From the Babylonian captivity, Iraq became a centre of Jewish culture
Victoria died last month. She was almost 100 years old, still living on her own in her house in the tranquil north London suburb of Golders Green, far from the
turmoil of war and revolution that had marked her life. Victoria was an Iraqi Jew. Spanning much of the 20th century, her memory carried down to us the poignant story of the Iraqi Jewish community from the 1920s to its final passing.
It’s a tale that goes back more than 2,600 years. Few, if any, communities on Earth have such a historical memory. From the Babylonian captivity to modern times, Iraq was a centre of Jewish society, learning and culture. One Talmud – that vast compendium of Jewish legal scholarship, custom and folklore – was written in Babylonia.
After many ups and downs during the Middle Ages, by 1900 the Jews were the second-largest community in Baghdad. Their population was some 50,000 strong, including famous commercial families such as the Sassoons and the Ezras, especially active in the trade with India.
Victoria was born into that very traditional world. She married Shalom when she was 16 and he was 21 – an arranged marriage, though they had admired each other from afar. Their first child was born a year later. Around that time, in 1941 – after a failed pro-Nazi uprising – the first pogrom in Baghdad took place. Jewish properties were looted, and 200 people were killed. (Victoria and her family were saved by a Muslim neighbour.)
When the modern state of Israel was founded in 1948, life for Jews became increasingly difficult in many parts of the near east and north Africa. More than 120,000 left Iraq over the next few years, stripped of everything but one tiny bag and the clothes they stood in. By 1951, most of the community had gone, having relinquished citizenship and property in a land that had been their home for two and a half millennia. Six thousand stayed on, though, among them Victoria, Shalom and their young family.
For a time, things were calm. Shalom and his Arab business partner did well. There was a new Chevrolet, picnics at the ancient site of Ctesiphon, nights sleeping under an awning on the roof in the heat of summer, family celebrations in the garden. But in 1958, the military overthrew the monarchy and things took a turn for the worse. In 1961, the family took a two-week holiday in Lebanon, and from there travelled to London, never to return. They did well – a house on the Finchley Road, a Morris Minor – though Victoria never quite adjusted, and still preferred to speak Arabic at home.
Meanwhile, in 1963 the Iraqi Republic was overthrown by a Ba’athist coup and the country spiralled into the cycles of violence that have plagued it for six decades since. By 1974, under Saddam Hussein, only 400 Jews remained. The last Jewish wedding took place in 1978; the last rabbi died in 1996; the last active synagogue closed in 2003, around the time of the invasion by the American-led coalition. During the war, efforts to track down survivors in Iraq found 34 Jews, mainly elderly and poor. By 2009, just eight Jews were left; today there are four. The story is almost over.
They have left behind 2,600 years of memories, including the Great Synagogue of Baghdad, perhaps the oldest in the world. A 2020 report taking stock of Jewish heritage sites in Iraq listed 118 synagogues, 48 schools and three cemeteries, along with nine holy places. Most famous were the lovely shrines of Ezra, on the Tigris in southern Iraq, and Ezekiel, on the Euphrates near Hilla. Both have Muslim custodians now, and the synagogue next to Ezekiel has been refurbished as a mosque.
In Iraqi Kurdistan, where some Jewish families may still live, one or two places have been restored with foreign money and private donations. Among them is the synagogue in the Christian village of Alqosh north of Mosul, with its tomb of the Old Testament prophet Nahum. In the old days it was the scene of a jolly June pilgrimage, with all communities taking part in the singing and dancing.
There’s a heroism in the stories of people such as Victoria and her family – and of all those who flee conflict and persecution, forced to put best foot forward and build new lives on distant shores with the eternal optimism of the immigrant. As for the memories, they survive among the exiles – in Israel and in north London, too. As one friend said to me: “We left Iraq. But Iraq didn’t leave us.”
➤➤ Turn to page 42 to read Michael’s article shedding new light on the “Dark Ages”