250 B'NEI MENASHE ARRIVE IN ISRAEL

(October 14) A group of 250 B'nei Menashe olim from Manipur landed Wednesday at Ben Gurion Airport. Traveling on a flight arranged by Shavei Israel, the private Jerusalem-based organization tasked with bringing them, the group comprised the last of 722 B'nei Menashe whose Aliyah, though approved in 2015, was delayed for years by Israeli government procrastination.

The immigrants were welcomed at the airport by the Minister of Aliyah and Absorption, Pnina Tamano-Shata. After a brief ceremony, they were taken to an absorption center at an undisclosed site, where they will spend the next three months studying Hebrew and preparing for their rabbinical conversion to Judaism. Subsequently, they will be given housing in the northern city of Nof ha-Galil (formerly Upper Nazareth), as were the two groups that preceded them.

The immigrants flew to Israel from Manipur's capital of Imphal via New Delhi, where mishaps betook several of them. In one case, a small child was diagnosed with Covid-19 and she and her family were unable to continue on their way. In other instances, persons were discovered not to have Israeli visas. How they could have boarded the Imphal-New Delhi flight without them is unclear.

But the most curious case was that of 35-year-old Nachshon Haokip, who was traveling with his wife and two small children. Nachshon had angered Shavei Israel by participating in the Degel Menashe food relief campaign in the summer of 2020 that Shavei opposed and by refusing to sign the oath of allegiance to it that it had demanded from all the immigrants. In addition, his brother, Hillel Haokip, is a known anti-Shavei activist in Israel.

Although nevertheless included in the group, Nachshom was informed upon reaching New Delhi that he could not proceed further because details on his Israeli visa did not match those on his Indian passport: whereas the passport bore his Kuki first name of Henjangam, his visa had his Hebrew name of Nachshon, and while the passport correctly gave his year of birth as 1986, the visa stated it as 1982. The devastated Nachshon, forced to part from his wife and children who continued to Israel, received a telephone call from Shavei Israel's chairman Michael Freund telling him to return to Manipur and expressing the hope that he would eventually be able to rejoin his family.

Could it be a coincidence that the one person in the group of 250 whose passport and visa did not tally was someone who had been on Shavei Israel’s blacklist? The details in Nachshon's passport were, like those of all the immigrants, forwarded by Shavei Israel to the Ministry of Interior in Jerusalem, which then issued the visa. No one in Jerusalem could have known Nachshon's Hebrew name. Only Shavei’s office could have substituted it for his Kuki one.

This and the incorrect date of birth inevitably lead one to wonder whether Shavei, unable to punish Nachshon by removing him from the government-authorized 2015 list, deliberately falsified details of his passport in order to render his visa invalid. His being ordered back to Manipur only strengthens the suspicion. Would not another telephone call, a simple clarification from Michael Freund to the Ministry of Interior, affirming that Nachshon was the victim of a clerical mistake on Shavei’s part, have sufficed to allow him to fly with his family to Israel?

INDIAN EMBASSY HOLD ANNUAL HAIFA BATTLE COMMEMORATION WITH B'NEI MENASHE DELEGATE IN ATTENDANCE

(8 October): The Indian Embassy in Israel held its annual commemoration on Thursday, October 7th of the conquest of Haifa by Indian troops in the final stages of World War 1. Although the commemoration usually takes place on the 23rd September, the day on which Indian troops conquered the city from its Turkish, German and Austrian defenders, it was held 2 weeks later because of previous covid19 restrictions. In attendance at the ceremony as an invited representative of the Israel's B'nei Menashe community was Isaac Thangjom, the Executive Director of Degel Menashe.

Isaac Thangjom signing the ceremony's guestbook.

While only a minor footnote in the history books, the Battle of Haifa is memorable for several reasons. It was the first time that Indian troops, who served widely in the British imperial army during World War 1 fought entirely under the command of their own officers. And it may well have been the last time in the annals of modern warfare in which an "old-fashioned" cavalry charge was successfully executed.

The battle took place during the last week of Gen. Edmund Allenby's Palestine campaign, which took a sudden turn when the British Army broke through Turkish lines in mid-September and turned what had been a standstill into a rout. The troops participating in the battle came from its ranks of Jodhpur Lancers, Mysore Lancers and the Hyderabad Lancers. Their task was to clear the narrow strip of flat land between the Mediterranean Sea and Mt Carmel on which Haifa, at that time a small town was located, and to clear the path for further advance to Acre. They faced two main obstacles: the swamp along the Kishon river, which blocked their path of the advance and the German and Austrian machine gun and artillery emplacements on the lower slope of the mountain. Armed with nothing but swords and lancers, the three battalions swept under heavy fire through the area that is now downtown Haifa and reached the Kishon while foot soldiers outflanked and captured enemy gun positions. In the end, the Turkish troops they were supposed to be supporting having fled, the Germans and the Austrians surrendered. 1,350 prisoners were taken by the Indians at the expense of 34 wounded and 8 killed, including the Commanding Officer, Dalpat Singh Shekhawat.

