With Ezra and Nehemiah in Modern Iraq

Christians Fear Being Wiped Out Like Jews Before Them


Jewish refugees from Baghdad in 1951.

A few years ago I was given the monumental task of teaching the Biblical texts of Ezra, Nehemiah and Esther in one Sunday school class. The study involves what happened to the people after the Babylonian captivity and the rise of the Persian Empire.

They probably thought the class would be small, but the historical and application relevance kept people coming. One thing we learned was that not everybody went back to Jerusalem. In fact, Baghdad had a fairly large Jewish population right up until the middle of the Twentieth Century. Just as in Daniel's time, Jews occupied important positions managing essential institutions in Iraqi society. The Baghdad Symphony was once composed mainly of Jewish musicians.

At one time almost a third of Baghdad's population was Jewish. During British rule from 1922. During the British Mandate and following independence in 1932, these Jewish residents were instrumental in the development of judicial and postal systems.

In 1941 the Mufti-inspired pro-Nazi coup of Rashid Ali led to the murder of 180 Jews and the wounding of many more in the Farhud pogrom. The British Army reoccupied Baghdad and restored security for the population. Once again Jewish residents managed essential institutions.

In 1948, when Israel was established, anti-Jewish violence once again broke out. In 1950 Jews were permitted to leave the country within a year. They had to forfeit their citizenship, liquidate their businesses and sell their property [at great loss] in order to do so.

In all, 104,000 Jews were evacuated from Iraq in Operations Ezra & Nehemia [named after the leaders who took the people back to Jerusalem from exile in Babylonia]. 20,000 more were smuggled out through Iran. In 1952 the government stopped all emegration.

Persecution heightened again in the 1960's, especially at the time of the Six Day War. Jewish property was seized, bank accounts were frozen. The Baghdad government quietly allowed the remaining Jews to leave in 1970. Only a handful of people remain, most are too old to leave. The entire Jewish population, if evacuated today, would not even fill one motor coach.

The Jews of Iraq [click to read] by Mitchell Bard tells their story in greater detail.

The recent attack on a Christian church and the murder of two priests has Jane Arraf in Jewish World Review Pondering the Situation [click to read] of Christians in Iraq today.

"Iraqi Jews, once an integral part of society here with a history dating back to Babylon, began fleeing in the 1940s. Now only stories of their once vibrant community remain.

Christians, most of them eastern rite Catholics, trace their history in this country to the earliest days of Christianity. Before the 2003 war, there were up to a million Christians here — about 3 percent of the population. Half that number is estimated to have left in the past seven years, continuing an exodus begun after the 1991 Gulf War when Saddam Hussein's secular regime turned increasingly Islamic.

Although thousands of Assyrian Christians and others were killed under Iraq's Ottoman rule a century ago, the attack on the church last week is the worst in the country's recent history. The attack, claimed by an Al Qaeda-linked group, was followed two days later by 16 bombings in Shiite neighborhoods in Baghdad that killed at least 70 people."

Update: More Iraqi Christians Murdered [click to read] from Jewish World Review.