Recently purchased in northern Lebanon at an antique dealership. The second picture is from a Church which was certainly a Synagogue in the past catering to Lebanon’s Jewish sons.
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It has been 1 year since the launch of this website and we hope to continue this endeavor for as many years as it takes until a new reality surfaces in Lebanon- genuine national unity where all Lebanese citizens reserve the right to live freely, openly, and with dignity regardless of their religious persuasion.
Lebanon is a nation built by minorities for minorities and shall remain as such. We must remain steadfast and unwavering in our beliefs, our values, for they are universal values applicable to any citizen in this world.
A great man once said, when working towards righteousness, “First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win”. We are already successful because we have laid the foundations for this unparalleled undertaking, and in due time, we hope we will continue moving forward with the establishment of an NGO based in Beirut which is the only avenue towards triumph.
In only one year we have caught the eye of major international press, whether Time Magazine or An-Nahar Newspaper, we have proved this project is relevant to all citizens of the world and not specific primarily to Lebanon. The message of love, tolerance, and coexistence must be replenished and protected in the land of the cedars, the land of coexistence- Lebanon. Initially this project was attacked and shamed, but we have proved with time what we really stand for. Not any form of ignorance or hatred can shake the rock we call www.thejewsoflebanon.org
With more determination, ambition, and inspiration, I vow to continue spearheading this project until the new reality surfaces in Lebanon. A country for all, a message for the world.
Aaron-Micaël Beydoun
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Tiny Jewish community lives on in Beirut
From Agence France-Presse - 26/04/1998
Nayla Razzouk
BEIRUT, April 26 (AFP) - A tiny community of elderly Jews continues to live on in Beirut, quietly celebrating feasts and prayers at home, heedless of virulent anti-Jewish feeling and decades of violence pitting Arabs against Jews in the Middle East.
“They are mostly old people living quietly, a few businessmen and a handful of families with children,” said Toufik Yedid, secretary of the Jewish Council, who turns 84 this year.
Yedid, the only member of the tiny Jewish community who agreed to speak, said however that Jews in Lebanon were never subject to “official repression” as in some other Arab countries.
“Some unfortunate incidents happened to Jews, but we did not take it personally because many people associate Jews with Israel, which is a totally wrong perception,” he said.
Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri said earlier this week that his country was officially still at war with Israel, which first invaded its northern neighbour 20 years ago.
“We are Lebanese, but we just happen to be Jewish. We are one of the 19 officially recognized communities in Lebanon,” Yedid said of the some 95 Jews who live in Beirut’s Christian eastern suburbs.
“Jews in Lebanon? I didn’t know there were still Jews in Lebanon,” said businesswoman Shereen Salem, 34, echoing the reaction of many Lebanese.
“If this is true, then they must be living in complete hiding or there must only be a handful of them because they are really invisible in society.”
The Jewish community numbered more than 10,000 in the 1940s, but a massive exodus, mostly toward Europe and the United States, began after the 1948 creation of Israel and throughout the 1967 and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars.
“Very few Jews went to Israel, but most of them did not stay there for social and economic reasons,” said Yedid.
At the onset of the 15-year civil war in 1975, about 3,000 Jews were still living in Lebanon, but a last wave of departures occurred after the 1984-1985 abduction of 11 Jews by militias in Moslem-dominated west Beirut.
“Four of them were killed and their bodies were recovered. We know that thousands of Lebanese are also missing, but like other communities we are still concerned about the fate of the remaining missing seven,” said Yedid.
Yedid says he is not afraid to stay in Lebanon, but admits that “life in Beirut is difficult for us.”
“We have not had a rabbi since 1975, but we still hold Sabbath prayers and celebrate our feasts quietly in our homes with Kosher meat, wine and matzo (unleavened bread) imported from Syria or Europe,” he said.
Yedid sighed sadly when asked about the 16 synagogues that once existed in Lebanon and the abandoned Jewish cemetery on the former Green Line that once separated warring Christian and Moslem militias in Beirut.
