ABSTRACT
The migration of black Ethiopian Jews to Israel since 1977 is a small yet dramatic movement, with unique features. The migration dream of Ethiopian Jews has exceptionally deep roots in their traditional culture, but their heightened expectations make the parallels in experience with migrants inspired by more typical secular dreams of particular interest. The author draws on the findings of an oral-history project which he carried out from 1986-1988, collecting accounts of the migration of Ethiopian Jews and their encounter with Israel. There are altogether some 50,000 Ethiopian Jews in Israel. In the late nineteenth century, a new era opened in the relations between Ethiopian Jews and other Jewish communities in the world. The migration dream of return from long exile to Israel, to ‘Yerussalem’ as they called it, was fundamental to traditional Ethiopian Jewish society.
