Lost Jews group shifts focus to Galilee
Following criticism from left-wing politicians, the immigration-assistance group Shavei Israel has stopped settling immigrants in the West Bank, directing them to the Galilee instead.
“We did it to stop ideological issues from blinding people to our cause,” says Michael Freund, the U.S.-born founder and president of the nongovernmental organization, which focuses on bringing back lost Jewish communities around the world into the fold of Judaism. “We saw that even though our activity in reality had nothing to do with politics, we still had to break out of being viewed as some kind of right-wing organization,” he added. Advertisement
Shavei Israel was founded by Freund in 2004 and is funded by private donations. It has a permanent staff of a dozen educators and rabbinic figures in its Jerusalem head office and a similar-sized group of employees and emissaries working in nine different countries. One of the group’s major projects has been facilitating the immigration into Israel of 1,500 members of the Bnei Menashe – people from northeast India who claim descent from one of the Lost Tribes of Israel.
“The last 450 Bnei Menashe we’ve brought have all gone to live in Ma’alot, Karmiel and Upper Nazareth,” says Freund. But the previous 1,000 Bnei Menashe who arrived went to live in settlements. “We got flack for this,” he says. “Most of our problems have come from certain people on the left.”
According to Freund, placing Bnei Menashe in settlements was a purely pragmatic decision. “While studying here for a year for their conversion, the Bnei Menashe are on a tourist visa and not eligible for any government assistance or support,” he explains. The only places willing to offer support, Freund says, were settlements. “We tried in places like Dimona and Mitzpeh Ramon. They were happy to have more people, but they didn’t have the resources to take them in.”
‘Caesarea, Hadera, wherever’
Freund, who immigrated to Israel in 1995 from New York and now lives in Ra’anana, recalls a conversation in Hebrew with former interior minister Ophir Paz-Pines of Labor, who called the housing pattern of the Bnei Menashe “a delirious ruse undertaken by rightists to fill settlements,” according to Freund. “I didn’t understand his objections, but I offered that to sign a document saying he would decide where they go,” says Freund. “Caesarea, Hadera, wherever. I told him we just want to bring them to Israel. But it’s hard to break out of how everything is political in many people’s minds.”
The founder of Shavei Israel concedes he expected more resistance from the hardline religious establishment than the left-wing because they have more conservative views toward conversion. “Our relations with the rabbinate are actually quite good,” he says.
It was the story of the Bnei Menashe that launched Freund on his path. Sitting as a kosher cafe in Ra’anana, he says he first heard about them while working at the Prime Minister’s Office in media relations during Benjamin Netanyahu’s first stint as premier. In dealing with immigrants with exotic appearances, Freund says he has come to see “a shocking aspect” of Israeli society. “I didn’t grow up in this society, so I was surprised to see a lot of racist sentiment. Even in circles that deem themselves liberal and enlightened, many make disparaging and improper comments.”
He cites comments by the incumbent interior minister, Kadima’s Meir Sheetrit. When Sheetrit, who was born in the small village of Ksar El-Suk in southern Morocco, was appointed as minister, he warned against making Israel “a foreign legion nation” by accepting “various refugees claiming to be Jewish.” Sheetrit, according to Freund, “is no fan” of Shavei Israel. “I very much hope the change in government will mean good things for our activities,” Freund says.
For its own part, Shavei Israel tries to be careful not to get carried away by its mission to find lost Jews, according to Freund. “Whenever Shavei Israel goes into a new community, skepticism is our point of departure. It’s very easy to get swept away and start finding Jews wherever one wants to. We have to be very careful, because there are of course people who are motivated by economic factors. But that doesn’t mean we should shy away from it.”
With recent data indicating that assimilation among Western Jews is as high as 70 percent in some countries, Freund hesitantly says that bringing back so called “lost-Jews” is not “the answer to assimilation, but it’s one of the answers.” He explains, “You can’t look at it quantitatively, but if a serious effort is undertaken, we can definitely bring back tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands.”
According to Freund, there are another 7,000 Bnei Menashe in India waiting to immigrate. Another 15,000 Subbotnik Jews – descendants of Russian peasants who converted to Judaism over 200 years ago – could yield some immigrants, along with some Polish “hidden Jews” from the Holocaust.
But the group with the biggest potential is the Bnei Anusim – descendants of Jews from Spain, Portugal and South America who were forcibly converted to Christianity during the Spanish Inquisition era. “If only 10 percent of Bnei Anusim come back, it will be a return of large numbers of people,” he says. “There is a reason to work there.”