Yahya Yousuf al-Marhabi idly breaks off leaves from a branch of qat and adds them to the walnut-sized ball of pulp puffing up his cheek. As he sits on the carpeted floor of his living room, the television facing him shows Yemeni soldiers loading an artillery shell into a cannon and firing it toward rebel positions in the hills that surround his former home, Sa’ada. When an on-air reporter mentions the name of the rebel leader — the recently killed Abdul Malik al-Houthi — al-Marhabi spits.
“Dog,” he mutters under his breath.
Al-Marhabi has reason to dislike al-Houthi: In January 2007, Shi’ite rebels loyal to al-Houthi forced al-Marhabi and his entire community to flee their homes in the north of Yemen, near the Saudi border, under cover of darkness. Taking with them only what they could carry on their backs, the Jews of Sa’ada left their mud brick homes in that ancient walled desert city to take up residence in Yemen’s capital as wards of the government.
Al-Marhabi is the rabbi and leader of this band of refugees — some of the last remaining Jews in Yemen — and it has been three years since these Jews have seen the village in which their ancestors have lived for centuries.
Now, says 24-year-old Abdallah bin Suleiman Marhabi, the rabbi’s cousin, “There’s nothing for me there. They took everything after we left, and then destroyed our homes.”
The death threats that forced the Jews of Sa’ada to flee did not come from a group related to Al Qaeda — a growing movement in Yemen that has commanded world attention by taking responsibility for the attempted Christmas Day bombing of a Northwest Airlines plane en route to Detroit. In fact, Al Qaeda, a militant Sunni group, counts Shi’ite Muslims like al-Houthi among those they hate. But the al-Houthi rebellion has been no less devastating for the Sa’ada Jews for all that. And the government, until now, has seen this rebellion, rather than Al Qaeda, as the primary threat to its shaky sovereignty over a mountainous desert land rife with armed tribal groups that have complex and shifting relations with each other, with Al Qaeda and with the government.
Sana’a, Yemen’s capital, is one of the few places where the government exercises unchallenged sovereignty. So, when the Jews of Sa’ada fled their village, it was to here they came. The government stepped in to provide them with homes, food allowances and a modest monthly stipend to sustain them and their basic needs. They number 67 people, split among seven large families.
The Jews’ situation is one of stagnation: They do not work, as they cannot afford the start-up costs for their businesses. Many of them are silversmiths, some are carpenters and mechanics. All require expensive equipment.
And so they sit. They spend their days chewing qat, a habit-forming stimulant whose use among Yemenis is ubiquitous. It is this atmosphere of stagnation that breeds talk of emigration among some of the younger men and women in the Jewish community who contemplate better options in Israel or America. To address this problem, and provide incentives for community members to stay, the Yemeni government is currently in negotiations to provide them with start-up capital for their businesses.
The government may be supportive, but in Yemen, antisemitism runs deep. Jews are routinely singled out in sermons as an easy target for vitriol, a scapegoat to turn attention away from the problems of the here and now. But the Jews in Yemen brush off the hatred of those sermons with nonchalance and an air of aloof exemption, as though the hatred applies only to foreign Jews, not to Yemenis. Most Muslim Yemenis have never met a Jew, and so they are excited and amazed to learn that indigenous Jews still live in Yemen, speaking the same dialect as Muslims. It seems that for many Yemenis, the antisemitic notions that are taught from early on somehow do not apply to the Jews in Yemen, who are seen as countrymen and friends — though not, apparently, by the al-Houthis.
Al-Marhabi is the lynchpin of Jewish life here: He is the only one who knows the laws of kosher slaughter, circumcision and many other basic services needed for a Jewish community to survive. He is also fiercely proud to be Yemeni. He wears a Yemeni flag upon his lapel, and boasts of his personal friendship with Yemen’s president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, of whom he speaks in glowing terms.
“There is no place like Yemen,” he tells a visitor. “Not in America, not in Israel, it is just not the same. When the people of Yemen say, ‘We don’ want a single Jew here,’ I will go, but until that day, Yemen is my home, and it is where I will stay.”
Political instability has rarely spelled good news for Jews, and Yemen is no exception. With the revelation that Umar Farouk Abdulmuttalib, the accused would-be bomber of Flight 253, received training in Yemen, the country’s status as a terrorist hideout has, once again, put Yemen in the spotlight. With the insurrection in the north of the country, and a separatist movement in the south, the government’s resources are stretched thin.
