jews lived, was sent to President Ben-Zvi (Document 1, File PRES-10/9, pp. 392-390). Rabbi Yaacov Shreibaum, who had served as a rabbi for IZL (Irgun) prisoners sent to Eritrea by the British, also supported this position. Rabbi Shreibaum’s opinion of Ethiopian Jews was negative and he saw them as savage and primitive, but agreed that they should be brought closer to Judaism. He did not believe that an emissary from Israel could adapt to conditions in the villages in Gondar and suggested that Yemenite Jews from Asmara could fill the gap (ibid., Pp. 275-274).

A textbook on the Jewish calendar in Hebrew and Amharic prepared by Yonah Bugala and Rabbi Shmuel Beeri, File PRES. 10/9, p. 244. The Ethiopian Jews used their own calendar

Twenty-seven schools were established in the villages. In 1955-1956, two groups of students were sent to Israel to be educated in the religious youth village of Kfar Batya. The students were to return to Ethiopia to serve as teachers in the villages, to teach Hebrew and to bring the Jews closer to the customs of rabbinic Judaism. They were aged 13 to 18 and there were no clear plans for their further training. Some went on to more advanced institutions and among them were future community leaders such as Baruch Tegegne and Zimna Barhani.

One of the students, Malka Avraham, working in the kitchen in Kfar Batya 1.5.1955. Photograph: GPO

In 1956, Yehuda Sivan replaced Rabbi Beeri and served until 1958. In October 1956, Sivan wrote to Ben-Zvi that he had difficulty obtaining a license to visit Gondar or to open a school there, and also described very poor conditions in the schools. Access to the villages was difficult as there were no roads, and he had to ride a mule or walk for hours to get there. The roads were also dangerous due to the hostility of the neighbours. Sivan also complained that  budgets were not reaching him as promised. However, he was impressed “by this brave and graceful tribe, which deserves to be called a people and also the House of Israel (Beta Yisrael)” (Letter to President Ben-Zvi, December 6, 1957, PRES- 10/10, p. 81. See also file PRES-10/9).

At the end of 1957, the Agency decided to cut the emissary’s budget by 60% and to close the institution in Asmara. The school network ran into difficulties, and all the schools were closed except for two: the main school that had already moved to Uzba, the community center near Gondar, and the school in Ambobar. According to Sivan, even before this he had to subsist on loans from members of the Jewish community in Asmara, and did not receive any assistance from the Israeli consul in Addis Ababa, Hanan Bar-On, who objected to any Israeli involvement in the Jews’ fate. The school in Uzba was burned down in early 1958 by hostile neighbors.

א.4 | 1958: President ben-Zvi steps in

At the beginning of November 1958, Ben-Zvi received a letter in Hebrew and Amharic signed by 38 community leaders protesting against the cuts in Jewish Agency activity and warning of increased efforts by the missionaries to convert the Jews. Ben-Zvi invited some of the heads of the Agency, led by Zalman Shazar, and the deputy speaker of the Knesset, Israel Yeshayahu, for a consultation. Yeshayahu had visited Ethiopia that year and was not impressed by the Agency’s activities. In a report on the visit, he praised the efforts of the new emissary, Moshe Bar-Yehuda, but added that he could do little because of his meagre budget. Yeshayahu criticized the state institutions which had begun to help the community, to teach them Hebrew and to build up their hopes, without making a decision whether they should be considered Jewish. He argued that as long as there was no ruling on the question, the masses of Jews would object to letting in an ‘African tribe’ without determining with certainty that they were Jews. From a religious point of view, if their Judaism was recognized, fears of mamzer status would arise, “since they do not observe marriage law as stipulated in Jewish law, but according to biblical verses and their own traditions […] Religiously, they will have to undergo a conversion procedure as if they were not Jews and this may hurt their feelings. After all, they see themselves as Jews. On the other hand, the question arises as to why we need to take an African tribe and convert it.” If it was decided to recognize the community as Jews, they would want to immigrate to Israel, and it was also possible that the converts to Christianity, who were not well-treated by the Christians by birth, would want to join them (Yeshayahu’s report in File PRES-10/10, pp. 44-26).

At the meeting, Ben-Zvi stated that the members of the community were Jews in every way, and demanded that the heads of the Agency decide to treat them properly or leave them alone. Shazar acknowledged that some questioned the need to deal with the Ethiopian Jews, whether because there were “other priorities” or doubts whether they were indeed Jewish. Yeshayahu argued that there was no room at all for the question whether to abandon the Jews in Ethiopia since “they consider themselves Jews and express Jewish faith and consciousness.” S.Z. Shragai, head of the Immigration Department, supported the immigration of the entire community. But due to the great difficulties involved, it was decided to try to strengthen the community on the spot and to encourage international Jewish organizations such as the JDC and ORT to take on part of the task.

