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Memories of Eden By Tom Segev June 1, 1941 was the date of the festival of Shavuot. On that day, Arab hoodlums burst into the Jewish neighborhoods of Baghdad. The riots continued the next day, too. The rioters raided the houses, murdered, raped, looted, burned a synagogue and shops. Nobody knows for certain how many Jewish residents were killed; their number is generally estimated at over 150. Many hundreds were wounded. The pogrom, which is known as the Farhud, was stopped by the Baghdad police. Arabs, too, were killed and wounded. Less than 24 hours earlier, Baghdad had been transferred to British rule. Churchill ordered that the short-lived regime of Rashid Ali al-Gilani, who had seized power with the help of the Nazis, be brought down. The British entry into Iraq was considered part of World War II. The Farhud of Baghdad marked the beginning of the end of the most ancient Jewish community in the world, and some compare it to Kristallnacht in Germany and Austria 70 years ago. Advertisement A young couple, Violette and David Shamash, were celebrating the holiday with relatives; they had left their baby, Mira, with an Arab nanny. They experienced hours of terrible anxiety until the nanny brought the child to them. Meanwhile they began to move the furniture, in order to block the doors. Violette heard women's screams from the neighboring houses. Afterward she discovered that many of the Arab neighbors had volunteered to protect the Jews. This is a very Jewish story, not a Zionist one. Violette and David Shamash described themselves as Arabic Jews. The Farhud spurred them to leave their country. Like many Iraqi Jews, they settled at first in Bombay, but the British were about to leave India; Violette and David Shamash came to Jerusalem. The British were about to leave the Land of Israel as well, so the Shamashes settled in Cyprus. After the British left there, too, the couple moved to London. Violette Shamash liked to write. When she died about two years ago at the age of 94, she left behind a large collection of letters and diary entries that describe the daily routine of the last generation of a community that had lived in Iraq consecutively for 2,500 years: What they ate and what they wore, how they fell in love and how they mourned. Aware of the changing times, she wrote about the appearance of the first matches and the first wristwatches, and also diligently recorded what happened to the Jews of Baghdad whenever a new ruler came to power. Mira, the baby, grew up and married Tony Rocca, who was a Sunday Times correspondent, and the two edited Violette Shamash's letters and diary entries into a captivating autobiography; shortly before her death, she managed to witness the toppling of Saddam Hussein's statue. The book, which has just been published, broadcasts nostalgia; it is entitled "Memories of Eden." Rocca researched the events of that day and for the first time suggests a fully documented answer to the question of why the British did not act to prevent the Farhud. Its essence: The British ambassador, Kinahan Cornwallis, did not obey the instructions he received from London; he did what he wanted. As one of those who had invented the Iraqi nation, the ambassador thought that the residents of Baghdad should not be angered and should not be given a feeling that the British were imposing a puppet government on them. Therefore he left the army outside the center of Baghdad and allowed the Arabs to harm the Jews. The Arabs hated them, one reason being that they were considered allies of the British in Iraq; and they also hated the British, one reason being that they were considered allies of the Jews in the Land of Israel. Everyone knew what was about to happen; ambassador Cornwallis didn't care. Lawrence of Arabia described him as a man "forged from one of those incredible metals with a melting point of thousands of degrees." The honorable ambassador spent the hours of the Farhud playing bridge. The British Broadcasting Company has done it again: This time the BBC is questioning one of the fundamental beliefs of Christianity. Christians generally believe that the son of the carpenter from Nazareth was crucified with nails that were hammered through his palms. The BBC says it was done differently. In a film to be broadcast on Sunday, Easter Sunday, Jesus does not spread his arms to the sides, as in a universal movement of embrace. Instead, he raises his arms. The nails are not hammered into his palms, but into the bones of his forearm. His legs are not hanging down, but are folded upward, in a fetal position. The creators of the film say they reconstructed the Crucifixion on the basis of an archaelogical study, among other things the skeleton of a crucified man found in Jerusalem shortly after the Six-Day War. Several Christian spokespersons are very angry. In one of the stairwells of University College, London, stands a large wooden box with the most bizarre attraction in town. Jeremy Bentham, the philosopher, looks as though he was brought here from Madame Tussaud's leftovers; the head really is made of wax and the students pass it without a glance. The sight is quite idiotic. A straw hat on a bloc of wax, a black jacket with a white collar and brown pants. This is the embalmed body of Bentham, sitting at a table on which there are eyeglasses and a ring; he died in 1832. In his will, Bentham bequeathed his body to the college he had founded; after embalming him into eternal life, they stored him in a box, behind glass. Over time his body began to disintegrate, the head fell off and students stole it. It was replaced by a wax head. When the students returned the original head, it was stored in a safe in the basement, so it wouldn't be stolen again. Judging by his location in the stairwell, the college doesn't seem to have much respect for him, but yes, once a year they take him with his box to the senate hall for dinner; because according to tradition, he is supposed to participate in it. In an adjacent building is the Petrie Museum of Egyptology, named after Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie, who is considered the father of modern archaelogy. The findings are in cupboards that stand very close together, identified by yellowing cards on which several lines are typed with a typewriter. In the corner of the bottom shelf of one of the more remote cupboards is an embalmed head. No, it isn't Bentham's head, nor is it the head of Flinders Petrie himself. It is the embalmed head of a girl who has just left the beauty salon, perhaps a bride from the Roman period. In order to see Flinders Petrie's head, you have to make an appointment at the Royal College of Surgeons; they have it preserved in a glass jar, but warn visitors that it may not actually be the head of the genius. His body is buried on Mt. Zion in Jerusalem, but since he was considered a genius, his widow issued a directive to have the head removed, packed in a wooden box and sent to the Royal College of Surgeons in London, so they could burrow into the depths of his brain, and perhaps find the secret of his genius. That was in 1942. After that the head disappeared and was found only 40 years later. But is it really his head? Because the head in the jar is adorned with a black beard; Flinders Petrie's beard was white. Only one thing can apparently be determined with certainty: It is not the head of Jeremy Bentham. He used to shave his beard. Bookmark to del.icio.us   Graphic footage Israel posts clips on YouTube of Jerusalem yeshiva terror attack. Remembering Gaza Knesset approves bill to commemorate the Jewish settlements of Gush Katif.

Today Online Rights group: Deaths in IDF W. Bank raid were apparent executions Responses: 159 Top rabbis: Harvesting organs of the brain dead is `bloodshed` Responses: 52 Defense officials: Hezbollah rockets can reach almost all of Israel Responses: 77 Ari Shavit: Olmert doesn't belong in the prime minister's office Responses: 28 More Headlines 22:43 Arab FMs re-endorse 2002 Saudi peace initiative 23:05 Court strips Avigdor Lieberman of attorney-client privilege 17:40 Defense officials: Hezbollah rockets can reach almost all of Israel 22:53 Tel Aviv goes dark as part of global 'Earth Hour' campaign 20:16 Israel posts clips on YouTube of Jerusalem yeshiva terror attack 21:10 Ex-High Court chief: State must bring all Ethiopian Jews to Israel 21:58 Thousands protest in Hebron against charity closures 14:20 Egypt holds new talks with Hamas, Jihad over truce with Israel 20:29 Treasury official: Economically, Israel is a bi-national state 15:10 MKs okay state-funded center commemorating Gaza settlers 18:47 Bush invites Abbas to U.S. for talks on Palestinian state 22:42 Police informant: Golan teen murder suspect confessed to killing Previous Editions Select Day 26 mar 25 mar 24 mar 23 mar 21 mar 20 mar 19 mar 18 mar 17 mar 16 mar 14 mar 13 mar

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