But for all the country’s problems, in Yemen, al-Marhabi is special: Government ministers contact him for his opinion on various matters; journalists call him almost daily for quotes, and TV crews routinely set up in his living room, treating him as both a rare anomaly and a trusted confidant. He is, for many Yemenis, a “safe Jew,” one who sings the official party line, and issues anti-Zionist statements condemning the Israeli government.
What he often brings up, and what many forget, is that the Jews in Yemen are Arabs. Their native language is Arabic, and their dress, food and gender norms are culturally indistinguishable from “normal” Yemeni Muslims. They are the ones who have stayed when almost all their brethren left, for the most part for Israel. And most remain determined to stay: Yemen is their home, and the thought of having to reinvent themselves in America or Israel is daunting and unappealing to them. Their identity is that of Arabs, and they speak of Zionism and Zionist organizations with disdain. Centuries of sparse contact with the wider Jewish world have deepened this identity, and they view even the Ashkenazic, anti-Zionist Satmar Hasidim who come to court them with deep suspicion.
In fact, nearly 10 of them have studied in Israel, some for two years or longer, and have chosen to return to Yemen rather than stay in Israel.
The families of this community are particularly concerned about their children losing touch with their heritage and religious tradition, should they emigrate. Those who have gone to Israel and returned have told tales of scantily clad Israeli women, men without peyes who do not pray and the disintegration of traditional Yemeni Jewish life. Faced with a multitude of options in Israel, children are no longer bound to the Jewish community by default, and the retention rate within the community plummets. From this perspective, Yemen is a vastly more pious country, where the children will be raised with a strong and comprehensive Jewish education — in the distinctive Yemeni way.
Many involved in the process of bringing Jews to Israel, learning lessons from earlier Yemini immigration waves, took these concerns into consideration and offered the Yemenis placement in Orthodox communities and religious-education options for their children. Despite those offers, the holdouts still refuse to leave their homeland.
Still, no degree of fervor or love of country can delay the inevitable, and given their numbers, it is within our lifetime that this ancient community will disappear.
In this far-flung and forgotten corner of the map, the perseverance of the last Arab Jews dimly flickers. It is a land with an ancient Jewish presence that
was once ruled by a Jewish king — Yusuf Dhu Nuwas in the sixth century. Many tribes back then converted to Judaism, and even today there are tribes, long Muslim now, whose members are nevertheless aware of their descent from Jewish forbears.
Prior to the 1950s, Yemen had more than 50,000 Jews spread throughout the country, but with the creation of the State of Israel, the vast majority left, in a legendary operation known as Magic Carpet. Several thousand remained until the early 1990s, until they, too, left for Israel. Now, only a few hundred remain. Besides the 67 refugees from Sa’ada now living in the capital, fewer than 200 live in a small village called Raida, roughly two hours north of Sana’a. It was in Raida that a Jew named Moshe Yaish al-Nahari was murdered one year ago, gunned down in the street outside his home. His murder sparked a new exodus of Jews from the country.
But for al-Marhabi and the people who depend upon him, they will continue to exist as they have for a thousand years or more: protecting the traditions and passing on the Torah and Talmud from generation to generation. Despite their Arab cultural identity, their pride and patriotism, the Jews here will always be a community unto themselves, a vulnerable niche within, rather than an equal part of, the greater Yemeni society. Until the time of their departure, however, these few individuals are the last Mizrachi Jews in their indigenous context, and should they leave, a piece of Jewish life will be lost to the world.
Contact Josh Berer at feedback@forward.com.
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The Jews of Yemen do NOT have an Arabic identity; i.e. they do not see themselves as a part of the Arab ethnicity or peoplehood. Since the Jews of Yemen are a traditional community who know how to read and write only in Hebrew, I am quite certain that they define themselves only in traditional terms. That means that they have only a Jewish identity; i.e. they are a part of the Jewish peoplehood, and they see themselves as part of an ancient exiled nation.