On May 4, 1959, another meeting was held at the President’s House to discuss the plan to transfer the schools in Ethiopia to the ORT educational network. Ben-Zvi described his efforts for the Ethiopian Jews in the past, his argument with Eshkol and his desire to set up at least one settlement for them in Israel which would give them hope. In his opinion, some of the religious demands presented to Ethiopian Jews were excessive. They needed to learn Hebrew and to adopt the usual Jewish calendar, but there was no reason to ask them to adopt the customs of Polish Jews.

For Ben-Zvi’s position, see also Document 2, Chaim Gvaryahu to Knesset members Avraham Herzfeld and Michael Hazani, 13/5/1958, File PRES-10/10)

א.5 | Aid to the Ethiopian Jews or political and security interests in Africa?

In the late 1950s, Israel strengthened its strategic ties with Ethiopia in the framework of the “Peripheral Alliance,” which sought to establish security cooperation with non-Arab and non-Muslim countries on the fringes of the Middle East, such as Iran and Turkey. The aim was to balance the pan-Arab policy of Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser. With the opening of the port of Eilat for trade after the Sinai Campaign, this alliance helped to secure the Red Sea as a free and open maritime channel for shipping goods to Israel, especially oil from Iran, a vital strategic need. Israel also provided Ethiopia with development aid and had close relations with the security forces. Foreign Ministry documents held in the ISA express the fears of the ministry’s directors that pressure on the emperor and the Ethiopian government to allow Jews to emigrate, or even discussing the issue, could jeopardize political and security relations with them. The Ethiopian authorities opposed special help for the Jews and demanded assistance to the entire population. Yeshayahu’s 1958 report also noted the government’s opposition to Jewish emigration and singling them out for special help, and explained it by the multiplicity of ethnic groups  and religions in the country and the fear that giving the Jews preference would encourage claims by Muslims and separatist groups (ibid., P. 40).

In the early 1960s, the former Mapai MK and writer, Haim Ben-Asher, visited Ethiopia and reported on the atmosphere of depression among the community and increasing pressure from the authorities to convert to Christianity. After encountering an employee of the Israeli building company, ‘Solel Boneh’ who spoke of the Jews with contempt and suggested solving their problem by mass conversion, Ben-Asher added that some wonder whether the decision not to bring them to Israel was not related to their skin colour. In a letter to Yosef Carmel, President Ben-Zvi’s military aide, he also described the negative attitude of Israeli consul Hanan Bar-On to the community, and his view that “Faitlovitch put it into their heads that they are Jews” (Document 3, File PRES-10/10 pp. 56-54).

Following Ben-Asher’s report, Ben-Zvi put pressure on the Foreign Ministry and summoned the director-general, Haim Yahil, to a meeting. Moshe Sasson, director of the Middle East Department, described it to Bar-On (May 6, 1960, File MFA 440/9, pp. 346-350). The president argued that “it is impossible for us to help black Africa, but to discriminate against African Jews,” and demanded that the consulate in Ethiopia should not wash its hands of the Jews and should allow them to be employed by Israeli companies. It should try to help them discreetly so as not to harm either the Jews themselves or relations with Ethiopia

Ben-Zvi’s reference to Israel’s assistance to “black” Africa points to another trend in Israeli foreign policy at that time – the attempt to establish ties with African countries which were being liberated from colonial rule and to offer them aid. Golda Meir, who served as Foreign Minister at the time, was very much identified with this trend and frequently visited Africa. A few days after the conversation with Ben-Zvi, she met with the JDC representative in Europe to discuss assistance to Jews in Ethiopia (File MFA 440/9, p. 352). (See also the ISA volume on Prime Minister Golda Meir (in Hebrew), edited by Hagai Tsoref, Chapter 66).

Ben-Zvi continued his efforts and in December 1960 met with Shmuel (Ziama) Divon, the assistant to the foreign minister (who would be appointed Israel’s first ambassador in Addis Ababa in 1963), and Rahamim Timor, his assistant, who had served as deputy consul in the city. Divon and Timor told Ben-Zvi that the emperor had very little influence over events in the provinces far from the capital. Timor supported the establishment of a Jewish school in the capital itself and not in Gondar, whose governor raised many difficulties. As for the plan for a settlement for Ethiopian immigrants in Israel, Timor emphasized the enormous difficulties in obtaining exit permits because Ethiopia “is a police state in the full sense of the word” (Document 4, File PRES 10/11, pp. 186-182).

