Last Days in Babylon: The History of a Family, the Story of a Nation by Marina Benjamin, 2006

"This is a history unknown even to most Jews. Benjamin narrates it fluently and passionately." from a review by Moris Farhi published in the Independent  3/27/07

In this very informative memoir, Marina Benjamin (born in 1964), a British journalist, focuses on the life of her maternal grandmother, Regina Sehayek Levy, whose life spanned most of the twentieth century. Born in Iraq in 1905 toward the end of the rule of the Ottoman Empire, she lived out her last years in England where she died in 1992.

The author divides her story into three parts: The Lost World, Changing Times and Coming Full Circle. In each section she gives us a crash course in the politics that were in play at the time and with that background as context, she discusses how the Jewish community as a whole as well as members of her family in particular were affected by the Iraqi leader of the moment, the shifting British presence, and Arab world politics.

Benjamin starts by recreating old Iraq and Baghdad, giving us a crash course in early Iraq history, both Arab and Jewish. She notes that Jews had lived continuously in Iraq for 2700 years, living most of the time in harmony with their fellow Arab Iraqis. Early in the twentieth century one third of Baghdad’s residents were Jewish. Jewish men were successful merchants and traders and were also well represented in various departments in government offices. The author explains that they were successful because they were multi-lingual and had family and co-religionist outposts around the world that facilitated their business transactions. 

Like the Arab Iraqis, the Jewish Iraqis were culturally conservative. For example, all marriages in the early part of the century were arranged. Dowries were routine. Marina's grandmother Regina Sehayek was betrothed to Elazar Levy, a well-established businessman, who was thirty years older than she was. An only son with a widowed mother, he delayed marrying until he had married off and provided dowries for all of his sisters.

Throughout the decades of the twentieth century life got gradually more difficult for Iraqi Jews. There were many signs of trouble. Iraq, ruled by the Turks who sided with the Germans during World War I, was subsequently occupied by the British. The Iraqi Arabs were resentful when the Iraqi Jews aligned themselves with the British. In addition, Pan-Arabism as a movement became a real force in Iraq at the same time that Zionism was emerging as a movement in the west.

Benjamin then discusses the Arab Iraqi reaction to the creation of the state of Israel and how that impacted the Iraqi Jews. Living in Iraq became intolerable, and in the early 1950’s  325,000 Iraqi Jews were airlifted to Israel. Regina Levy chose a different path. Widowed with three children, she managed to arrange passage to Calcutta where her sister Josephine lived. After several years there she became an Indian citizen, obtained passports for her and her children, and left for England.

At the end of her memoir the author writes about the reception the Iraqi Jews received in Israel. She quotes the largely European Ashkenazi leaders who disparaged the Iraqi Jews as hopelessly backward. And she ends her memoir with some thoughts on a visit she made to Iraq in 2004. She mourns the death of a community with a rich, proud and extensive history.

This memoir includes many family photos, notes identifying sources,  a bibliography for further reading, and an index.

To read an abbreviated version of Marina Benjamin's memoir in the form of an essay she wrote for Tablet, click here.

People
Author’s family on her maternal grandmother’s side
Yehesqail Nissan
    David Yehesqail Nissan – Yehesqail’s son
        Salman Nissan – David’s son
            Salha Nissan – married Ezra Sehayek (son of Shlomo Sehayek, son of Ezra Sehayek)
                Solomon Sehayek – son of Salha and Ezra
                Marcelle Sehayek – daughter of Salha and Ezra
                Josephine Sehayek – daughter of Salha and Ezra
                Nessim Sehayek – son of Salha and Ezra
                Regina Sehayek – daughter of Salha and Ezra; married Elazar Levy
                    Haron – son of Regina and Elazar; married Ann Hewitt
                    Marcelle – daughter of Regina and Elazar; married Sassoon Benjamin
                        Andrea – daughter of Regina and Elazar
                        Marina – daughter of Regina and Elazar; author
                    Bertha – daughter of Regina and Elazar; married Victor Nourallah
            Violet – sister of Salha Nissan Sehayek; married Victor Battat
                Gourji Battat – Violet and Victor's son
            Farah – sister of Salha Nissan Sehayek

Author’s family on her maternal grandfather’s side
Agha Elazar Levy
    Yaeer Levy, son of Agha Elazar
        Elazar Levy – son of Yaeer
            Haron Levy – son of Elazar; married to Simha
                Elazar Levy – son of Haron and Simha; married Regina Sehayek (see above)
                Khatoun Levy– daughter of Haron and Simha
                Habiba Levy – daughter of Haron and Simha
                Farha Levy – daughter of Haron and Simha
                Dola Levy – daughter of Haron and Simha
                Muzli Levy – daughter of Haron and Simha
        Shimoun Levy – son of Yaeer

