December 10, 2004/Kislev 27 5765, Vol. 57, No.15
Falash Mura try to make life in IsraelAs plight drags on, federations take up the issue
DINA KRAFT
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 The Falash Mura community in Ethiopia's Gondar province celebrates the arrival of a Torah donated by an American Jew. Photo courtesy of NACOEJ |
The Albel family, originally from Ethiopia, moved again earlier this year.
This time they're moving into a permanent home and out of the Israeli government center for new immigrants where they have lived since arriving in Israel more than two years ago.
"Finally we'll have our own home," says Asram Albel. "It's good here, but we can't stay here forever."
Raised as Christians in a remote Ethiopian village, the Albels came to Israel as part of a wave of Falash Mura seeking to immigrate to the Jewish state.
The Falash Mura are Ethiopians whose Jewish ancestors converted to Christianity, often under social pressure, but who have resumed practicing Judaism.
In his hand, Asram Albel clutches the key to the apartment the family has bought in the working-class town of Kiryat Malachi, about an hour's drive south from the absorption center where he, his wife and two daughters shared a one-bedroom apartment.
Though unemployed and still a relative newcomer to the country, Albel - who wears a cell phone tucked into the pocket of his blue jeans - already looks like an Israeli.
Like Albel, most Falash Mura in Israel are unemployed, struggle with learning Hebrew and have relatives still in Ethiopia waiting to emigrate.
It's unlikely Albel, 57, will find work at his age. But vocational training courses are available to him and others in the community.
Falash Mura children study in schools together with other Israelis and are quickly learning Hebrew, often acting as translators and links to society for parents who find it more difficult to learn a new language.
The children are offered special tutorials and academic enrichment programs to help them keep up and even excel in the classroom.
Some 20,000 Falash Mura have immigrated to Israel. In February 2003, the Israeli government decided in principle to expedite the immigration of the rest of the Falash Mura community - estimated at another 20,000 people. But on Nov. 29, Israel's Supreme Court decided to postpone a ruling on the issue until after a Dec. 26 meeting between Sallai Meridor, chairman of the Jewish Agency, which runs aliyah, and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
Proponents of the Falash Mura have gained steam in the American Jewish federation movement.
A handful of federations created special funds last year that raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to aid Falash Mura awaiting immigration.
The United Jewish Communities, the federation system's coordinating body, recently formed a committee to determine how to assist the Falash Mura. The group held its first meeting at the UJC General Assembly in mid-November to discuss building broader backing for the Falash Mura among local federations.
The Israeli government has cited budget constraints as the reason for the delay. Emigration from Ethiopia is far more costly than from other places due to the tremendous social gap between the new Ethiopian immigrants and the rest of Israeli society.
A representative of the State Prosecutor's Office told the high court that the rate of Falash Mura aliyah was determined by budgetary and human resource constraints, adding that it was "unacceptable for Jewish organizations to force Israel to increase the rate through the court," according to Ha'aretz.
After the court decision, Meridor charged Israel with causing "unnecessary suffering" to the Falash Mura, and called the economic arguments against their immigration "baseless."
"It is not right to hamper the pace of immigration from any country in the world; this is the only case of this happening in the history of the State of Israel," Meridor said in a statement.
After the meeting with Meridor, the Israeli government is required to report its progress on the issue, followed by a response by the plaintiffs - families of Falash Mura who are living in Israel awaiting their relatives' arrival.
The government expects that most of the Falash Mura will be eligible for aliyah, but it's only inspecting 100 families per month for eligibility. With just one person to handle inspections in Ethiopia, the Interior Ministry expects inspections to take another three years.
Last month, the Jewish Agency asked the Israeli government to double the rate of Falash Mura aliyah from 300 to 600 per month.
The UJC has agreed to advocate for that figure as well, said John Fishel, president of the Jewish Federation of Los Angeles and co-chairman of the UJC committee on the Falash Mura.
The committee will use the time between now and Dec. 26 to "get more of the federated communities up to speed," Fishel said.
The Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix is not involved at this time, says a Federation spokesman.
It's "very hard with something like this to really understand it if it hasn't been on your radar screen" amid the slew of issues facing federations, Fishel said. "Sometimes the process is slow and laborious, but sometimes it's really necessary."
Albel's wife Lagas, 40, is a slight woman. Standing in her empty apartment in the absorption center, she appears more nervous about leaving than her husband.
"I'm used to it here. Here there is a staff that can speak Amharic," she says, referring to her native Ethiopian tongue.
"It will be hard to get along," she adds, her eyes widening.
She is surrounded by neighbors who have come to help pack and move the family's last belongings out of the apartment.
The Albels came to Israel with virtually nothing. Now, everything in their small absorption center apartment - all provided by the government - is moving with them: metal bed frames and mattresses, a narrow coffee table, a refrigerator.
The sun pours through the window of the Albel's now-empty eighth-floor apartment, triggering talk of a different sort of emptiness - the void left by those still in Ethiopia, including Lagas Albel's parents and four siblings.
Leaving the absorption center, the family makes its way past the lobby where children watch a Spanish soap opera with Hebrew subtitles. Older Ethiopians, cloaked in traditional white cloth shawls, stand around talking.
The family heads outside, where friends help them load their belongings onto a moving van.
Tamar Bassan, the center's social worker, hands Asram Albel an envelope containing a letter with the details of the family's history in Israel. It will be useful for any future social worker that might work with the family.
Bassan fears that because of economic strain at the Kiryat Malachi municipality, the Albel family might fall between the cracks of the city's social services network.
"I feel in a way like my children are leaving," she says. "I worked with them for over two years, very closely, and I want to know they will be received well on the other side."