Meanwhile, Norman Bentwich, the former Attorney General of Mandatory Palestine and a retired professor at the Hebrew University, who had been close to Haile Selassie during World War II, was asked to visit Ethiopia and to meet with the emperor to prepare the ground for the establishment of a vocational school by the ORT network. The visit took place in early 1961 (see Document 5,  Report in File MFA 440/9), following which the “Public Committee for Aid to the Falashas” was established, with the participation of the Jewish Agency and ORT, which later changed its name to the “Israeli Committee for Ethiopian Jewry”. President Ben-Zvi served as honorary president of the committee, and after his death in 1963, he was replaced by President Zalman Shazar. The chairman was the representative of the World Jewish Congress, the sociologist Aryeh Tartakover. British Jewish organizations, especially the Jewish Colonization Organization (JCA), recruited by Bentwich, began to support the Ethiopian school network. They also sought to provide medical services in Jewish villages so that they would not need to use medical services provided by the missionaries (File MFA 440/9, p. 289).

The many delays in carrying out the plans and the unfulfilled promises, led to bitterness and disappointment among the Jews. Yona Bugala, who continued to receive a salary from the Jewish Agency and to pay the teachers and instructors who remained, sent reports to the agency which were forwarded to Ben-Zvi. In August 1962, he wrote to Haim Ben- Asher and protested against the rabbinate’s treatment of young people from Ethiopia who managed to reach Israel. He explicitly stated that the basis for their attitude was not a religious problem but racism, similar to the situation in Nazi Germany or the southern United States: “Our unfortunate people will feel that they are hated on the one hand [in Ethiopia] because of their religion and on the other hand [in Israel] because of their colour” (Document 6, File PRES-10/11, p. 313)

Reports on despair among members of the community and further calls for urgent assistance led to a general sense of failure among the activists at the end of 1962. The Kfar Batya initiative also ended in disappointment. From a letter written by Avraham Halperin, the chief religious inspector of Youth Aliyah, we learn that the trainees were not re-absorbed in Ethiopia upon their return and some were even forced to return to the missionary institutions. Others found work in Israeli companies active in Ethiopia. Some wanted to return to Israel, but without official recognition of their right to immigrate, they faced many obstacles (File PRES 10/11, pp. 346-342). Halperin’s conclusion was that “bringing these trainees to Israel without a plan for their future did them a great injustice. On the one hand they raised them greatly above the level of their brethren there and on the other hand they were not promised a suitable future.” Halperin did not see much chance of their being absorbed in Israel.

א.6 | Medical assistance to the Jews

At the end of 1962, Dr. Dan Harel left for Ethiopia. Harel was officially sent by the World Jewish Congress, but in fact received a salary from the Centre for International Cooperation (MASHAV) at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Divon, now ambassador in Addis Ababa, wrote to Moshe Kol, director of the Youth Aliyah Department, on July 23, 1963, about the difficulties facing Harel and those trying to help the Jews. He reiterated the criticism of the activities of the Jewish Agency in Ethiopia and the damage caused by giving special help to the Jews to their relations with their non-Jewish neighbours (Document 7, File MFA 3406/18).

Once again, Prof. Bentwich’s intervention with the emperor was needed, together with appeals to ministers,  especially to  a minister of Jewish descent, Tadessa Yaakov, and even to the local governor in Gondar himself,  to obtain the necessary permits for Harel. The local governor insisted that a clinic was opened for all residents of the area. But in the end Harel managed to overcome the difficulties and to form good relations with the governor (Document 8, ibid.).

n August 1963, a meeting was held of the senior staff of the Foreign Ministry, which reiterated the previous view that help for the Jews should be “of a general Jewish and non-Israeli nature” (File MFA 440/9, p. 157). In the summer of that year, David Tzafroni, a teacher of agriculture, arrived in Ethiopia. In a report submitted in November 1963 (ibid., Pp. 21-16), Tzafroni emphasized that farming methods in Ethiopia were very primitive, but any improvement led to negative reactions from the neighbours, lawsuits, unrest and concern among the authorities. In May 1966, Bentwich again visited Ethiopia and held talks with the emperor and other officials. The report of his visit (in file 440/8, pp. 113-112) indicates an attempt by the Israeli embassy in Addis Ababa to prevent the publication of a plan for agricultural settlement of Ethiopian Jews in Israel.