Indian soldiers with Indian and Israeli flags.

The ceremony of the commemoration started at 9 am at the Indian Military Cemetery at the bottom of Mt Carmel. The Indian Defense Attaché, Group Captain Sundaramani Krishnan conducted the commemoration. The Ambassador H. E. Sanjeev Singla gave a tribute on the contribution of the Jodhpur Lancers on the final

assault that liberated the Haifa from the Turks. Mr. Gary Koren followed talking about the wonderful relationship between the countries, trade, economic ties, defense and off course, tourism. Indian contingent from the UNDOF performed the Guard of Honour. The Haifa Police band played the Indian and Israeli national anthem. The last item, laying of the wreath, the first one by the Indian Ambassador and then, Mr. Gary Koren followed by imminent citizens like Mr. Nissim Moses, a Bnei Israel historian and other prominent personalities including those of Indian origin. Then it was laid by various Defense Attachès of countries like the US, Britain, Canada, Germany, Poland, South Korea, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Australia, Japan and several others.

Ambassador Singla and Defence Attaché, Group Captain Krishnan speaking at the ceremony.

Indian soldiers fought with the British Army in a number of battles in 1917-18 and some 900 are buried today in cemeteries all over Israel. Although, Gen. Allenby's conquest of Palestine is generally regarded as marginal to the conduct of World War 1, it was in fact, a crucial element in hastening the war's end with the total collapse of the Turkish 7th and 8th Army that had faced Allenby's troops, there was nothing to prevent the British from sweeping through Turkey itself and threatening German and Austrian lines from the south. When the Central Powers surrendered soon after in November 1918, the speed with which they did so was partly a result of Allenby's victory.

Guests at the ceremony.

An interesting sidelight to this story is that two battalions of Jabotinsky's Jewish Legion, the 38th and the 39th of the Royal Fusiliers, fought in the same British breakthrough. Of the opposite side of the front from the Indians, they crossed the Jordan, north of Jericho and took part in the British conquest of Trans-Jordan. The only time in which Indian and Jewish units have ever fought together, this can be thought of as the first harbinger of the close cooperation between India and Israel today.

SOME 270 B'NEI MENASHE SET TO MAKE ALIYA

(30 September) Our Newsletter has learnt that some 270 B'nei Menashe from Manipur will be leaving for Israel on the 14th October. Although no official announcement has been made, the prospective immigrants have all been informed by Shavei Israel, a private Jerusalem based organization that has been put in charge of B'nei Menashe aliya.

The group of immigrants is comprised of the last of the 722 men, women and children who were on the 2015-16 list of candidates for aliya approved by Shavei Israel and the Rabbinate. With their arrival in Israel, all B'nei Menashe approved for aliya will have made it. This leaves over 5,000 B'nei Menashe still waiting for their turn. Upon being informed of their upcoming aliya, the heads of all families involved were summoned to Shavei Israel office in Churachandpur. There they were made to pay a fee of Rupees 500 per person to have their photos taken and required to sign an oath of loyalty to Shavei Israel. In this oath, those of them who had signed the petition last February asking the Israeli government to put an end to Shavei's monopoly on B'nei Menashe aliya were made to declare that their names were put on the petition without their knowledge. No room was left for doubt that whoever refused to sign such a statement would be struck from the aliya list. Virtually all of the petition signers complied with this ultimatum. "Even though my family knew this was not true, we signed anyway because we were afraid to lose our chance for the aliya," we were told by a B'nei Menashe who asked to remain anonymous. "I would like to state clearly that I stand by my beliefs and I, like everyone else I know whose name was on the petition, signed it willingly and with full consent."

One sign of the imminent aliya was the departure from Israel for Manipur on the 29th September of Tzvi Khaute, Shavei Israel's Coordinator for B'nei Menashe affairs. Khaute was sent from Israel to make the final arrangement and supervise the proceedings.

According to informed sources, the immigrants will spend a period of time in an absorption centre in Israel where they will undergo formal conversion to Judaism, after which they will be given housing in the northern city of Nof HaGalil (Upper Nazareth). In this, they will join the two previous groups from the 2015-16 list who are now living in Nof HaGalil, too.