Lizette Battat – a relative of Salha Nissan Sehayek
Yusef Elkabir – a cousin of Elazar Levy
Goorji Levy – a cousin of Elazar Levy
Albert Levy – a nephew of Elazar Levy
Reuben Zeloof – a cousin of the Regina Sehayek
       
Friends, Acquaintances, and Sources       
Sion Aboudi
Meir Elias
Menham Salah Daniel
Sasson Hesqail
Elly Kadoorie
Khedouri Zilcha
Claire Dellal
Violet Masri
Farah Nissan
Rosie Fattal
    Louise Fattal – Rosie’s daughter; married Freddy Shohet
Anwar Kedoori
Abraham Masri
Salima Joury
Sion Koubi
Enzo Sereni
Ezra Kadoori
Avraham Mordad
Ibrahim Lawee
Reuben Battat
Shafiq Ades
Heskel Shemtob
Yudke Tajer
Shalom Saleh Shalom
Yusef Basri
Elmer Berger
Sassoon Khedouri
Ezra and Sayeeda Levy
    Emad  and Saleh Levy – their sons
Marcelle Daoud
Samir and Jacob Shahrabani (brothers)
Edwin Shuker
Dora Qashqoush
Tawfiq Sofaer
Violet Tweg
Rachel Zelon
Meir Basri
    Carole Basri - Meir Basri's niece
Eli Amir
Khalida Mouallem
                   
Places and Institutions
Baghdad, Iraq
Rashid Street, Baghdad, Iraq
The Shorja, Baghdad, Iraq
Laura Kadoorie School for Girls, Baghdad, Iraq
Frank Iny School, Baghdad, Iraq
Menahem Daniel School, Baghdad, Iraq
Bataween, Iraq
The Shurah
Baswa, Iraq
Ezra Daoud Synagogue, Baghdad, Iraq
Meir Tweg Synagogue. Batatweein, Iraq
Massouda Shemtob Synagogue, Baghdad, Iraq
Nes Ziona Camp, Israel

My Father's Paradise: A Son's Search for his Jewish Past in Kurdish Iraq by Airel Sabar 2008

Winner of the National Book Critic Circle Award for Autobiography, 2008

Although on the surface this fascinating memoir is about Ariel Sabar and his father Yonah and their relationship, it is so much more. The author is a journalist born in California to an American mother and a Kurdish Jewish father who is a professor of Aramaic at the University of California at Los Angeles. Ariel Sabar has had a difficult relationship with his father who was unlike any of the fathers of his Los Angeles friends; the author was both irritated and embarrassed by his father’s “foreign” ways.

It is only at the birth of his own son that the author thinks long and hard about generations and continuity and reaches out to his father in a gesture to patch a frayed relationship and to try to understand him. Out of that attempt at understanding comes this memoir. It involved many interviews with his father, trips back to his father’s home town of Zakho in Northern Iraq, trips to visit his father's friends and relatives in many places, especially in Israel where Yonah Sabar had immigrated with his family when he was thirteen.

In addition to conducting interviews, Ariel Sabar has done a lot of research to bring his father and the experiences that molded him to life. To give his father’s life context, he recreates Zakho in the early part of the 20th century where Muslim, Christians, and Jews intermingled. Zakho was so isolated it was as if time had stood still. The Jewish community spoke a version of Aramaic that scholars had assumed had died long ago. The author successfully weaves together his family story along with an informative history of Jews in Iraq, Kurdish Jews in Iraq, and a concise history of the Aramaic language.

The author’s father was the last Kurdish Jew to be a bar mitzvah in Zakho and the family fled with most other Kurdish Jews to Israel. To provide context for this phase of his father’s life, Sabar explains the relationship between the Ashkenazi founders of Israel and the Sephardi immigrants. He then goes on to describe the living conditions of immigrants in Israel in the 1950’s, his father’s education, his interest in languages, and how he was steered by professors to study the neo-Aramaic he grew up speaking.

His father’s background was certainly unusual. The contrast between the conditions into which he was born with its high rates of illiteracy and the status he attained in the scholarly world makes for an interesting story. But this memoir transcends its specifics: it has the universality of a story of the lives of many immigrants – of having to leave their homeland and make their way in a world that never really feels like home. Like these others, he feels he has been cast out of paradise.

To see a color picture of Ariel and Yonah Sabar in Zakho in 2005, click here.

