- Jewish refugees
In the course of history,
Jew ish populations have been expelled or ostracised by various local authorities and have sought asylum fromantisemitism numerous times. The articlesHistory of antisemitism andTimeline of antisemitism contain more detailed chronology of anti-Jewish hostilities, whileJewish history andTimeline of Jewish history outline the broader picture.After its establishment in 1948, the
State of Israel adopted the 1950Law of Return making Israel a home not only for the inhabitants of the State, but also for all members of the Jewish people everywhere. This law also made Israel an ideal destination for voluntary Jewish immigration.UN recognition of Refugee status
The status of
refugee is defined by the 1951 UN convention, except forPalestinian refugees defined by the 1949 UNRWA convention. Since their creation, neither convention has recognized the status of refugee to Jewish displaced persons.Partial list of events that prompted major streams of Jewish refugees
;722 BCE: The
Assyria ns led byShalmaneser conquered the (Northern)Kingdom of Israel and sent theIsraelites into captivity atKhorasan . Ten of twelveTribes of Israel are lost.;597 BCE: The
Babylonian captivity . In 537 BCE the Persians, who conqueredBabylon two years earlier, allowed Jews to return and rebuild Jerusalem and the Temple.;70: The defeat of the
Great Jewish Revolt . Masses of Jews were sold to slavery across theRoman Empire , many fled.;135: The Romans defeated
Bar Kokhba's revolt . EmperorHadrian expelled hundreds of thousands Jews fromJudea , wiped the name off the maps, replaced it withSyria Palaestina , forbade Jews to set foot in Jerusalem.;7th century:
Muhammad expelled Jewish tribesBanu Qaynuqa andBanu Nadir fromMedina , which was founded as a Jewish city. TheBanu Qurayza tribe was slaughtered and the Jewish settlement of Khaybar was ransacked.;1095 - mid-13th century: The waves of
Crusade s destroyed hundreds of Jewish communities in Europe and in the Middle East, includingJerusalem .;Mid-12th century: The invasion of
Almohades brought to end theGolden age of Jewish culture in Spain . Among other refugees wasMaimonides , who fled toMorocco , thenEgypt , thenEretz Israel .;12th-14th centuries:
France . The practice of expelling the Jews accompanied by confiscation of their property, followed by temporary readmissions for ransom, was used to enrich the crown: expulsions fromParis by Philip Augustus in 1182, from France by Louis IX in 1254, by Charles IV in 1322, by Charles V in 1359, by Charles VI in 1394.;1290: King
Edward I of England issues theEdict of Expulsion for all Jews fromEngland . The policy was reversed after 350 years in 1655 byOliver Cromwell .;1348: European Jews were blamed for poisoning wells during the
Black Death . Many of those who survived theepidemic and pogroms were either expelled or fled.;1492: Ferdinand II and Isabella issued the
Alhambra decree , General Edict on the Expulsion of the Jews fromSpain (approx. 200,000), fromSicily (1493, approx. 37,000), fromPortugal (1496).;1654: The fall of the Dutch colony of
Recife inBrazil to the Portuguese prompted the first group of Jews to flee toNorth America .;1648-1654: Ukrainian
Cossack s and peasants led byBohdan Khmelnytsky destroyed hundreds of Jewish communities and committed mass atrocities. Ukraine was annexed by theRussian Empire , where officially no Jews were allowed.;1744-1790s: The reforms of Frederick II, Joseph II and Maria Theresa sent masses of impoverished German and
Austria n Jews east. "See also:Schutzjude .";1881-1884, 1903-1906, 1914-1921: Repeated waves of
pogrom s sweptRussia , propelling mass Jewish emigration (more than 2 million Russian Jews emigrated in the period 1881-1920). DuringWorld War I , some 250,000 Jews were transferred from western Russia. "See alsoPale of Settlement ,May Laws ,Russian Civil War .";1935-1945: The Nazi persecution culminated in
the Holocaust of theEurope an Jewry. TheBritish Mandate of Palestine prohibited Jewish immigration to theLand of Israel . TheBermuda Conference ,Evian Conference and other attempts failed to resolve the problem of Jewish refugees, a fact widely used in Nazipropaganda . "See alsoS.S. St. Louis ";1948-1958: The
Jewish exodus from Arab lands . The combined population of Jewish communities in theGreater Middle East (excluding Israel) was reduced from about 900,000 in 1948 to less than 8,000 today. Some of these communities were more than 2,500 years old. Israel absorbed approximately 600,000 of these refugees, many of whom were temporarily settled in tent cities called "Ma'abarot ". They were eventually absorbed into Israeli society, and the last "Maabarah" was dismantled in 1958. The Jewish refugees had no assistance from the UNRWA. "See alsoFarhud .";1960s-1989: State-sponsored persecution in the
Soviet Union prompted more than 1 million Soviet Jews to emigrate to Israel, 250,000 to the United States with "refugee" status, and 100,000 to Germany. "See alsorootless cosmopolitan ,Doctors' plot ,Jackson-Vanik amendment , refusenik,Zionology ,Pamyat ."See also
*
Refugee
*Jewish diaspora
*1929 Hebron massacre
*Evacuation of Jews in Gaza, 1929
*Jewish exodus from Arab lands
*Jewish villages in West Bank depopulated in 1948
*Jewish villages in Gaza Strip depopulated in 1948
*Jewish history
*the Holocaust
*Population transfer
*Palestinian Exodus
*Antisemitism
*Christianity and antisemitism
*Islam and antisemitism
*Arabs and antisemitism External links
* [http://www.jewishtraces.org Ordinary exile] , the story of Austrian Jewish refugees in France and in Belgium
* [http://womennewsnetwork.net/2007/08/21/a-lifes-worth-of-living-witnessing-the-life-of-foreign-correspondent-ruth-gruber-in-her-new-book-witness/ A Lifes Worth of Living] by Lys Anzia. WNN - Women News Network
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.