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How Much of Egypt Still Remains in the Lives of Egyptian-Israelis?

November 21, 2015

Once home to a community of over 75,000 Jews, Egypt’s Jewish community today has shrunk to merely seven. Many of the Egyptian Jews who left Egypt willingly or forcibly in the late 1940s and 1950s, or in most cases their offspring, still reside in Israel. Filmed by Corey Gil-Shuster of the Ask Project (otherwise known as Ask an Israeli/ Ask a Palestinian project), a set of interviews reveals a glimpse of the rarely spoken-of Egyptian culture that still lingers on behind closed doors in Israel. Either born in Egypt or born to Egyptian parents, it seems that certain Egyptian habits can withstand the test of time and make it past wars and political disputes, such as Molokhiya, Umm Kalthoum and old Egyptian movies. Speaking to the younger generations that may never have experienced Egypt firsthand, Erez from Tel Aviv describes how his half-Iraqi, half-Egyptian family still watches Abdel Halim and Farid al-Atrash’s movies on Friday afternoons. “I used to watch [the movies] as a kid,” Erez says. “But today, I feel a real connection to the music.” While many Egyptian-Israelis expressed their enthusiasm to visit Egypt one day, if they haven’t already, Moshe, whose…


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