Page 12-The Canadian Jewish News. Thursday, July 22. 1993
M-T
Features
ace
~ Reporting from Acre, Jerusalem and Beershe-ha, Sheldon Kirshner takes a look at Ethiopian Jews in Israel t(Hiay.
By SHELDON KIRSHNER
Minuave Getu. his wife and ten children live in a bleak caravan site in Acre, north of Haifa: Until two years ago. he was a comparatively well-off construction worker in Ethiopia's Gon-dar province, where he and his family were the proud proprietors of "a nice, big house."
In Israel, the 49^year-old Ethiopian Jew is un-cniployed. and makes do with a tiny mobile home equipped with a mini kitchen, hole-in-the-wall bathrotim. blink-of-the-eyc living room. and cramped bedroom
Unable to find steady work. Getu is supported by the Israeli government, which has repatriated upwards of 45.000 black-skinned Jews from Ethiopia since the 1970s. Five thousand Ethio-plans are native-born Israelis.
In common with yiilually all his middle-aged Ethiopian compatriots, Getu is barely literate in Hebrew and unaccustomed to Israel's fast-moving, ever-changing Western society. It is therefore unlikely that he will ever tltid more than a menial, poorly-paid job.
"\ live on hope."" he said plaintively one recent sunny afternoon.
Uprooted from their remote tx>mmunities in die heart of Africa. Ethiopian Jews face enormous difficulties and challenges in their adopted homeland.
■"They don't relate to Western culture the way we do," said Sigal Zaft. a 20-year-old Israeli ariiiy soldier who teaches the Ethiopians Hebrew.
"For the older generation, there will not be integration into Israeli society." obsened her colleague. Ricki Blankofsky. Their culture is different. They are Africans. The younger generation will fit in." ; - .
Blankofsky. no doubt, was thinking of her companion. Sho.shi Samu. who's 24. Samu. who performs the functions of a social worker here, arrived in Israel 13 years ago. one of the first Ethiopians to settle in the Jewish state.
"Ifelt like a total stranger at first." she" said /"in fluent, idiomatic Hebrew. - 'Now 1 feel like an Israeli."
Such is her family's successful absorption into Israel's mainstream that her brother is engaged to be married to the daughter of a long-established Ashkenzi Jewish family. : Descendants of ancient Israelites, the Ethiopians were recognized as Jews by the Israeli rabbinate in the early 1970s, just as the first Ethiopian Jews trickled into'Israel. Organized immigration began in August ,1977 with the arrival of a group of 62 Ethiopians. Between 1979 and 1984. they were joined by an additional 7.088 Ethiopians.
Israel airlifted most of the rest of the Ethiopians in several waves.
Operation Moses, which unfolded in late 1984 and early 1985. netted 6.329 Ethiopians. From the mid to the late 1980s, something like 9.000 were brought to Israel. With Operation Salomon in May 1991 .Israel's Ethiopian colony was\n- . creased by more than 13.000. Since then, Israel has won the release of nearly 5.000 Ethiopians.
Micha Feldman. the head of the Ethiopian desk in the Jewish Agency, believes about 300 Jews remain in Ethiopia. In his estimate, they are com-mg to Israel at the rate of 70 to 80 per month;
Members of the Falash Mora community — Ethiopians whose ancestors converted to Christianity — are also expected to end up in Israel. There is speculation as to their numbers. Estimates run from 30,000 to several hundred thousand. "The real number is about 50.000,"" said Feldman, who ser\ed as Israel's consul in Addis Ababa during Operation Solomon."Eventually, they will probably come to Israel."
In June. Israeli interior ministry officials went to Ethiopia to process the first of 200 Falash Moras wishing to leave. Under recent guidelines. Falash Moras are eligible to immigrate if they have a first-degree relative in Israel, and if their •'return" to Judaism is sanctioned by a rabbinical court.
Feldman, who's considered one of Israel's leading authorities on Ethiopian Jews, does not minimize their problems.
"Most Ethiopians are illiterate," he said in an interview conducted in his spare Jerusalem office; "The parents and most of their children are not familiar With that institution called school."
Generational gap one of the problems dogging Ethiopian Jews as they try to adapt to life in Israel
Back in Ethiopia. 95 percent of Jews were tenant farmers, blacksmiths and ariisans. In the main, the others were civil servants, teachers and soldiers. "It's rare to find an Ethiopian with a higher education," Feldman noted. "We haven't' yet succeeded in narrowing the education gap between Ethiopian and Israel children.''