The writer makes the mistake of referring to the Yemeni Jews as 'arab.' There is no such creature as an 'arab' Jew. Only if the person in question is an arab who has converted to Judaism would the term be correct. The original Jewish community was established by immigrants from ancient Judea and Samaria, long before islam appeared in the region. Unfortunately, the current Jewish inhabitants have absorbed the moslem culture which makes them very ill-prepared to function in a modern, non-moslem society.
Sounds like we need another airlift! Pray and support them, now.
What is the solution for the remaining Jews of Yemen? They are a flashpoint in the Arab-Israeli struggle and a thorn the native Arab Yemenis do not need in their struggle to keep Moslem jihadists from taking over the government. Israel and Yemen should come to a private agreement to send the remaining Yemeni Jews to Israel, whether they want it or not. This few people should not cause this much trouble, it's just not practical. Yet they are the only remaining link in the event between King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. they are the descendants of the traders that went back with her to establish trade routes for the King. They and their memories must be preserved and in Israel they can re-establish themselves in business and be self-supporting. There is already a large Yemeni Jewish population in Israel. This will be the Final Aliyah for the Jews of Yemen.
Yemeni Jews actually were part of the 1st Aliyah Emigration to Palestine began in 1881 and continued almost without interruption until 1914. 10% of Yemen's Jews came by choice in those early days and were well established in Israel long before 1948. They made a significant contribution to Israel's culture before many other groups arrived. They were among the the first true religious zionists. Some also emigrated to New York.
The airlift from Yemen which began in 1948 was actually called "On the Wings of Eagles" not Magic Carpet.
Operation On Wings of Eagles, an operation between June 1949 and September 1950 brought 49,000 Yemenite to the new state of , in a secret operation that was not made public until several months after it was over. The evacuees included about 43,000 Yemenites, more than 3,000 Adenis, and nearly 1,000 Habbanis (from Hadramawt). 500 Djibouti and Eritrean Jews - were also airlifted to Israel.
interesting that the Zionist commentators seek to define the identity of other Jews. If Jews live, as they did in their thousands before the Israeli state destroyed their way of life (& in Iraq planted a few bombs to help them on their way!)in Arab societies and speak Arabic, as they do, they are Arab. Sorry folks, I know it doesn't accord with your racist outlook on the world but that's the way things are.
Tony Greenstein, my in-laws are Iraqi Jews who traced their ancestry back in that country more than 1,000 years. Like most Iraqi jews they were forced to flee the country in the 1940's. They spoke arabic fluently, adopted arab dress and there was no aspect of Iraqi muslim culture which was foreign to them. None of them, or any of the numerous other Iraqi jews i know or the many Moroccan jews I know, would ever have considered themselves 'Arab' jews. Anyone suggesting same would have been regarded as hopelessly ignorant on all things arab/muslim and jewish. They were Iraqi Jews, plain and simple. The equally ancient, and descendants of the original inhabitants of the area, the Assyrians who also are not of arab origin, would educate you on the difference between themselves and arab Iraqis.
This is a wonderful factual-based response to someone who made the same mistake of regarding a separate ethic group, the Assyrians, as just being 'arab.'
http://www.ninevehsoft.com/fiorina.htm
Of course, in case anyone is confused by the previous typo, that should read 'separate ethnic group.'
Tony Greenstein: Those Jews who resided for generations in the many Arab nations across the Middle East may be referred to as "Arab Jews," but they are generally known as and are preferred to be described by their "nationality" combined with "Jews," such as Egyptian Jews or Syrian Jews.Your reference to the "Zionist" bias is merely an ignorant and uncalled for swipe at those who rebuilt the Jewish State.Furthermore,the position of the Jews in Arab society began to "deteriorate" when Islam began its march under the sword in the 7th century CE.Islam did not wait for the return of the Jewish state. I would urge you to walk - no run - to the nearest library to do some serious reading.
Under Islam the Jews could live decently, as long as they acknowledged Islamic superiority. Some Jews had high posts in Moslem courts but no one was allowed to forget who was "boss". While they may have adopted local dress and some customs, they never forgot they were Jews and not Moslems. Sometimes evil would break out and there would be pogroms, then all would go back to normal. This seemed to happen everywhere and the worst was the Holocaust perpetrated by Nazi Germany. A certain degree of assimilation was allowed so they would not stand out too much but the line was drawn on both sides. Egyptian Jews, Syrian Jews - there was a more general title under Oriental or Separdic or in the case of the Iberian peninsula, the Ladino Jews. Yet we are found in India, South Africa, South America. The Yemeni Jews have a long, long proud history. I'd like to see the final members come home at last to where we all began.
