Urgent need: 5,000 prayer books are waiting to be sent to the Bnei Menashe in India For the past 10 years, more than 7,000 Bnei Menashe still living in India have been praying using a siddur (prayer book) that Shavei Israel produced especially for the community. This one-of-a-kind siddur has the Hebrew prayers spelled out phonetically in the Bnei Menashe languages of Kuki and Mizo. Through steadfast perseverance, many of the Bnei Menashe learned to read and write Hebrew and are now ready to move beyond praying using transliteration. They asked us to prepare a new siddur with Kuki and Mizo on one side and the full Hebrew text on the other, along with commentary in both local languages. The new siddur is now ready. With the help of a generous donation and our own funding, 5,000 copies of the new prayer book recently rolled off the printing presses. But now we are faced with a seemingly insurmountable challenge: shipping the siddurim to India. A container of 5,000 books weighs nearly 4 tons - not something you can send as "overweight" luggage on the plane. The timing is critical. During January and February, a number of Shavei Israel staff will be traveling to India specifically to teach Torah and further advance the community's Hebrew skills. We have planned three major activities in India for the Bnei Menashe. For all this to be a success, the siddurim need to be in Manipur and Mizoram, not waiting in a warehouse in Jerusalem. Moreover, providing the Bnei Menashe with the skills to pray in Hebrew has never been more important than now, with the Israeli cabinet preparing to vote on a resolution permitting the Bnei Menashe to come home. Fluency in Hebrew is undoubtedly the most important step towards a smooth aliyah. | 
