From Ethiopia to Israel, living the dream
The range of bizarre UN member state machinations about Israel is apparently unlimited. On Thursday, the UN General Assembly demanded, yet again, that Israel withdraw completely from the Golan Heights and resume peace negotiations with Syria. The resolution, adopted by a vote of 105-6, with 58 abstentions, did not mention the civil war in Syria, now in its seventh year.
This latest UN action is nothing new. The Syrian Golan resolution has been on the General Assembly docket annually since the early 1980s, conveniently included in “The Situation in the Middle East” package of measures, mostly supporting a variety of Palestinian causes, which single out Israel for harsh condemnation. They are habitually introduced, then adopted by an overwhelming majority and added to the UN files without advancing any prospects for Arab-Israeli peace.
Only the United States, Israel, Canada, the United Kingdom, Micronesia and Marshall Islands voted no on the Golan resolution. For the UK, which had abstained on the same measure in 2016, this was progress.
It was a very rare moment of consensus at the UN on dealing with Syria. Russia, which has singlehandedly blocked any meaningful resolution on Syria since 2011, and has vetoed, to date, 10 proposed Security Council measures, joined with those voting yes.
The Golan resolution expresses “deep concern that Israel has not withdrawn from the Syrian Golan,” and “grave concern over the halt in the peace process on the Syria track.” It further “demands once more that Israel withdraw from all the occupied Syrian Golan to the line of 4 June 1967.”
Those nations that supported the resolution thus agreed with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem, who declared in his September address before the UN General Assembly that “It is delusional to believe, even for a moment, that the crisis in Syria will make us forget our inalienable right to recover the occupied Syrian Golan fully to the lines of June 4, 1967.”
In UN deliberations, both historical context and present realities are ignored.
Israel came into possession of the Golan in June 1967 in the course of a defensive war against Egypt, Syria and Jordan, a coalition that aimed to annihilate the Jewish state only 19 years after its birth. Prior to the war, Syria regularly used the towering Golan Heights to shell Israeli communities below.
While Egypt, and then Jordan, would achieve peace treaties in 1979 and 1994 with Israel, Syria’s leader, Hafez Assad, resisted substantive negotiations with Israel despite US prodding.
Serious Israel-Syria talks did take place, notably at the Wye River Conference Center in the 1990s, following the 1991 Madrid peace conference. And as late as 2010, there were secret talks between representatives of President Bashar Assad, who had succeeded his father after his death in 2000, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
But rather than genuinely pursue peace, Assad continued to develop a large chemical weapons arsenal and attempted to develop a nuclear weapon. Israel, in an act of self-defense, destroyed Syria’s nuclear reactor in 2007.
The truly pressing issue today regarding Syria is not the status of the Golan, or even peace with Israel. It is the tragic reality of a country decimated by its own leader, who, in March 2011, launched a bloody war against his people.
Today, with more than 500,000 dead and one-third of the surviving population displaced inside the country or living as refugees outside Syria, the fighting continues. Yet, there is an emerging international consensus that acknowledges Assad will stay in power, and the Russians and Iranians who helped his regime survive amid the rubble of his country will remain in Syria.
Currently, Iran’s direct intervention in the war, the continuing expansion of its forces’ presence, and its designs to establish a base for its troops or for Hezbollah – Iran’s terrorist proxy – near the current border on the Golan, pose an ongoing threat to Israel. That should be of concern to UN member states, but is ignored.
Since the war in Syria began, Israel has avoided involvement while at the same time monitoring conditions closely, and, when deemed necessary for its own security, carrying out military strikes, mostly targeting Hezbollah. Most important, Israel has welcomed and delivered medical care for Syrians, some badly wounded by Assad’s forces, who crossed the border.
Whether an Israeli-Syrian peace process can restart one day depends largely on conditions in Syria and the future direction of Assad or his successor. As with other Arab-Israel peace efforts, success will come from direct, bilateral talks, not in the halls of the UN.
The Golan resolution, then, is nothing more than another pitiful and meaningless UN product.
The writer is the American Jewish Committee’s director of media relations.