“The synagogues are destroyed but we hope to rebuild them, especially the Magen Abraham synagogue, the only one spared by the bulldozers reconstructing Beirut,” he said.
After a safari-like drive into Wadi Abou Jmil — Beirut’s former Jewish neighborhood in the war-devastated city center — and once clouds of dust from the rough terrain clear, determined visitors can reach the synagogue.
Ironically, the synagogue, once taken over by squatters, suffered most of its damage from Israeli shells during the Jewish state’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon.
But the synagogue, with Hebrew inscriptions on its facade and a shattered red-tiled roof, has been walled up by the Jewish Council who fear further damage.
A young Jewish businessman who did not wish to be named said he had “no problem in dealing with all Lebanese, even Hezbollah because they consider me Lebanese like them”.
The Shiite Moslem Hezbollah spearheads the guerrilla war to oust Israel out of southern Lebanon and staunchly opposes making peace with the Jewish state.
“I am confident that many Lebanese Jews who have left want to return home once peace is reached in the region,” said Yedid.
“It will be very difficult for Jews to return, but nothing is impossible. Beirut schools once had Jewish, Moslem and Christian students sitting side by side,” said Sana Idriss, a Sunni Moslem woman in her 70s, recalling her childhood memories.”
Religious Tomb of Zebulun
Interior of Synagogue
Copyright © Marie-Claire Feghali/An-Nahar Newspaper Beirut
Lebanese Jews Living in Fear
HALA JABER
(AP) _ The few Jews remaining in Beirut say they live in fear and confusion because of the kidnappings of four Jewish men in west Beirut, where the Jewish community had always lived in peace with Moslems.
“”I am a Lebanese Jew and have lived in Lebanon all my life,” said one woman. “”I still cannot understand the reason behind it, but I must admit I am scared.”
“”What relation have we with the Israelis?” asked another woman. “”What is it to do with us? I don’t understand.”
The women, speaking on condition of anonymity out of fear of being singled out by the kidnappers, were interviewed in Wadi Abu Jamil, once the thriving Jewish quarter of west Beirut, where most residents are Moslems.
During the 1950s Lebanon’s Jewish population was estimated at about 9,000. Many Jews came to Lebanon because of anti-Jewish fervor in other Arab countries over the creation of Israel.
Judaism is one of 17 religions officially recognized by the Lebanese government. During anti-Zionist demonstrations in the late 1940s, Lebanese police were posted in Wadi Abu Jamil to protect its Jewish residents.
When Lebanon became headquarters for the Palestine Liberation Organization in the late 1960s, many Jews fled. More left during or after Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in September, 1982.
Now Wadi Abu Jamil’s decaying apartment houses are occupied mostly by Shiite Moslem squatters forced from their own homes by Lebanon’s long civil war. The synagogue is closed.
Mary Jamous, whose kidnapped husband is the secretary to the head of the Jewish community, estimated there are 200 Jews, “”no more,” left in Lebanon.
Her 51-year-old husband, Salim Murad Jamous, was kidnapped eight months ago. A month earlier, another Jewish leader, Raoul Mizrachi, 54, was abducted and later found slain in Beirut’s Shiite-populated southern suburbs.
Neither of those crimes aroused as much fear as the seizure of the four Jews in just three days in late March.
The last victim was Ishaq Sassoun, 65, the leader of the Jewish community, who was taken at gunpoint March 31 on his way from the airport after a trip to Abu Dhabi, one of Arab emirates on the Persian Gulf.
Earlier, kidnappers had seized Elie Hallak, a doctor in his 50s; Haim Cohen, a 39-year-old Iranian Jew, and Elie Srour, 68, a Lebanese.
A previously unheard of group calling itself the National Resistance Arm, National Liberation Faction claimed responsibility for the killing of Mizrachi, but no group has said it carried out the other kidnappings.
Mrs. Jamous said she did not know “”which party or group” kidnapped her husband, “”nor can I think of a reason for his kidnapping.”
