Group Identity in Transition: Between Ethiopia and Israel

• In Event: Images of Israeliness in Folk Culture (Hebrew)

Abstract

The Ethiopian Jews ALIYAH to Israel holds a crucial place within the mosaic of Israel’s Jewish
communities. Their generations-long Jewish identity and immigration to Israel calls for a
consideration of Judaism as a comprehensive cultural framework that challenges simplistic
assumptions as to the spiritual and physical unity of the Jewish people, as well as an
observation of diverse symbolic dimensions in the definitions of the collective. Questions
concerning identity continue to accompany the community, providing an important opportunity
for a comprehensive reformulation of the question itself, its main components and the
different forces acting in the arena. Thus, in the presence of continuing identity-
related challenges, I propose to examine the essence of central unifying mechanisms.
Specifically, national-memory frameworks are mobilized to forge a unifying Jewish-Israeli
identity. My presentation will look at the dynamics of change in group and even personal
memory with reference to five central examples: the Sigd celebration becomes
a national holiday; Memorial Day for Ethiopian Jews who died on their way to Israel; "Prisoners
of Zion" in Ethiopia; renovation of cemeteries and youth trips to Ethiopia; And recently, first
voices from within the community turning to Pogroms and even Holocaust in the context of
the Italian occupation in Ethiopia.

Author

• Hagar Salamon, Hebrew University