A Second Exodus: Ethiopian Jews in Israel Between Religion, Nation and State

Abstract

Questions about Jewishness, Judaism, and the Jewish people have been topics ofmillennia-long debates. In this paper, I focus on the formation of social hierarchies inIsrael based on skin-color to argue that there is unresolved yet consequential tensionbetween definitions of Jewishness as a religious tradition, a national identity, and astate apparatus. I embrace the perspective of Ethiopian Jews, whose identities werereframed in Israel as Blacks, to illustrate how this tension placed dark-skinnedimmigrants beyond the scope of both Jewish religious tradition as well as nationalidentity, to become the marginalized inhabitants of the Jewish State. Thereby Idescribe and examine two state-imposed processes in which Israel’s Rabbinateplays a central role: 1) Israel’s demand that Ethiopian Jews convert to Judaism inorder to be accorded citizenship. 2) Israel’s demand that Ethiopian Jewish childrenattend a segregated Jewish Orthodox public-school system, to acquire and cultivatea particular national identity. State-sponsored schools have become the basis forboth religious and national identity education and re-education.Key words: Jewish nationalism; immigration; religious (re-)education; Skin Color;Zionism.