: There are only two Ethiopian doctors practising medicine in Israel today. and one is a Falash Mora. Feldman noted. As far as he knows, about 350 Ethiopians are enrolled at Israeli technical and nursing schools as well as universities.
Many Ethiopians, at least half, are jobless. The majority of employed Ethiopians are manual workers in factories and in the building trade.
Becaiise farming, was imposed on them in Ethiopia, they have not returned to the land in Israel. They have not been drawn to kibbutzim and moshavim. largely because they reject a col: lective lifestyle and prefer to live with members of their particular/w/HH/a (clan);
Housing aLso po.ses a problem. According to Feldman. 13.000 Ethiopians still live in mobile hpiiies; which can be quite uncomfortable. Recently. Ethiopians staged a peaceful demonstration in Jerusalem to protest conditions. Feldman said the carava:n sites are being phased out. The
Minuave Getii with his wife and youngest chUd. The soldier is Sigal Zaft. [Sheldon Kirshner photo] _
last site^is planned to be dismantled within three years. /'
He estimates that 45 percent of the EUiiopians have.homes of their own. In March, Absorption Minister Yair Tsaban announced diat the government would implement a plan to move them into permanent housing in'the centre of the coiintry at a fraction of the realcost of apartments there.
Ethiopians are disgruntled with the attitude of the rabbinate toward their religious leaders (kes-sim). who are not recognized as rabbis. At present, ihereis only one fully-recognized Ethiopian rabbi in Israel.
In Ethiopia, kessim presided over marriages and divorces, circumcisions and funerals. They want the same rights in Israel. But the rabbinate refuses to accede to their demand until they study relevant Jewish law and pass a test.
Ethiopian Jewish tradition slops at the Torah. The Talmud and other commentaries that form the basis of Jewish law today are simply alien to'Ethiopians.
Doubts have not been raised about the Jewish-ness of Ethiopians. Nevertheless, the rabbinate has challenged their circumsicion rites. And when Ethiopians wed; they must undergo a symbolic conversion to Judaism, unless they appear before the sole rabbi in Israel audiorized to dispense widi this ritual.
Hebrew is a problem for most adult Ethiopians, who. Feldman said, have yet to learn it on even a conversational level Feldman is pessimis-. tic that Ethiopians who arrived in Israel ovtr the age of 30 will ever master Hebrew;
"Data shows they may become an underclass," he said darkly.
Ethiopian children, however, pick up Hebrew quickly and adapt.
Generally, Ethiopian adults speak, but do riot read and write. Amharic. their mother tongue. Feldman said there is a plan to teach them lhes;e skills so as to erase the stigma of their illiteracy and boost their self-esteem.
The problems they face in Israel seem so un-surmduntable that some Ethiopians have committed suicide. Since 1980, some 80 Ethiopians have taken their lives.
According to Feldman. upwards of 300 Ethiopians are affiicted with AIDS and the HIV virus —."a much higher percentage than the native Israeli population, but far lower than in Ethiopia.!' He fears that the arrivalof Falsh Mora may double the incidence of AIDS in Israel.
The Israeli government is doing its best to contain AIDS. Carriers are" given intensive instructions in safe sex.
As a rule. Ethiopians have been warmly welcomed and accepted by dieir fellow kraelis. ''The attitude has been'positive;" Feldman said. .Yet Ethiopians and Soviet immigrants have not gotten along famously. 'The Russians consider them unclean, uneducated and uncultured. Here, all of a sudden, they see black Jews."
Slava Strugitch. a Russian Jew who works in Acre's caravan site; acknowledged the problem. "Soviet Jews don't regard Ethiopians as Jews, iind color is one reason. They think that Ethiopians are inferior, culturally and educationally;'"
Amnon Safai. the Ministry of Absorption representative in Acre, said that Soviet Jews are afraid of Ethiopians because they believe they are conveyors of diseases; In his opinion, Sephardi Jews, more so than Ashkenazi Jews, tend to accept Ethiopians.
Roland Lahav. director of a caravan site in Beersheba; cited the generational gap as one of the most.severe issues facing the Ethiopian community.
"Ethiopian children have no trouble integrating. They are Israel's luture: But the absorption of their parents will take longer."
Enatmar Hillel-Salam. an Ethiopian graduate of Tel Aviv University, has studied the issue. ""The children learn Hebrew and assimilate Israeli customs much more quickly than their parents. This upsets the authority and self-confidence of the older generatiori. which is used to giving orders and having theni followed;"
Often. \oo. Ethiopians are niisunderstotxl by Israelis. As Hillel-Salam put it: "There are differences in mentality and culture. Among the Ethio-. plans, values such as self-restraint, tolerance; gentleness and obedience are very important. Ethiopians do not express negative comments or criticisms. These are considered to be expressions of weakness or failure.
