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News out of Ethiopia and its ongoing civil war in recent weeks has been fearful, with accounts of war crimes by all sides and a severe threat of famine in the north as rebels fighting the government close in on the capital, Addis Ababa.
With the situation so perilous, concerns have increased for the communities of Ethiopian Jews and descendants of Jews who remain in the country, with many Ethiopian-Israeli families becoming increasingly worried about the safety of their relatives. https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/are-the-jews-of-ethiopia-in-danger-684778.
Apparently 8,000 such Jews are stranded in the north and Addis Ababa, waiting to immigrate to Israel for years. Known as Falash Mura, their right to settle in Israel, however,is a contentious issue as their background rules out automatic citizenship available to most Jews. However, they have only been allowed to emigrate to Israel on a case-by-case basis, and thousands remain in camps in Ethiopia.
The Falash Mura community descends from members of the Beta Israel who were converted to Christianity by European missionaries in the late 1800s. They have since returned to practising Judaism but are not officially recognised by Israel's interior ministry as fully Jewish. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-54501546
The issue of whether they should be allowed to come to Israel at all is a divisive one, even among Ethiopian Jews in Israel. While some Ethiopian Jews in Israel support their right to settle there, others object, seeing them as non-Jewish Ethiopians.
Opponents of their immigration to Israel claim those stranded in the camps are mostly relatives of converts with little connection to Judaism. And once they immigrate, the relatives of the relatives will want to come, turning the immigration from Ethiopia into a never-ending saga, they say.
Many Ethiopian-Israelis and their supporters say that large numbers of those who converted to Christianity did so under duress, and that they remained in separate communities in Ethiopia and maintained their traditions. They accuse their critics and the Israeli government of racism and discrimination, as actively encouraging Jewish immigration, from wealthier countries and biased against poor Ethiopian Jews.
READ MORE: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/12/world/middleeast/israel-ethiopia-jews-immigration.html