Bagdad Jews Have Become a Fearful Few

[scarlettina]

I wondered but I had no idea what had become of Iraq's Jewish community during the war. Now I know. How sad and yet, somehow, how predictable.

Comments

[twilight2000.livejournal.com]

My neighbor, Sabah, is an Iraqi (from Baghdad) Catholic married to a Northern German woman. In his late 60's now, he remembers Baghdad very much the way that the article described it before the exodus -- and describes Beirut as a wonderful, lovely international city with so much life. The damage this ongoing insanity has done to all of this part of the world is sad beyond understanding. Sabah is saddened by the seperation that exists now - by the vast groups of people that are terrified of their neighbors - rather than joyous in the celebration that he remembers of all the joys of everyday life.

Jews were once a wealthy and politically active part of the spectrum of Iraq. In a fading red volume of the Iraq Directory of 1936, the “Israelite community,” then numbering about 120,000, is listed along with Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen, Muslims, Christians, Yazidis and Sabeans. Rescued from a Baghdad library, this book lists Hebrew among the six languages of Iraq and describes a country in which “the mosque stands beside the church and the synagogue.”

[pixxelpuss.livejournal.com]

That's terrible. I can't think of anything better to say. How sad.

[e-bourne.livejournal.com]

It is tragic, and a terrible commentary on what was once a vibrant cultural area.