Aliyah Conference, Jerusalem - Michael Freund (Shavei Israel) - Lost Tribes of Israel
Published on Oct 15, 2018
Standing in support of Israel, Jews, and believers in all the nations, in the name of Jesus (Yeshua). Sharing biblical truth, encouragement, news and prophecy.
Showing posts with label Michael Freund. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Michael Freund. Show all posts
Monday, October 15, 2018
Thursday, May 26, 2016
End of a 2,700-Year Exile: Israel Marks 8 Million Shekels for Return of India’s Lost Tribe By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz - BREAKING ISRAEL NEWS
End of a 2,700-Year Exile: Israel Marks 8 Million Shekels for Return of India’s Lost Tribe
“Thus saith the Lord GOD: I will even gather you from the peoples and assemble you out of the countries where ye have been scattered and I will give you the land of Yisrael.” Ezekiel 11:17 (The Israel Bible™)
MK Rabbi Dov Lipman and Israel Retruns Founder Michael Freund at Ben Gurion Airport together with the Bnei Menashe children who made Aliyah in 2014. (Photo: Nir Kafri)
It is truly a blessing to the nation when their tax dollars go towards bringing about a Biblical prophecy. This was the case when the Israeli government set aside eight million shekels to settle 712 members of the Bnei Menashe, a religious group from India which claims Jewish roots, in the Holy Land. The decision was reported in Israeli media on Sunday.
The Bnei Menashe tribe, which numbers around 9,000 members, last had contact with the Jewish people thousands of years ago, according to their oral history. They are distinct and separate from the community of Indian Jews known as Bnei Israel, who arrived in Israel in 1952. The Bnei Israel did not need to undergo conversion and genetic testing has recently substantiated their unbroken genealogical connection with Israel.
The Bnei Menashe live in northeast India, in an area situated between Myanmar and Bangladesh. Also known as the Shinlung, the Bnei Menashe have an oral tradition, passed down for 2,700 years, which describes how the Assyrians invaded the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 721 BCE and took them into slavery.
According to their tradition, they escaped slavery and fled to Persia, and then Afghanistan. The Bnei Menashe later migrated toward Hindu-Kush and Tibet, eventually reaching Kaifeng in East Central China around 240 BCE.
In 100 CE, the Bnei Menashe were expelled from China. Some fled down the Mekong River into Vietnam, the Philippines, Siam, Thailand and Malaysia. Others went to Burma and west to India.
The Bnei Menashe have always observed mitzvot (Torah commandments) and lived as Jews in every respect, and there are over 50 synagogues throughout northeastern India. Several hundred members of the community have already immigrated to Israel, and thousands more clamor to join them.
Israel’s Absorption Ministry gave responsibility for the aliyah and resettling of the 712 Bnei Menashe members to Shavei Israel, a non-profit outreach organization that helps people around the world who are descendants of Jews in order to strengthen their connection with Israel. Shavei will make arrangements with the local Indian government and fly the community from India to Israel. After the Indian Jews arrive, the organization will also be responsible for all aspects of their integration.
Michael Freund, founder and chairman of Shavei Israel, first heard of the Bnei Menashe 15 years ago when he was working as a deputy in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s communications office. Freund received a letter from the Bnei Menashe, claiming they were the long-lost descendants of the tribe of Menashe, and one of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. They asked for his help in returning to the Promised Land.
Though Israel is eager to help long-lost brethren return to their homeland, the absorption process is difficult and has not always been successful. Almost the entire population of Ethiopian Jews was brought to Israel in multiple airlifts, but their integration into Israeli society suffered serious shortcomings.
Freund explained the challenge of resettling long-lost Jews in Israel. “When we started Shavei, I saw the need for establishing a comprehensive absorption model together with the government,” Freund told Breaking Israel News.
“A lot of time and planning went into this model. We consulted with experts in the field and as a result, the Bnei Menashe are considered a model for success,” Freund explained. “All of the communities have asked for more immigrants from the group, and other communities have heard of the success of the program and have asked to take part.”
Over 3,000 Bnei Menashe and tens of thousands new immigrants from other communities have make aliyah to Israel, with the help of organizations like Shavei and the Israeli government.
The prophetic project has diplomatic implications, as it brings Israel and India even closer. In October last year, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the Bnei Menashe a “living bridge between our two peoples” in his speech at the special Knesset session in honor of the president of India, Pranab Mukherjee.
Thursday, October 8, 2015
Rallying Hispanics for Israel
Rallying Hispanics for Israel
This summer’s bruising and ultimately failed effort to torpedo US President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran has provided pro-Israel activists in the United States with an important and timely lesson.
Despite spending tens of millions of dollars, organizing advertising campaigns in the print and electronic media and lighting up switchboards on Capitol Hill, they did not succeed in preventing the White House from putting together the votes needed to stymie opposition to the atrocious atomic accord.
Clearly, Israel’s defenders in the US are in dire need of some reinforcements, and I believe that Hispanic Americans may just provide the key to ensuring long-term support for the Jewish state.
While organizations such as the Conference of Presidents and the American Jewish Committee have been reaching out to the Latino population in the US in recent years, far more must be done to court this crucial sector of American society and it behooves Israel to wake up and take notice.
