The history of the Jews in Lebanon deals with the presence of Jews in Lebanon, which stretches back to Biblical times.
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Lebanese Jews are traditionally a Mizrahi community living mostly in and around Beirut. Almost all of the community has emigrated to Israel, France, USA, Canada, Argentina, Brazil and Australia.
There are only between 20 and 40 Jews now living in the country.[1][2] Emigration was not great even after Lebanon's first civil war in 1958, as Lebanese Jews were tightly integrated into society and felt no need to abandon their homeland. But emigration increased after Lebanon's 1975 civil war, and increased further after Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982.[1]
In pre-Biblical times, the region between Gaza and Anatolia (essentially modern day Lebanon, Israel, Jordan and Syria ) was a single cultural unit. Despite the lack of any central political authority, the region shared a common language family (Northwest Semitic languages, including Phoenician, Ancient Hebrew and Aramaic), religion and way of life. This included some of the world's first permanent settlements arranged around early agricultural communities and independent city states, many of which maintained a wide network of trade relations throughout the Mediterranean and beyond.
By the time of the Israelite Kingdoms, Lebanon and Israel (including present-day Jordan) could be recognized as distinct entities, although they remained close allies, experiencing the same fates with changing regional developments. During this period, parts of modern Lebanon were under the control of Jerusalem, and Jews lived as far north as Baal-Hermon on the slopes of Mount Hermon (sometimes identified with Hasbaya, which once again became an important center of Jewish life in the first half of the 20th century [3]).
According to the Hebrew Bible, the territory of the Israelite tribes of Asher and Naphtali extended into present-day Lebanon as far as Sidon in the north. These tribes formed part of the united Kingdom of Israel and then the northern kingdom of the same name. However, Assyria captured Naphtali in c. 732 BCE and deported its population, a fate which befell the rest of the northern kingdom in c. 723 BCE. The New Testament also refers to Jesus's sojourn around Mount Hermon which appears to take for granted Jewish presence in this locality. Some people also add the locality of Qana (near Tyre in Lebanon) but the Bible clearly avoids confusion by referring to it as "Qana of Galilee".
Following the Bar Kokhba Revolt against Rome in c. 132 CE, several Jewish communities were established in Lebanon. Caliph Muawiya (642–680) established a Jewish community in Tripoli, Lebanon. Another was founded in 922 in Sidon. The Jewish Academy was established in Tyre in 1071. In the 19th century, hostility between the Druze and Maronites communities led many Jews to leave al-Qamar, with most moving to Hasbaya by the end of the century.
In 1911, Jews from Greece, Syria, Iraq, and Turkey moved to Beirut, expanding the community there with additional more than 5,000 members. Articles 9 and 10 of the Lebanese Constitution of 1926 guaranteed the freedom of religion and provided each religious community, including the Jewish community, the right to mange its own civil matters, including education, and thus the Jewish community was constitutionally protected, a fact that did not apply to other Jewish communities in the region[4]. The Jewish community prospered under the French mandate and Greater Lebanon, exerting considerable influence throughout Lebanon and beyond. They allied themselves with Pierre Gemayel's Phalangist Party (a right wing, Maronite group modelled after similar movements in Italy and Germany, and Franco's Phalangist movement in Spain.) and played an instrumental role in the establishment of Lebanon as an independent state.
During the Greater Lebanon period, two Jewish newspapers were founded, the Arabic language Al-Alam al-Israili (the Israelite World) and the French Le Commerce du Levant, an economic periodical which still publishes (though it is now owned by non-Jews).
The Jewish community of Beirut evolved in three distinct phases.[5] Until 1908, the Jewish population in Beirut grew by migration from the Syrian interior and from other Ottoman cities like Izmir, Salonica, Istanbul, and Baghdad. Commercial growth in the thriving port-city, consular protection, and relative safety and stability in Beirut all accounted for the Jewish migration. Thus, from a few hundred at the beginning of the 19th century, the Jewish community grew to 2,500 by the end of the century, and to 3,500 by the First World War. While the number of Jews grew considerably, the community remained largely unorganized. During this period, the community lacked some of the fundamental institutions such as communal statutes, elected council, welfare and taxation mechanisms. In this period, the most organized and well-known Jewish institution in the city was probably the private Tiferet Israel (The Glory of Israel) boarding-school founded by Zaki Cohen in 1874. The school attracted Jewish students from prosperous families like Shloush (Jaffa), Moyal (Jaffa), and Sassoon (Baghdad). Its founder, influenced by the Ottoman reforms and by local cultural trends, aspired to create a modern yet Jewish school. It offered both secular and strictly Jewish subjects as well as seven languages. It also offered commercial subjects. The school was closed at the beginning of the 20th century due to financial hardships.
The Young Turk Revolution (1908) sparked the organization process. Within six years, the Beirut community created a general assembly, an elected twelve-member council, drafted communal statutes, appointed a chief rabbi, and appointed committees to administer taxation and education. The process involved tension and even conflicts within the community, but eventually, the community council established its rule and authority in the community. The chief rabbi received his salary from the community and was de facto under the council's authority.
With the establishment of Greater Lebanon (1920), the Jewish community of Beirut became part of a new political entity. The French mandate rulers adopted local political traditions of power-sharing and recognized the autonomy of the various religious communities. Thus, the Jewish community was one of Lebanon's sixteen communities and enjoyed a large measure of autonomy, more or less along the lines of the Ottoman millet system. During the third phase of its development, the community founded two major institutions: the Magen-Abraham Synagogue (1926), and the renewed Talmud-Torah Selim Tarrab community school (1927). The community also maintained welfare services like the Biqur-Holim, Ozer-Dalim, and Mattan-Basseter societies. The funding for all these institutions came from contributions of able community members, who contributed in Jewish holidays and celebrations, through subscription of prominent members, fund-raising events and lotteries the community organized. In fact, the community was financially independent and did not rely on European Jewish philanthropy.
The development of the Jewish yishuv in Palestine influenced the Jewish leadership, who usually showed sympathy and active support for Zionism. Interestingly, the Jewish leadership in Beirut during this time aligned itself ideologically with the American-Based B'nai B'rith organization through its local proxy (Arzei Ha-Levanon Lodge) which was stuffed by local community leaders. The B'nai B'rith lodge in Beirut attracted the social and economic elite. It embarked on community progress and revival through social activism, Jewish solidarity, and philanthropic values. Unlike the Alliance, who mainly aspired to empower the Jewish individual through modern education, the B'nai B'rith strove the empower both the individual and the community as a whole. In Beirut, unlike other Jewish communities, most of the community council members were also B'nai B'rith members, hence there existed an overlap between the council and the lodge. Of course, the Alliance school was popular in the community as it focused on French and prepared students for higher education. Since there was no Jewish high school in Beirut, many Jewish students attended foreign (Christian) schools, either secular or religious. The Jewish community was one of the smaller communities in the country, and hence it was not entitled for representation in the Parliament. Being excluded from Lebanese political life, the Jewish leadership aspired to improve the community's public standing by consolidating and improving the community as a whole. Overall, the French mandate period was characterized by growth, development, and stability.
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The Jewish Community Presidents include:[6]
Between the years of 1799 and 1978, a series of Chief Rabbis led the Lebanese Jewish community.[7]
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