Ihear countless aliya stories, each different from the last. Some come to Israel of their own accord, for job opportunities or a better lifestyle, or even on a whim. Others, however, immigrate to Israel because it is their only hope. That was once me. Now, assisting new immigrants to the Jewish state gives me not only a sense of closure, but more importantly, a front-row seat to the continuous unfolding of the Zionist dream and the Jewish future.
Several decades ago, I found myself – along with hundreds of others – being secretly funneled onto a plane in the middle of the night by soldiers from a country I didn’t yet know. I would arrive in Israel as part of Operation Moses, the massive Jewish immigration mission from Ethiopia spanning November 1984 to January 1985.
Ethiopian Jews had been permitted to make aliya until 1977, when the African country’s dictator, Mengistu Haile Mariam, rose to power. From 1977-1984, leading up to Operation Moses, some 8,000 Ethiopian Jews gradually came to Israel through a number of small airlifts.
Under Mariam’s Marxist rule, many of us were persecuted for participating in Jewish educational and Zionist activities – including my brother, who was murdered by the regime. For my siblings and I, aliya was virtually our only option for survival.
It wasn’t easy. First we had to get from Ethiopia to Sudan – a journey that took us eight days on foot, with extremely limited water and food. We were two days from the Sudanese border when I began to feel sick and collapsed. I thought I was dying. My friends tried to treat me. They drew blood to reduce the pressure that I was feeling, and I lost consciousness. My friends would literally drag me for two days, all the way to Sudan.
The hardship didn’t end there. Once we reached Sudan, we stayed for four months in a refugee camp, where we witnessed 10-20 adults and children dying every day due to unsanitary food and neglect. We all longed for a better future.
Finally, our saving grace came from the Israel Air Force.
Quickly, the Israeli soldiers boarded hundreds of us onto a plane that took us to Israel. What I didn’t know at the time was that I would become one of the 6,364 Jews to arrive in Israel through intermediary countries during Operation Moses. My flight was just one of 30 that brought about 200 Ethiopian Jews at a time to Israel. I don’t know how many Jews didn’t make it along the way, but I was almost one of them.
Today, my career bears a striking resemblance to my personal journey.
Since the early 1950s, The Jewish Agency for Israel has assisted more than 90,000 Ethiopians with their aliya by arranging visas and transportation, as well as by providing them with their first home in Israel and up to two years of housing in one of the organization’s absorption centers that are dedicated to the needs of Ethiopian immigrants. Today, I work as a counselor and assistant at one of these absorption centers, in Hanita.
My goal is simple: After receiving so much from The Jewish Agency and from the State of Israel, I try to give back to new immigrants who find themselves in similar positions. My journey to Israel was the most difficult experience of my life, but also the most rewarding. My daughter, Rebecca Avera, works as a Jewish Agency emissary in Nevada. My nephew, who was lucky enough to make aliya with us, received a PhD from the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology and is studying with the Fulbright Foundation for his post-doctoral degree in electrical physics.
There are now more than 135,000 firstand second-generation Ethiopian immigrants living in Israel. Ethiopian aliya is a point of pride for our government – as it should be. It highlights the importance of Israel’s commitment to protecting Jews around the world.
Currently, The Jewish Agency is working to reunite families of Ethiopian immigrants, as so many of these families get broken apart by the immigration process. In 2017, as of September, The Jewish Agency had facilitated 10 aliya flights from Ethiopia – bringing 516 relatives of Ethiopian immigrants to Israel. The organization is striving to bring a total of 9,000 family members of Ethiopian immigrants to Israel by 2020.
Walking around Israel, I see a mosaic of Jews from myriad countries, denominations and affiliations. Some are native Israelis, others are immigrants who see Israel as their second chance at life, and still others are everything in between. Regardless of the circumstances, we all believe in what Israel stands for: the opportunity to live freely. As Israelis, we know that we can no longer be persecuted or victimized simply for being who we are.
For me, Operation Moses was nothing short of a fairytale, a miracle, and a dream. By working to give new immigrants the same lifeline that I was once afforded, I am living the dream.
The author works at the Hanita Absorption Center for Ethiopian immigrants, coming to Israel during ‘Operation Moses’ in 1984. Today, her daughter Rebecca Avera is a Jewish Agency emissary in Las Vegas.