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Ethiopian immigrants protesting discrimination, carrying signs reading 'stop the apartheid' and 'stop the racism' in Petah Tikva last week. (Nir Keidar)
Last update - 00:00 27/12/2007
Groups appeal state bid to wrap up mass Ethiopian immigration
By Anshel Pfeffer, Haaretz Correspondent
Tags: Falashmura, Ethiopians 

Petitioners took action Wednesday against the planned return next week of Interior Ministry officials stationed in Ethiopia - a step toward ending mass emigration from the country to Israel.

The petitioners asked the court to defer Interior Minister Meir Sheetrit's decision to recall the officials pending the High Court's decision on a separate petition calling for Israel to issue another 8,000 immigration permits to the Falashmura, Ethiopians who claim Jewish ancestry.

Wednesday's petition was filed by the organization Struggle to Save Ethiopian Jewry and relatives of would-be immigrants from Ethiopia.
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According to a government decision from 2006, the Jewish Agency is slated to stop its activities on immigration from Ethiopia by June, when the last group of immigrants issued with permits arrives in Israel.

Last week, Sheetrit held a meeting reviewing all the remaining applicants for immigration to Israel. But petitioners say thousands of Falashmura who under the Law of Return have the right to immigrate remain in temporary camps, waiting permission to move here.

To date, some 30,000 Falashmura have immigrated to Israel, where they have undergone strict Jewish conversion. Despite efforts to bring the remaining Falashmura to Israel over the years, their numbers keep growing. At the moment, some 8,000 people claiming Jewish descent and asking to immigrate to Israel still populate camps in Ethiopia's remote Gondar province.

Jewish Agency officials say the process has become rife with corruption and that many non-Jewish Ethiopians have claimed Jewish ties to immigrate to Israel, where they later revert to Christianity.



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  • Ethiopian immigrants protesting discrimination block Petah Tikva streets
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      1.   Israel will have a problem, if these ethiopian 04:17  |  cristo 27/12/07
      2.   let them in 07:38  |  Mike 27/12/07
      3.   Mike #2 08:08  |  Judith 27/12/07
      4.   Falashmurra Petitions 08:32  |  Noam 27/12/07
      5.   #1 cristo. Where is your proof? 09:02  |  Maureen Ann 27/12/07
      6.   The Falashmura are economic opportunists and are not Jewish 12:00  |  Moshe 27/12/07
      7.   Ethiopian Jewish rabbis say that the Falashmura are not Jewish 12:06  |  M 27/12/07
      8.   Ethiopian absorption a failure--why add to the problem? 12:22  |  Israeli 27/12/07
      9.   Please explain 12:50  |  Joe 27/12/07
      10.   To cristo (Christ?) 14:39  |  Local 27/12/07
      11.   To Joe (Please explain) 14:49  |  Israeli 27/12/07
      12.   Israel; learn from the non-Jewish Russian immigration 15:58  |  Alicia 27/12/07
      13.   NOT A SINGLE ETHIOPIAN IS JEWISH!!! NOT A SINGLE ONE!!! 20:27  |  Tom 27/12/07
      14.   Joe....nr9 21:34  |  leon 27/12/07
      15.   Tom nr 13 21:35  |  leon 27/12/07
      16.   answer to christo 08:59  |  addis 28/12/07
      17.   Falasha practiced ancient judiasim 05:27  |  leoul 29/12/07
      18.   Falasha practiced ancient judaism 06:20  |  Tamrat 06/02/08
      19.   hey 20:40  |  Yael 23/05/08
      20.   You don`t know everthing 06:42  |  Sarah 23/02/09
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