The K Experience

Black Jews

Present - Here and Now

Wednesday, 18 June 2008

I, like many other people in the world, have been led to believe that Jews, all Jews, are pretty much white and live in the West, USA or Europe, or Israel. But to my surprise, I recently found out that this was not entirely so...

This week I was lucky enough to see the pre-screening of an amazing film named "Live and Become", by director Radu Mihaileanu. The film tells the story of a young Christian Ethiopian boy who disguises himself as an Ethiopian Jew in order to escape famine and emigrates to Israel.

Before I watched the film I had no notion of Ethiopian Jews. My image of Jews was something like the images below

Jewish Man

But watching the movie "Live and Become" opened my eyes to the somewhat hidden sides of Jewish heritage. The Beta Israel or Falasha are the Jews of Ethiopia, some would say the direct descendants of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. Still following the Jewish traditions and accepted and recognised by the Jewish nation of Israel, it was planned that they would escape the harsh life of Ethiopia, where they were denied the right to buy land and forbidden to practice Judaism, to be brought to Israel. This was attempted in a few stages, Operation Moses (1984-1985) where 8000 Jews moved from Ethiopia, and Operation Solomon (1990) where roughly 14,000 where moved to escape hardship.

Black Jews

The film centers around the life of the young boy who was transported to Israel as part of Operation Moses. He is adopted by an Israeli family, and taught how to live a Westernised life. The film covers many issues, such as racism towards the Falasha, and the issue of the Ethiopians who were actually Christian but took on the Jewish Identity to escape Ethiopia, which was Schlomo's (the main character) story.

Live and Become

"Live and Become" told a story different from the traditional movies depicting the Holocaust, where to be a Jew was to be prosecuted causing many to hide their identities. It told one where Jews were protected and where people took on false Jewish identities to be saved, another side which had been hidden for so long.

The film won a huge number of awards at it's European release, including Best Screenplay, Cesar ("French Oscar") 2005; Audience Award, Berlin Film Festival 2005; European Cinema Award, Berlin Film Festival 2005; Ecumenical Award, Berlin Film Festival 2005; and Golden Swan (Best Film), Copenhagen International Film Festival 2005 to name but a few. For more information on the movie (A spoiler) see the New York Times Review of the film. For more information on the Beta Israel, or Falasha, read about The History of Ethiopian Jews (with details of Operation Moses and Solomon), or check out the Beta Israel wikipedia entry. The film opens up around Los Angeles on the 27th of June.

[Sources: Picture of Beta Israeli man: Ethiopian restaurant.com; Pictures of Beta Israeli Boys from NatalieBehring.com Flickr; Pictures of white Jews bbc.co.uk and Corbis.com; Picture of "Live and Become" poster Menemsha Films.com.]