Maybe the Yemeni Jews, who don't want to leave, heard about the more than 1000 Yemeni children who disappeared from kibbutz dormitories in Israel in the '50s. The parents were told the children died during the night. Most likely the children were distributed to childless, post Holocaust adoptive parents. Only one was later found as an adult, in NY. Don't forget this betrayal of the Yemenis.
Actually, it was R. Yahya Yousuf al-Marhabi who referred to the Yemenite Jews as “Arabs.” I imagine choice of self-identity depends on the context. My guess is that Arabized Jews —yes, “Arabize” is a word— like R. Yahya Yousuf consider their Jewishness to be a tribal or supra-tribal identity that does not conflict with the national identity of being Yemeni or the cultural identity of being Arab.
Referring to some of the commentators as Zionists is accurate inasmuch they had commented on the need for the remaining Jews in Yemen to make aliyah. Suggesting that the State of Israel destroyed the way of life of such Arab Jews, on the other hand, is a swipe at Zionism, and an inaccurate one at that. Pan-Arabism and Arab nationalism did more to extirpate Judeo-Arab culture in most of the Middle East by redefining native Jewish populations as undesirable aliens and agents of foreign influence. Pan-Arabism and Arab nationalist movements existed long before modern Israel was founded.
Contrasting Yemeni Jews to “native Arab Yemenis” is kind of racist.
Operation Magic Carpet was an alternate name for Operation On Wings of Eagles. As many of the pilots were American, Operation Magic Carpet probably has more currency in the US than מבצע על כנפי נשרים.
I suspect that the author is reasonably correct in referring to the Jews still in Yemen as being "Arab Jews", or, probably more properly, "Arabic Jews". Just as I am an American Jew, one portion of my identity is with the nation-state that I reside in. I am certainly in large part culturally American. The Jews that still live in Yemen have got something going on that keeps them there; I'd have moved to Israel decades ago in similar circumstances.
The Christians of the Arab world were not regarded as "Arabs" per se until the late 19th century. Prior to that Arabs were defined by language, culture, and religion. Today we hear of Christian Arabs; many Christians embrace the identity, e.g., the late George Habash.
(Note, however, that being Arab has not mitigated the pressure on "Christian Arabs" to move on, move out. Bethlehem and Nazareth were, not long ago, majority Christian towns. They are both majority Muslim towns now.)
European style nationalism arrived in the Middle East in the 19th century; this led to a cultural reaction among the Arabs, and they began to define the term "Arab" in terms more national than religious. Jews, however, were apparently excluded from the term "Arab". I'm guessing that this is in part because Zionism arrived around the same time, and Jews themselves felt a different national pull than their Muslim and Christian neighbors. So it may well have been that Jews themselves opted out of the Arab national label rather than having been excluded. But then, perhaps it was the presence of Zionism that led the Arabs to exclude their Jewish neighbors.
In brief, I believe that there are "Arabic Jews", just as there are American Jews, French Jews, European Jews, Indian Jews, and so forth. But I don't think there are any "Jewish Arabs", for historical and cultural reasons.
For over 2000 years, Jews have been moving to countrys that would allow them to leave in peace and safety. And for that time, Jews have adopted the manners and customs of those countries.Yemeni Jews are not Arab Jews, just like American Jews are not Anglo-Saxon Jews. To call Yemani Jews Arab Jews is insulting, since "Arab" is a culture tied mostly by religion and traditions, not a country. My family is composed of Syrian Jews who came to Cuba during an Anti-Jewish uprising in 1921, when hundreds of Sysrian Jews were slaughtered. I was born in Cuba, so I was a Cuban Jew who spoke Spanish. Now I am an American Jew, not an Anglo-Saxon Jew.
Yemen is a very backward country and a failed state in every aspect. The Jews of Yemen should immigrate to Israel while they still can. Israel will warmly welcome them just as they have consistantly done with all other Jewish immigrants. The tens of thousands of Yeneni Jews who immigrated to Israel in the past have prospered and flourished and have become an integral part of the Israeli vibrant society. They owe this to themselves and their children.
Clearly there is no future for the Jews in Yemen.