Jewish refugees - Definition and Overview

In the course of history, Jewish populations have been expelled or ostracised by various local authorities and have sought asylum from Anti-Semitism numerous times. The article History of anti-Semitism contains more detailed chronology of anti-Jewish hostilities, while Jewish history and Timeline of Jewish history outline the broader picture. In the modern political discourse, the term Jewish refugee is most frequently used for immigrants to Israel from Arab and Muslim lands in the context of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Partial list of events that prompted major streams of Jewish refugees

1960s-1991 State-sponsored persecution in the Soviet Union prompted approx. 1 million Soviet Jews to emigrate. See also rootless cosmopolitan, Doctors' plot, Jackson-Vanik amendment, refusenik, Zionology, Pamyat.

1952. A tent city for Jewish refugees in Israel

1948-1955 The exodus of Jews from the Arab and Muslim Middle East and North Africa. The combined population of Jewish communities in the Middle East (excluding Israel) was reduced from about 900,000 in 1948 to less than 8,000 today. Some of these communities were more than 2,500 years old. The State of Israel (population in 1948 was about 650,000) absorbed approximately 600,000 of these refugees, many of whom were temporarily settled in tent cities called Maabarot. They were eventually absorbed into Israeli society, and the last Maabarah was dismantled in 1958. Unlike Palestinian refugees, Jewish refugees had no assistance from U.N. bodies such as the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.

1935-1945 The Nazi persecution culminated in the Holocaust of European Jewry. The British Mandate of Palestine prohibited Jewish immigration to the Land of Israel. The Bermuda Conference, Evian Conference and other attempts failed to resolve the problem of Jewish refugees, a fact widely used in Nazi propaganda.

1881-1884, 1903-1906, 1914-1921 Repeated waves of pogroms swept Russia, propelling mass Jewish emigration (about 2 million Russian Jews emigrated in the period 1881-1920). During World War I, some 250,000 Jews were transferred from western Russia. See also Pale of Settlement, May Laws, Russian Civil War.

1744-1790s The reforms of Frederick II, Joseph_II and Maria Theresa sent masses of impoverished German and Austrian Jews east.

1648-1654 Ukrainian Cossacks and peasants led by Bohdan Khmelnytsky destroyed hundreds of Jewish communities and committed mass atrocities. Ukraine was annexed by the Russian Empire, where officially no Jews were allowed.

1654 The fall of the Dutch colony of Recife in Brazil to the Portuguese prompted the first group of Jews to flee to North America.

1492 Ferdinand_II and Isabella issued General Edict on the Expulsion of the Jews from Spain (approx. 200,000), from Sicily (1493, approx. 37,000), from Portugal (1496).

1348 European Jews were blamed for poisoning wells during the Black Death. Many of those who survived the epidemic and pogroms were either expelled or fled.

1290 King Edward I of England expelled all Jews from England. The policy was reversed by Oliver Cromwell in 1655.

12th-14th centuries, France. The practice of expelling the Jews accompanied by confiscation of their property, followed by temporary readmissions for ransom, was used to enrich the crown: expulsions from Paris by Philip Augustus in 1182, from France by Louis IX in 1254, by Charles IV in 1322, by Charles V in 1359, by Charles VI in 1394.

Mid-12th century The invasion of Almohades brought to end the Golden age of Jewish culture in Spain. Among other refugees was Maimonides, who fled to Morocco, then Egypt, then Eretz Israel.

1095 - mid-13th century The waves of Crusades destroyed hundreds of Jewish communities in Europe and in the Middle East, including Jerusalem.

135 The Romans defeated Bar Kokhba's revolt. Emperor Hadrian expelled hundreds of thousands Jews from Judea, wiped the name off the maps, replaced it with Syria Palaestina, forbade Jews to set foot in Jerusalem.

70 The defeat of the Great Jewish Revolt. Masses of Jews were sold to slavery across the Roman Empire, many fled.

597 BCE The Babylonian captivity. In 537 BCE the Persians, who conquered Babylon two years earlier, allowed Jews to return and rebuild Jerusalem and the Temple.

722 BCE The Assyrians led by Shalmaneser conquered the (Northern) Kingdom of Israel and sent the Israelites into captivity at Khorasan. Ten of twelve Tribes of Israel are lost.