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Bringing the Yemenite Remnant to Israel
By R. Hofner
A report from Iran in which Israelis were interviewed by Palestinian newspaper Al Manari claims that the organized immigration of the rest of Yemenite Jewry to Israel has taken its first steps through the cooperation between the Israeli and the Qatar Emirate governments. The first group, a family of six, has already landed at Ben Gurion airport in a special Emirate plane via Doha. Other groups are expected to arrive in the coming months. The report added that ministers and high ranking Knesset Members, partly from Shas, are involved in the project.
In very recent years, several dozen Yemenite Jewish families have also made aliya. The urgency in bringing over the remaining ones from the community stems from the fact that up till now, Jews enjoyed the protection of the past president, Ali Abdallah Salah, the benevolent ruler for decades, who was ousted as part of the "Arab Spring" that swept through a number of Arab countries, generally bringing more Islamist governments into power. The climate is now threatening for Jews and families are finally willing to leave.
All in all, most of the ancient Yemenite community has already left, this wave of immigration involves those remaining, estimated to be some 200 Jews, most of them elderly.
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