The time has come

Help a Bnei Menashe to make aliyah now!

On her way to Israel?

We want to share with you some exciting news: the aliyah of the Bnei Menashe will soon resume!

Over the summer, we reported on the dramatic decision of Israel's Ministerial Committee on Immigration and Absorption to bring to the full cabinet a resolution permitting all of the remaining 7,232 Bnei Menashe still in India to make aliyah. This will allow them at last to join their 1,700 brethren already living in the Jewish state.

The cabinet is now slated to approve the final resolution in the coming weeks and, as early as mid-December, we will be able to bring the first group of 250-500 immigrants to Israel. These will be the first Bnei Menashe to arrive in Israel since 2007, when the previous government froze the aliyah.

While the State of Israel will pay for most (though not necessarily all) of the absorption costs, it appears that Shavei Israel will need to cover the rest, including transporting the immigrants to the Jewish state.

The amounts are substantial and we need your help to bring the Bnei Menashe home. Airfare alone from northeastern India, where the Bnei Menashe reside, is approximately $1,200 per person. Another $1,800 per immigrant is necessary to cover additional costs, as well as to provide a modest grant to help each arrival in Israel to get started.

The task ahead of us is daunting, but so is the opportunity - to make what is perhaps the most significant difference imaginable in the lives of a devoted Lost Tribe of Israel. As you know, the Bnei Menashe, or "sons of Manasseh," are descendents of one of the Ten Lost Tribes who were exiled by the Assyrian empire more than 27 centuries ago. We now have the chance to help them fulfill their heartfelt yearning for Zion by restoring them to the land of their ancestors.

With the arrival of Rosh Hashanah, the start of the new Jewish year,,we turn to you now - long time supporters of Shavei Israel as well as those who are new to the organization. Please include the Bnei Menashe in your prayers - and please help us to help them come home to Israel. You can make a considerable impact on their lives, and any amount you can afford would be of great assistance as we prepare for the resumption of the aliyah.

With your support, the Bnei Menashe will soon see their 2,700-year-old dream of a "Next Year in Jerusalem" finally become a reality. Please click here to donate today to this vital cause

Juan Jose Ventura

Shavei profile: Juan Jose Ventura maps a hidden family tree over 500 years

 
Juan Jose Ventura lays out an extensive and intricately detailed family tree on the table. He runs his fingers up and down the different lines of the tree's meandering roots, past the tiny names and dates, as he traces his family's Jewish lineage all the way back to 1484 in Spain.

Ventura's family tree is a tremendously impressive piece of detective work, made all the more remarkable because it wasn't until ten years ago, in 2001, that Ventura even suspected he had any Jewish background at all.

It began when Ventura, 35, moved from his native Cordoba, Spain, to The Netherlands to do his Ph.D. in Economics. Suddenly "all kinds of people started asking me out of the blue if I was Jewish," he says. "They would say 'maybe you're Jewish and you don't know.' But I always answered them 'no, it's not possible.'"

Despite his protestations to the contrary, a seed had been planted, and Ventura was no longer so sure. Then, a chance meeting in Amsterdam with a young woman from Russia served as his personal tipping point. "She told me about people who were hiding their Jewishness in the Ukraine. 'People like you,' she said."

Ventura was in the process of discovering that he was a descendent of the Bnei Anousim, Jews in Iberia who were compelled to convert to Catholicism 500 years ago and whom historians refer to by the derogatory term Marranos.

To learn more about how Ventura built his family tree, continue reading on our website.   

A portion of the Ventura family tree

First of its kind seminar for Marranos held in Sicily 

At the seminar in Sicily

In the late 14th century, there were more than 37,000 Jews spread across the Italian region of Sicily, living in some 52 different Jewish communities. But by the end of 1492, following the Edict of Expulsion, there were nearly none. The few who remained were forced to convert to Catholicism by the Inquisition and kept their Judaism a closely guarded secret.

Today, however, the descendents of those Jews are reclaiming their birthright. In early September, Shavei Israel organized a first-of-its-kind seminar to help Marranos (referred to in Hebrew as Bnei Anousim) in Sicily begin the process of returning to their roots.

Dozens of Marranos from Sicily, as well as with the southern Italian regions of Puglia and Calabria, joined the seminar, which took place in the picturesque town of Syracuse. Prior to the Expulsion, Syracuse was the second largest Jewish community in Sicily, where a reported one third of the population was Jewish.

Entitled "The New Frontier of Italian Judaism," the Shavei Israel-sponsored seminar included lectures and classes on a range of Jewish cultural and religious subjects, as well as a walking tour of Jewish historical sites in the Giudecca (old Jewish quarter). Of particular interest was an ancient mikveh (ritual bath), which is said to be the oldest ever discovered in Europe.

To read more about the seminar, continue to our website.We have pictures in our photo gallery. 

Shavei Israel reaches out and assists Lost Tribes and "Hidden Jews" seeking to return to the Jewish people. These include the Bnei Menashe of India, the Bnei Anousim of Spain, Portugal & South America, the "Hidden Jews" of Poland and others. We welcome your support.  

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