ICEJ HELPS SPONSOR LAST FLIGHT OF ETHIOPIAN AIRLIFT–PHASE II

BY DAVID PARSONS, VICE PRESIDENT & SENIOR SPOKESMAN

Israel declared an end to Phase II of the “Operation Tzur Israel” airlift in July when a group of 130 Ethiopian Jewish immigrants landed at Ben-Gurion Airport on an ICEJsponsored Aliyah flight.

The “Rock of Israel” airlift was launched in December 2020 to speed up the Ethiopian Aliyah, as many families have been separated from close relatives in Israel for over two decades. In two phases so far, the operation has managed to bring over 5,000 Ethiopian Jewish immigrants to reunite with close family already in Israel.

Ever since the Israeli government resumed the historic Ethiopian Aliyah in 2015, the Jewish Agency For Israel has brought a total of 7,514 Jewish immigrants from the East African country home to the Promised Land, with the ICEJ sponsoring flights for 3,225 of these new arrivals, including 375 this year.

Besides wanting to reunite these Ethiopian families, JAFI officials also made sure most of the immigrants who arrived on the latest flight were from Gondar, a region battered in recent months by widespread Muslim rioting.

One immigrant family we met embodied the long, painful separation these Ethiopian Jewish families have endured over recent decades. Their little two year-old daughter Miriam first captured my attention as I waited on the hot tarmac while they descended the stairs leading down from the plane. She was half asleep in her father’s arms, no doubt exhausted from the long bus ride from Gondar to Addis Ababa and then a four-hour flight to Tel Aviv. But when I offered her an Israeli flag, she perked up with a smile and we became instant buddies.

Inside the welcome center where new immigrants are processed, the family were the first ones called to meet with a clerk to sort out their immigration papers. I happened to be standing next to the door as they entered the clerk’s office and I felt a tug on my hand. Miriam was looking up with that same captivating smile, happy to see me again.

After processing their entry documents, I spoke to the father, Ajik Tzera, through a translator. He was only twelve years old when his mother left Gondar for Israel some 20 years ago. He stayed behind with close relatives who all expected to be making the same journey to Israel soon after. But now, here he was arriving in the Land a grown man at 32, with a wife and young daughter in tow.

When I asked about his hopes for his daughter Miriam now that they had reached the Promised Land, the father lowered his head and began weeping, too overcome with emotions to answer.

An hour later, we watched as the group of new Ethiopian immigrants emerged into the Arrivals Hall, where family and friends were eagerly waiting with decades of pent-up tears and emotions.

The family will now settle into an absorption center for more Hebrew and Judaism classes. Thankfully, with so many relatives already accustomed to life in Israel, their landing will be softer than those who came in the mass Ethiopian airlifts of the 1980s and 90s.

Meanwhile, there are many more Jewish families still waiting in Ethiopia to be reunited with relatives in Israel. Israeli authorities hope to resume the Ethiopian Aliyah flights soon.

So far this year, the ICEJ has sponsored Aliyah flights for over 1,000 Jewish olim from Ethiopia, Russia, Ukraine and the Baltic states. Adding in our support for other Jews making the move to Israel this year, we have currently helped over 4,000 Jews with Aliyah assistance in 2023, and many more are still to come.

Donate today at: give.icej.org/aliyah