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Kurdish Jews

Ora Hatan, one of the honorary torchlighters at the state’s annual Independence Day ceremony on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem on April 21, 2026, stands in her new restaurant in her house in Shtula on April 13, 2026. (Diana Bletter/Times of Israel)
April 21, 2026, 8:59 pm
Volunteer cook who pampers IDF troops under Hezbollah fire lights Independence Day torch
Ora Hatan, whose mother was honored in 2008, is chosen for her ‘determination’ as she stays put on the Lebanese border, feeding soldiers even after a rocket destroyed her family restaurant
By Diana Bletter
Illustrative: Former Iraqi prime minister Haider al-Abadi, center, addresses a newly elected parliament during its first session in Baghdad, Iraq, September 3, 2018. (AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
May 24, 2022, 3:03 pm
Iraqis communicating with Israel in any way could soon face execution – report
Bill also forbids ‘financial or moral assistance’ to Israel, UK’s Jewish News reports, raising concern for Iraq’s Jewish community; UK Jewish leader from Iraq calls bill ‘barbaric’
By ToI Staff
'Osnat and Her Dove: The True Story of the World's First Female Rabbi' written by Sigal Samuel and illustrated by Vali Mintzi (Levine Querido)
January 30, 2021, 11:15 pm
World’s 1st female rabbi led a 16th century Mosul yeshiva for Kurdish Jewry
Journalist and novelist Sigal Samuel honors her Iraqi Jewish heritage with picture book about Osnat Barazani, whose life was a real-life early Yentl story set in the Middle East
By Renee Ghert-Zand
Omar Farhadi, an elderly Iraqi Kurd points to a frame showing a stylized hexagram, or a Star of David, hanging in a room dedicated to famous Jewish Kurdish art teacher and painter Daniel Kassab, at the Museum of Education in Erbil's oldest primary school, in the capital of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, on July 5, 2020. (SAFIN HAMED / AFP)
September 7, 2020, 5:14 am
In Erbil, Iraq’s few remaining Jews cling to a fading heritage
400 families of Jewish descent still live in Iraqi Kurdistan, once home to a thriving community; some now practice their faith in secret, while others have converted to Islam
By Qassim Khidir
Barashi street in Jerusalem, named for Yitzhak Barashi, a Kurdistani-born rabbi who fought in Israel's War of Independence. (Shmuel Bar-Am)
July 11, 2020, 6:34 am
How Kurdish Jews made their way to Jerusalem, shocked Herzl, began to thrive
A chance meeting with British geologists spurred many of Kurdistan’s Jews to move to Israel in the early 1900s, where they made an impression on its founders
By Aviva and Shmuel Bar-Am
A member of Iraq's Kurdish Jewish community takes part in a ceremony on the last night of the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah in the Iraqi town of Al-Qosh, December 29, 2019. (SAFIN HAMED / AFP)
December 30, 2019, 9:50 pm
Hanukkah candles burn in Iraqi Kurdistan, where few Jews remain
Some 20 Jews gather in Al-Qosh to light menorah in celebration of Jewish festival, decades after most of community left for Israel
By AFP
US Chargé d’Affaires in Iraq Joey Hood (c) tours the Tomb of Nahum in northern Iraq on April 26, 2019, where he pledged $500,000 to restore and preserve the site (Courtesy/US Consulate General in Erbil)
April 26, 2019, 9:58 pm
US to donate additional $500K to restore tomb of biblical prophet Nahum in Iraq
1,500-year-old building was for centuries the site of a major Kurdish Jewish pilgrimage every Shavuot
By ToI Staff
The author (R) with his brother (middle) and their Yazidi hosts in Lalish, Iraqi Kurdistan, on November 23, 2018. (Courtesy)
January 28, 2019, 11:29 am
Torture museums & temples: An Israeli reporter gets a glimpse of Iraqi Kurdistan
Until recently it was under threat of conquest by Islamic State, but Iraq’s northern region is now so calm as to make a visit from Israel relatively manageable
By Jacob Magid
Iraqi Kurdistan Jewish representative Sherzad Mamsani speaks at a Holocaust Memorial Day event on May 5, 2016. (Judit Neurink/Times of Israel)
March 18, 2018, 3:04 pm
Kurdish ministry denies it sacked Jewish representative to appease Iraq
Religious affairs ministry says firing of community representative Sherzad Mamsani was ‘purely administrative’, post to be refilled once right candidate is found
By ToI Staff
Iraqi Kurdistan Jewish representative Sherzad Mamsani speaks at a Holocaust Memorial Day event on May 5, 2016. (Judit Neurink/Times of Israel)
March 15, 2018, 6:53 pm
Kurdistan sacks Jewish community representative to appease Baghdad
Two years after being asked to rebuild a decimated community, Sherzad Mamsani has been removed from his position. The catch: He was an unpaid volunteer
By Judit Neurink
A Kurdish Jew handles a string of worry beads in northern Iraq (Ziv Genesove)
January 5, 2018, 11:32 am
Stranded in Iraq, some Jews say Israel abandoned them
Residents of the Kurdish autonomous region who immigrated to the Jewish state in the 1980s and then moved back to their home country cannot renew their transit permits
By Ziv Genesove
A picture taken on October 21, 2017, shows a man holding an Israeli flag alongside the flag of Iraqi Kurdistan during a demonstration outside the UN Office in Irbil, the capital of the autonomous region. (AFP Photo/Safin Hamed)
November 30, 2017, 2:24 pm
Kurdish land shouldn’t be treated as enemy territory, Knesset bill proposes
As MKs line up to declare support for Kurdistan, one lawmaker seeks to facilitate contact between Kurds and Israelis
By Dov Lieber
Then-Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki speaks to the press in Baghdad, Iraq, March 2010. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)
September 17, 2017, 8:45 pm
Iraq vice president warns against ‘second Israel’ in Kurdistan
As referendum nears, Nouri al-Maliki says a country set up on a religious or ethnic base, like the Jewish state, would be ‘unacceptable’
By AP and ToI Staff
Supporters of the ultra-nationalist Turkish Homeland Party protest outside the Israeli embassy in Ankara against what they claim are attempts to establish a "second Israel" in Iraqi Kurdistan, September 15, 2017 (screenshot: Homeland Party website)
September 17, 2017, 11:27 am
Turkish nationalists protest creation of ‘second Israel’ in Kurdistan
Israeli embassy in Ankara evacuated as demonstrators seek to portray upcoming Kurdish independence referendum as Zionist plot
By Sue Surkes
Jerusalem rabbi Chacham Zechariah Barashi (photo credit: Lazar Berman/Times of Israel)
March 7, 2017, 6:49 pm
Kurdish rabbi dies in Jerusalem, at 117 (apparently)
Said to have been born in 1900, Rabbi Zecharia Barashi was thus the world’s oldest living Jew, Kurd and Israeli… though Guinness was not able to document it
By ToI Staff
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