People (Author's paternal grandparents were first cousins.)
Author’s father’s paternal grandfather’s side of family
Ephraim Beh Sabagha – married to Hazale (second wife); author’s great grandparents
    Rachel – their daughter
    Eliyahu*- their son
    Israel* – their son; married Naima
    Rahamim – their son; married to Miryam Beh Naze (his first cousin); author’s grandparents
        Yonah – their son; author’s parents
    Murdakh – cousin of Rahamim

Author’s father’s paternal grandmother’s side of family
    Rifqa – married to Menashe; author’s great grandparents
        Shmuel – their son
        Yusef – their son
        Miryam; their daughter; married to Rahamim Sabagha (her first cousin)
            Rifqa –  daughter of Miryam and Rahimim
            Yonah – son of Miryam and Rahimim; married Stephanie Kruger; author’s parents
                Ariel – son of Yonah and Stephanie; married Meg; the author
                       Seth and Phoebe – their children
                Ilan – son of Yonah and Stephanie
            Sarah – daughter of Miryam and Rahimim
            Avram- son of Miryam and Rahimim
            Shalom – son of Miryam and Rahimim; married to Rina
                Noa and Nadav – their children
            Uri – son of Miryam and Rahimim
                Lee – his son
            Ayala – daughter of Miryam and Rahimim
        Saleh – cousin of Miryam
    Aribe – Menashe’s second wife
        Zaki, Yosef and Naim, Shoshana, Salim – children of Aribe and Menashe
    Hazale – Menashe’s sister; married to Ephraim Beh Sabagha (see above)

Non-relatives
Zaki Levy
Moshe Gabbay
    Shmuel – his son
Rabbi Samuel Barzani
    Asenath – his daughter
Rabbi Sassoon Kadoori
Menahem Salih Daniel
Ezra Haddad
Yosef El Kabir
Shafiq Ades
Zacharia Shmaya
    Tzion and Reuven – his sons
Shlomo Bar-Nissim
Abraham Zilkha
Yosi Elati
Yosef Sagi
Baruch Givati
Avigdor Shemesh
Moshe Hillman
Yona Gabbay   
* The author states in his “Note on Method” that “he changed the names of people who were involved in a family controversy in Israel, because they are dead and did not have a chance to defend themselves.” It seems likely that Rahimim’s brothers were given the pseudonyms Israel and Elyahu.

Places
Zakho, Iraq
Mosul, Iraq
Basra, Iraq
Nineveh, Iraq
Habur River, Iraq
Amadiya, Iraq
Arbil, Iraq
Babylon,Iraq
Nippur, Iraq
Kirkuk, Iraq
Westwood area of Los Angeles
Katamonim section of Jerusalem
The Ben-Zvi Institute at Hebrew University
Department of Near Eastern Languages and Literatures, Yale University, New Haven, Conn.
Department of Near Eastern Languages, University of California at Los Angeles

  

Farewell, Babylon: Coming of Age in Jewish Baghdad by Naim Kattan, first published in French, 1975

Naim Kattan received the 2004 Prix Athanase, Quebec's highest literary award. He also was awarded France's Legion d'Honneur.

Naim Kattan, born in 1928 in Baghdad, left Iraq for Paris to study at the Sorbonne on a scholarship from the French government shortly after the end of World War II and eventually settled in Montreal where he became a prominent writer. In his memoir which covers his years growing up in Baghdad, he stresses that a Jewish community had been in Iraq since the time of Nebuchadnezzar after the destruction of the first Temple in Jerusalem and that he and his friends felt like solid Iraqi citizens who were Jewish. They spoke Arabic and, in fact, he said that Jewish students frequently won the end-of-the-year school prizes for excellence in Arabic.

But there was unrest and discrimination against the Jews that reached a crescendo in June of 1941, when Kattan was thirteen, with the Farhoud – a violent mob-led onslaught against the Jewish community fomented by Germans and Muslims as a reaction against the Jewish population and the British military presence. Although order was restored, the Jewish community remained on edge and many made plans to leave Iraq as soon as the war was over.

Naim Kattan describes those times and his life during them. He became a student at the Alliance Israelite Universelle where, with other Jewish students, he studied Arabic, French, Hebrew and English. Facility in these languages prepared the students for places in the civil service, for the law, and for roles as translators and merchants. He describes the various groups that interacted fairly amicably even after the Farhoud, but we also see the increasing nationalism and anti-Zionism that came to the fore after World War II when the State of Israel was on its way to becoming a reality.

Kattan gives us a very interesting descriptions of neighborhoods, local customs, both Jewish and Muslim, and is especially enlightening about male/female relationships. His discussion of the matchmaking that ensued when his sister was of age to be married conveys in vivid detail how that ritual played itself out. He also spends time describing his education and his intellectual circle of friends. The memoir ends when, in tears, he left his family for Paris.

Note: This memoir will not be helpful to genealogists looking for family names.Kattan seems to have deliberately not included the names of individuals, most likely to respect their privacy. But it is definitely worth reading for the description he gives of an Iraqi Jewish culture that has disappeared. 

To read an interesting description of the Farhoud, that has been likened to Kristallnacht, click here.
People
Yossef al Siddik – author’s grandfather
    Manasseh – his son
    Ephraim – his son

Yaacoub Benyumine – prominent Jewish lawyer in the Baghdad Jewish community

Places
Battawiyeen, Baghdad, Iraq
Meir Synagogue
Alliance Israelite Universelle
Shamash School
Moshi Café
Al Rafidayn Club