“”All my neighbors are Shiites and we are on good terms with them. They like us and have nothing against us,” she said.
“”We stayed when the Palestinians were here, and we had no trouble with them, later with the Syrians and then with the Israelis,” she said. “”We never thought of leaving.”
Mrs. Jamous and several of the other Jewish women linked the kidnappings to the Israel’s invasion and its occupation of south Lebanon, from which it is now withdrawing.
“”Since Israel invaded, this country has been a mess,” Mrs. Jamous said.
An aunt of her husband said, “”We, like any Lebanese, hid in shelters during the Israeli invasion and saw none of them. I do not speak Hebrew. I speak only Arabic.”
Lily, a 70-year-old woman, said she was frightened because armed militiamen had come several times to ask her to leave her house so Shiite refugee families from south Lebanon could live in it.
“”I can’t do that because I have no where to go and no one to turn to,” she said. “”The last time they came, I cried and begged with them so hard I fainted and then they left and said they won’t ask for the house any more.
“”But,” she added, “”these days I live in constant fear that one of these nights they might break into the house and do something to me.”
The women also spoke of their confusion, not only at the kidnappings but at their situation as Jews in the Arab world.
“”It is not our fault that we were born Jews,” Mrs. Jamous said, adding that Jews no longer held religious services in Wadi Abu Jamil.
Another woman, who said she had been a teacher in the Druse village of Aley until 1983 civil war battles there, said she could not understand the kidnappings because the victims were neither rich nor political figures.
“”I have never been threatened or insulted or treated differently because I am a Jew,” she said. “”I wish that whoever is doing all this kidnapping will explain their motives and demands. If there is a regulation or law that says we have to leave the country, then we would. But at least let us know about it.”
(Copyright 1985. The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
Date: 09/04/1985
Publication: The Associated Press
Jewish Leader Abducted
Beirut
Police said yesterday that unidentified gunmen abducted the head of Lebanon’s Jewish community on Sunday, forced him into a car and drove off.
The man, Ishaq Sassoun, 65, worked for a Lebanese company. He was the fourth Jew to be abducted in West Beirut in the last three days.
Police believe the kidnapings may be linked to the fighting in southern Lebanon between the Israeli occupation forces and the Moslem Shiite underground.
About a hundred Jews live in West Beirut. Most Lebanese Jews emigrated after the Arab-Israeli war of 1967, mostly to Israel. Others went to the United States and Canada.
Sassoun had just arrived from a visit to the United Arab Emirates and was on his way home from the airport when the kidnapers intercepted him, the police said.
The other Jews were kidnaped over the weekend in the Wadi Abu Jamil neighborhood. Police identified them as Elie Hallak, Elie Srour and Haim Cohen, an Iranian Jew.
About 7500 Jews lived in Wadi Abu Jamil neighborhood before the exodus. They used to be recognized as one of 17 religious communities in Lebanon and were assigned one seat in the 99-member parliament. Now the neighborhood is inhabited by Kurds.
In a related development, a Dutch Jesuit priest who disappeared 16 days ago was found dead at the bottom of a well in eastern Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, a Jesuit spokesman said yesterday.
The priest, the Rev. Nicholas Kluiters, 43, was one of 11 Westerners who have disappeared or been kidnaped in Lebanon this year, and one of six in the past month.
A police report said the body of a “badly decomposed” man was found near where Kluiters was believed to have been kidnaped on March 14. “Unfortunately, we are now certain it is him,” a Jesuit spokesman in Beirut said.
No one claimed responsibility for his disappearance.
Early today, a French Embassy official said kidnapers have released Gilles Peyrolles, a French diplomat who was abducted almost two weeks ago in the north Lebanese city of Tripoli.
“He has been freed and is in good health,” the official said. He would not say where Peyrolles is.
New York Times
(Copyright 1985)
Date: 02/04/1985
Publication: The San Francisco Chronicle