Shavei Israel flies 102 Bnei Menashe home
One-hundred-two members of the Indian Bnei Menashe Jewish community arrived at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport this week, brought on aliyah by Shavei Israel.
The new immigrants all hail from the northeastern Indian state of Mizoram, which borders Burma and Bangladesh and is home to the second-largest concentration of Bnei Menashe in India after that of the state of Manipur. This marks the first time since January 2014 that Bnei Menashe are making aliyah from Mizoram. They all plan to settle in Nazareth Illit, which already has a flourishing Bnei Menashe community.
The Bnei Menashe are believed to be descendants of the tribe of Manasseh, one of the Ten Lost Tribes exiled from the Land of Israel more than 2,700 years ago by the Assyrian empire. So far, some 3,000 Bnei Menashe have made aliyah thanks to Shavei Israel, including more than 1,100 in the past four years.
Some 7,000 Bnei Menashe remain in India waiting for the chance to return home to Zion.
Shavei Israel is a Jerusalem-based nonprofit organization founded by Michael Freund, who immigrated to Israel from the United States with the aim of strengthening the ties between the Jewish people, the State of Israel and the descendants of Jews around the world.
The organization is currently active in more than a dozen countries and provides assistance to a variety of communities such as the Bnei Menashe of India, the Bnei Anousim (referred to by the derogatory term “Marranos” by historians) in Spain, Portugal and South America, the Subbotnik Jews of Russia, the Jewish community of Kaifeng in China, descendants of Jews living in Poland, and others.
“Over the course of the coming year, with G-d’s help, we will bring a total of more than 700 Bnei Menashe immigrants to Israel – the largest-ever airlift in a single year,” Freund said. He added: “After 27 centuries of exile, this lost tribe of Israel is truly coming home. But we will not rest until all the remaining Bnei Menashe still in India are able to make aliyah as well.”
Source: Shavei.org
