ESSENCE OF ROCK : When the Farhud Came to Be’eri

The Iraqi Jewish community, the oldest such community outside of Israel, has a

history spanning over 2,600 years. Hundreds of years before the 7^th century Muslim occupation, Jewish communities had existed in this region. The Jews shared the Arab culture with their Muslim and Christian neighbors, but they lived in separate communities. Jewish assimilation into Muslim society was rare.

Under centuries of Islamic rule Jews were classified as dhimmis (‘second class citizens’). The crumbling Ottoman Empire gave them more equality. By 1884, 30,000 Jews lived in Baghdad. By 1900, the number had risen to 50,000, with Jews representing over a quarter of the city’s total population.

Brittain ‘created’ Iraq after WWI (Jordan is also a similar British 'invention'.) The modern, secular and almost democratic state became independent 1932. Iraqi Jews worked as lawyers, musicians, economists, accountants, academics, artists, and intellectuals. The fact that numerous Jews held key positions in public office, was resented by their Muslim compatriots.

In the 1940s about 135,000 Jews lived in Iraq (nearly 3 percent of the total population), with about 90,000 in Baghdad, 10,000 in Basra, and the remainder scattered throughout many small towns and villages.

In 1933, Germany acquired Iraqi Christian newspaper Al-Alam Al-Araby (The Arab World) and began publishing a serialized Arabic translation of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf. In 1939, Mufti Haj Amin al-Husseini of Jerusalem fled Palestine disguised as a woman. The Kingdom of Iraq welcomed him with gifts and money. His pro-Nazi propaganda and violent radio incitement against Jews resulted in racial Jewish laws, mass dismissal from public posts, discrimination and harassment in the streets.

On April 19, 1941, Britain declared war and tried to regain control of the region by occupying Basra. This resulted in widespread looting of many Jewish owned bazaar shops. Arab night watchmen protected Jewish possessions and many Moslems protected Jews in their homes.

During this time, four Iraqi officers, known as the “Golden Square,” carried out a coup to install Rashid A. al-Gaylani, a strident supporter of the Axis powers, as prime minister.

In the last week of May 1941, in Bagdad, Jewish homes were marked with a red palm print ("Hamsa"). They were instructed to pack suitcases and to wait to be taken to "detention camps for their own safety".

May 30, Rabbi Sasson Khaduri, the community leader, was told that, as a ‘protective‘ measure, the Jews were to stay home for the next three days. Plans for a larger massacre failed when the self-proclaimed governor was forced to flee the country.

When the military coup failed, Gaylani fled to Berlin, where Hitler warmly received him. Radio Baghdad announced exiled members of the royal family were returning very soon. British and Transjordanian forces were surrounding the capital and it was only a matter of days before they restored law and order. The relieved Jewish community thought it was safe to celebrate Shavuot.

On June 1^st, as they left synagogue on the eve of the Shavuot festival, a crowd awaited them with batons, daggers and swords.

Many of the Jewish houses and shops marked with the red Hamsa were ransacked and entire families were murdered by the mob. Jews trying to escape were pulled out of the vehicles and slaughtered. Synagogue windows were smashed, Torah scrolls desecrated, crazed mobs chased Jews with daggers and swords. Students and armed police joined the massacre. Survivors testified of policemen breaking into houses and slaughtering Jews, cutting off limbs and looting jewelry. Men had their genitals cut off and stuffed in their mouths. Women were raped and had their bellies slashed while still alive. Children were thrown into the river and wells. People were thrown off rooftops and the crazed mob delighted in hearing the cries of the stricken and tormented Jews.

What became known as the Farhud pogrom lasted for two days when Iraqi troops finally restored order. Throughout the onslaught, British troops, who were on the outskirts of the city, didn’t lift a finger to help.

The highest death toll was amongst Jews living in self-segregated areas. Many of those living in mixed Muslim-Jewish neighborhoods survived because of the bravery of their Muslim neighbors who protected them.

Mordechai Ben-Porat, a Jew who later served as an Israeli government minister, described his experiences:

“We were mostly cut off from the center of the Jewish community ... It was because of one Muslim neighbor that we survived the Farhud. We had no weapons to defend ourselves and were utterly helpless. We put furniture up against the doors and windows to prevent the rioters from breaking in.... For two days, the streets flowed with blood. The cries of the Jews were heard all over the city ... and finally bodies piled up in a huge mass grave. As well as Jews being killed and wounded, many hundreds of Jewish-owned properties were destroyed with around 1,500 homes and stores broken into, ransacked, and set ablaze. Damages to property were estimated at some $3 million (US$ 51 million in 2019).

The Farhud triggered the mass emigration of Iraqi Jews.

Through the clandestine underground immigration movement, some 120,000 people – 90 percent of Iraq's Jews were brought to the young Jewish State through Operation Ezra and Nehemiah (1950 and 1952). Today, fewer than ten Jews remain in the country.

On the eve of Yom Kippur 1946, members of the “Babylonians” – an Iraqi youth group- settled in Nahabir.

Shortly after breaking ground, the Zionist government asked some of the “Babylonians” to return to Iraq to prepare additional young men and women to make Aliyah. Kibbutz Be’eri, established a few miles west of today’s location, was part of the “11 points plan”.

Yaakov Tzemach, member of the Baghdad HeChalutz youth movement was trained by the “Babylonians”.

Later, after joining the IDF, Yaakov was part of the Israeli army’s Nahal agricultural settlement program, which sent a group to help strengthen Kibbutz Be’eri in the early 1950s.

Every Shavuot eve, Yaakov Tzemach would tell his family and Kibbutz Be’eri members the story of the 1941 Farhud pogrom. Yaakov’s family too, survived the massacre thanks to an older Muslim woman who physically blocked the way to their house and prevented the rioters from entering.

The cooking in the Kibbutz kitchen was also influenced by the Iraqi immigrants: “Even the gefilte fish was done in Mizrahi style.” Iraqi born Avraham Dvori (Manchar) was eight years old when he arrived at the kibbutz, where everyone spoke Hebrew. “I entirely forgot the Arabic I knew from home,” he said. His family of five children and 15 grandchildren also live in Beeri. “We have members from over 30 countries of origin. Everyone is mixed with everyone - this is the Land of Israel for me. This is what gives the kibbutz a sense of warmth.”

After the Farhud, the Jewish community set up a monument in Bagdad’s Jewish cemetery to mark the location of a mass grave.

This monument was later destroyed by the Iraqi government.

A replica of this monument was set up nearby the Be’eri forest.

On October 7, this forest was used by Hamas terrorists as a staging area before moving to attack Be’eri and other nearby communities.

That Simchat Torah, Yaakov’s grandson, Shachar, was part of Be’eri’s civilian emergency defense squad. He took part in a heroic and desperate defensive battle for many hours, before he was eventually killed.

Yaakov Tzemach ob”m (right), survivor of the Farhud, Shachar Tzemach ob”m (center) killed on October 7, with one of the family girls in his lap, and Doron Tzemach (left), member of Kibbutz Be’eri. From a family album.

“We made Aliyah from Iraq to Israel so that Arabs wouldn't be able to enter Jewish homes and murder us.”

Eighty two years later, the Farhud had returned to Be’eri.