We have all heard a lot about the growing political and social clout of US Hispanics, but it is the numbers which tell the full story.
According to a June 15, 2015, research report by the Pew Center, which is based on US Census Bureau data, the number of Hispanics in the United States reached a new high of 55.4 million people in 2014, representing 17.4 percent of the total US population. This means that more than one out of every six Americans is Hispanic, making them the largest minority group in the country.
And projections by the Census Bureau estimate that by 2050 the number of Hispanic Americans will more than double to 106 million.
These figures simply cannot be ignored. Latinos will continue to climb the economic and political ladders in the US, ascending to new heights of power and influence and reshaping the country. If Israel is not on their radar, it will inevitably affect the bilateral US-Israel relationship in the decades to come.
A number of Jewish groups are already utilizing some of the standard tools available in pro-Israel advocacy work, such as organizing leadership trips to the Jewish state and producing materials in Spanish that explain Israel’s cause.
But I believe there is a far more powerful instrument at our disposal, one that will touch the souls of many Hispanics and draw them closer to Israel and the Jewish people, and that is the Jewish ancestry that many of them share.
In recent decades, an awakening has been taking place as a growing number of people throughout the Spanishand Portuguese-speaking world are discovering their Jewish roots. These people, known as Bnei Anusim (Hebrew for “the progeny of those who were coerced”) or by the derogatory term “Marranos,” are descendants of Iberian Jews who were forcibly converted to Catholicism in the 14th and 15th centuries. Despite being hunted by the Inquisition, many continued to preserve Jewish practices and customs covertly down through the generations.
Nowadays, as more people discover their historical Jewish connection, either through genealogical research or DNA testing, this almost inevitably results in reshaping their attitudes toward Israel and the Jewish people. As chairman of Shavei Israel, the largest organization in the world today working with Bnei Anusim, I have seen this burgeoning phenomenon first-hand.
Consider the following: over the past decade, a series of genetic tests carried out on Hispanic men living in New Mexico, southern Texas and northern Mexico found that as many as 15% had Sephardic Jewish ancestors.
The phenomenon was the subject of numerous articles in the mainstream press, including The New York Times, Newsweek magazine and Smithsonian.com.
Similarly, in 2008, geneticists discovered a unique genetic mutation related to a form of breast cancer among Hispanic Catholics in Colorado that is identical to that found among Central European Jews, which clearly suggests that they have shared ancestry.
If indeed 15% of Hispanic Americans have Jewish ancestry, this means that as many as eight million US Latinos are descendants of Jews. This presents a unique opportunity for Israel and the Jewish people to reach out to them, and it is one that should not be missed.
Due to the passage of centuries since the forced conversions and expulsions of Iberian Jewry, many Hispanics are no longer fully aware of their historical connection to the Jewish people. We must work to remind them of this salient fact, and to utilize it as the basis for a coordinated outreach program to build bridges between Hispanics and Jews.
As the general Hispanic population learns of their community’s connection with Jews, it will build new bridges of understanding with the Jewish community and Israel, make them less likely to fall prey to anti-Semitic stereotypes and less inclined to support anti-Israel initiatives such as the BDS movement.
The benefits of such outreach could also extend to the demographic sphere. Inevitably, upon discovering or re-discovering their Jewish roots, a certain percentage of Hispanics will seek to rejoin the Jewish people.
Indeed, according to the 2014 Religious Landscape Survey by the Pew Research Center, 4% of American Jews are Hispanic/ Latino. At least part of this number is attributable to the growing numbers of Hispanics who have returned to Judaism. Obviously, Judaism is not a missionary religion. But if even just 2% of US Hispanics were to join the Jewish people, it would result in an increase in the American Jewish population of more than 1.1 million.
Reawakening the Jewish consciousness of Hispanic Americans will naturally lead them to be more supportive of Israel in the political arena. This can serve as an important boost to Israel’s cause on Capitol Hill, resulting in a powerful alliance of pro-Israel forces ranging from Jewish organizations to Christian evangelicals to Hispanic-Americans.
Thankfully, a number of visionary Hispanic leaders have taken steps to strengthen their community’s relationship with Israel.
Earlier this year, US Pastor Mario Bramnick launched the Hispanic Israel Leadership Coalition, an important new group that will seek to build greater support for the Jewish state among the tens of millions of Hispanic evangelicals worldwide.
“We want to build the Hispanic Evangelicals to be a firewall,” Bramnick said, “a protection against this rise of anti-Semitism and anti-Israel rhetoric.”
Prominent Latino leaders such as the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez and Pastor Guillermo Maldonado have been outspoken in their love for Israel, inspiring many to stand with the Jewish state and pray for her well-being.
It is time for Israel to return the favor, and grasp the hand of Hispanic friendship that is being extended our way. In a world that is increasingly hostile to all we hold dear, it would be comforting to know that we have a large cadre of amigos whose friendship we can count on in our hour of need.
Reprinted with author’s permission from The Jerusalem Post
Read more at http://www.breakingisraelnews.com/50484/rallying-hispanics-for-israel-opinion/#3S1wB2pyVv84W2Xi.99
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