/'People ask sometimes — how come the Ethiopians are so quiet, why don't they shout? How come they aren't direct and straightforward like the Israelis? When Israelis first meet, they know everj'thing about each other in the first five minutes — what they do. how much they make, their whole family histor>. '
"This doesn't happen among Elhiopiaiis. There is a whole long process of gaining die confidence of the other person beforejuch things jire discuss^. These differences in mentality can cause misunderstandings^nd even conflicts;"
[See related story on Page 8]
Mideast ^Analysis
By
SHELDON KIRSHNER
'ext to Eli Cohen. Wolfgang Lotz was probably Israel's best known spy. Cohen plied his trade in Damascus;.while Lotz worked undercover in Cairo. Lotz. whose Hebrew name was Ze'evGur-Arye. died recently after a long illness in Munich at the age of 72; He had been living in Germany since the 1970s. Born in Mannheim. Germany, he was the son
• of a non-Jewish theatre director and a Jewish actress. His parents raised him as a German, even neglecting to have him circumcised. Ten years after his birth, they divorced. In 1933. alarmed by the Nazis' accession to power, Helene Lotz and her son immigrated to Palestine.
Wolfgang Lotz attended an agricultural school, where he became an expert horseman. He joined the Haganah, the chief fighting force of the Yishuv, and during Worid War II, he served in the British army in Egypt. He fought in the War of Independence. and during the Sinai War. he commanded an infantry brigade.
Not long afterward, the Mossad recrijited him. He was selected because of his fiueni German, his blond, blue-eyed looks, his war record and his uncircumcised state. His mission Was to collect data about the How of Soviet weaponry to Egypt — Israel's most formidable foe — and about the presence of German scientists, .some of them former Nazis, in Egypt.
Lotz travelled to Germany to prepare his cover as piat of a German who had been a horse breeder in Australia. After a year in Germany, during which he acquired the necessary papers as a German national, Lotz made his way to Egypt. He arrived in January 1961. on the eve of Eli Cohen's departure to Syria., : Thanks to his extroverted personality, a trait that had impressed the Mossad; Lotz hail ho trouble making infiuential friends in Cairo. The first person he met at thie Cavalry Club — a haunt favored by Egyptian army officers — was Yous-sef Ali Gahoufab. He; in turn, introduced Lotz to membersof the Egyptian elite;
Wolfgang Lotz was an Israeli spy
' After a.debriefing session in Europe. Lotz returned to Egypt via Germany. On a train, he met. and fell in love with his wife-to-be. Walti-aud Martha Neumann, a German who lived in the United Slates. Against their better judgment. Lotz convinced his superiors that Neumann could be an asset in Cairo. He and Neumann would work together as a team.
By day. Lotz ran a riding school At night, he and his spouse led an active social life. Dennis Eisenberg, Uri Dan and Eli Landau, the authors of a book.(77jf Mav.wtif, published in T978) on Israeli espionage, claim thaiihe majority of his acquaintances apart from Egyptian military figures were ex-Nazis. They were drawn to Lotz partly because of his fabricated reputation as a rabid anti-Semite;
Lotz's performance in Cairo was superb, notwithstanding his reputation as an exiravageni spender. He conveyed valuable information and photographs on two key topics — the battle readiness of the Egyptian armed forces and the activities of German rocket and missile scientists; (Several of them left Egypt after receiving Mossad letter bombs;)
After his capture. Lotz claimed he was a German in the employ of Israel. In August ,1965.
• three months after Cohen's execution. Lotz was sentenced to life imprisonment with forced labor. Neumann received three years, and was fined.
In February of 1968. in exchange for nine Egyptian generals and scores of senior officers who had been taken prisoner in the Six Day War, Lotz and Neumann were released. They boarded a Lufthansa plane bound for Munich. During a stop in Athens, they were removed from the aircraft and put oh a flight to London. From there, they were flown to Tel Aviv.
Lotz started a modest riding school, and Neumann learned Hebrew. She suddetily became ill and died, and his business failed. He went to Los Angeles. Uien to Seattle, to make money. He was not successful. In 1978, Lotz returned to Germany, where he found_ajob in a Munich department store.
His remains were returned to Israel, where he was given a military funeral.