Report from Dr. Dan Harel to Prof. Tartakower on his work in Gondar, November 1962. File N 10/11 p. 331

א.7 | "Who is a Jew": a summary

By now the Israeli Committee and the Jewish organizations for Ethiopian Jews abroad understood that without a decision in principle by the authorized bodies to recognize the community as Jews the benefit from their efforts was questionable. A meeting on this subject was held in January 1965, followed by a letter from Yoav Biran of the Africa Department in the Foreign Ministry to Tartakover, explaining that it was not the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that prevented the immigration of Jews, but the “competent institutions”, that is, the Ministry of the Interior and the Chief Rabbinate (in File  MFA 3547/21).

During the 1950s and 60s the question “Who is a Jew?” and the right of the rabbinate to determine Judaism according to the status quo agreement were the subject of heated discussion. The young people from Ethiopia who were brought to Kfar Batya underwent a symbolic conversion ceremony on the advice of the Chief Rabbinate. In 1966, the issue of the religious status of Ethiopian immigrants came up in the media and the courts. A young man who had immigrated from Ethiopia in 1956, Benjamin Getia, wanted to marry an Israeli girl. When required to undergo a symbolic conversion, he refused, arguing that a Jew could not convert. The affair was published in the press and a question was asked in the Knesset (Document 9, File MFA 4485/2, p. 43). In 1968, the case came up in the Supreme Court. The tribunal ruled in favour of the Chief Rabbinate, and Getia married in a private ceremony.

There was some change in the Foreign Ministry’s approach in 1968 when Uri Lubrani became ambassador in Addis Ababa. Lubrani claimed that Bentwich and Tartakover’s role in dealing with the problem was ineffective. As long as the Jews did not intend to immigrate to Israel, there were ways to help them with the knowledge of the authorities. The Ministry should do more, especially in connection with a plan to settle Ethiopian Jews on land near the Sudanese border  then on the agenda (Document 10, File MFA 4175/24, pp. 278-275). According to a report by Yochanan Bein of the Africa Department, the plan  attracted the attention of senior officials in Israel,  including Foreign Minister Abba Eban, Dr. Nahum Goldman, leader of the World Zionist Organization and the World Jewish Congress, Eliahu Elath (representating the JCA) and Dr. Israel Goldstein (Keren Hayesod). However, there were also reservations about the security of the Jews in the border area, since most of the population there was Muslim, and about health dangers since malaria was endemic. The JCA agreed to support the project only on condition that ownership of the land or a long-term lease would be guaranteed (ibid., P. 242).

After Bentwich’s death in 1971, Dr. Israel Goldstein continued his work. In England the managing director of the influential newspaper “Jewish Chronicle” David Kessler, set up a Standing Committee to co-ordinate the various organizations’ activities and helped the settlement plan (File MFA 6737/12). New personalities in Israel joined the Committee for Ethiopian Jews, including Ruth Dayan, wife of Defence Minister Moshe Dayan, Zimna Barhani, who had managed to return to Israel, and Sergeant-Major Hezi Ovadia, a member of a Yemenite family from Asmara who immigrated in the 1930s and a well-known figure in the regular army. Ovadia even took on the task of getting recognition of the immigrants as Jews (Document 11, letter to the Chief Rabbinate, File GL 15793/6).

After twenty years of attempts to provide educational and medical aid to the community by Israel and Jewish organizations around the world, there was no real change in the situation of the Ethiopian Jews. The attempts were limited and inconsistent. The settlement plan on the Sudanese border also ended in failure. After several groups of young people from Gondar left for the area, they were unable to establish a permanent settlement there (see File MFA 2925/22). However, the efforts invested, along with the activities of local leaders, led to the spread of knowledge of Hebrew among the community and familiarity with customs and prayers accepted in Israel, and a small group of Jews managed to reach Israel without official help. They laid the groundwork for the new era that would begin with the turnaround in the Rabbinate’s position in 1973.

Yona Bugala with the headmaster of one of the schools, 1969. File PRES 430/6

Sources used:

Dov Goldflam, Between the Jewish Agency and the Foreign Ministry, lecture, December 2020

Haggai Erlich, Alliance and Alienation, Ethiopia and Israel in the Days of Haile Selassie, Red Sea Press, 2014

Meital Regev, Deciding not to Decide: Israel’s Policy towards the Falashas, 1948-1973, M.A. thesis, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev,  2014.