Homecoming to Israel for 'lost' Jews in India delayed by COVID-19

Some 100 members of the Bnei Menashe community were put in quarantine at a local Sikh temple after several of them became ill with the virus, delaying immigration to the Jewish state

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More than 100 Jews from India's northeastern Manipur state have had to delay plans to emigrate to Israel as family members fell ill with COVID-19 and were placed in quarantine in New Delhi.
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    • Soizagin, 40, who will soon renounce his Indian citizenship, calls his permanent move to Israel a "golden opportunity".
    3 View gallery
    Health workers tend to an Indian Jew, member of the Bnei Menashe, or the Children of Menashe, one of the "lost tribes of Israel" from the India's northeastern state of Manipur, suffering from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), at a COVID-19 care facility, inside a Gurudwara or a Sikh Temple, in New Delhi, India     Health workers tend to an Indian Jew, member of the Bnei Menashe, or the Children of Menashe, one of the "lost tribes of Israel" from the India's northeastern state of Manipur, suffering from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), at a COVID-19 care facility, inside a Gurudwara or a Sikh Temple, in New Delhi, India
    Health workers tend to an Indian Jew, member of the Bnei Menashe, suffering from coronavirus, at a COVID-19 care facility in New Delhi, India
    (Photo: Reuters)
    "We have been very excited," said Soizagin who goes by only one name and is recuperating at a Sikh temple, which has been turned into a COVID care center.
    "(We've been delayed) just because of this COVID positivity. Otherwise...we should have left by 31st of last month."
    Soizagin is part of India's roughly 6,000-member Bnei Menashe community, which lives largely in Manipur and neighboring Mizoram state and has formally been recognized by Israel's rabbinical leaders as Jews.
    3 View gallery
    An Indian Jew, member of the Bnei Menashe, or the Children of Menashe, one of the "lost tribes of Israel" from the India's northeastern state of Manipur, suffering from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), checks his mobile phone as he sits on a bed at a COVID-19 care facility, inside a Gurudwara or a Sikh Temple, in New Delhi, India     An Indian Jew, member of the Bnei Menashe, or the Children of Menashe, one of the "lost tribes of Israel" from the India's northeastern state of Manipur, suffering from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), checks his mobile phone as he sits on a bed at a COVID-19 care facility, inside a Gurudwara or a Sikh Temple, in New Delhi, India
    A member of the Bnei Menashe checks his mobile phone as he sits on a bed at a COVID-19 care facility in New Delhi, India
    (Photo: Reuters)
    On Wednesday, about 40 Bnei Menashe were quarantined at the New Delhi Sikh temple, said Soizagin, who was dressed in an olive green T-shirt and black pajamas and donned a Jewish kippah skullcap.
    The tale of how Bnei Menashe or the "Children of Menashe" settled in an Indian region, sandwiched between Bangladesh and Myanmar, is grand in its sweep of history but short on scientific support.
    Exiled from ancient Israel by the Assyrian empire around 730 BC, a tribe is forced east and travels through Afghanistan and China before settling in what is now India's northeast.
    3 View gallery
    Indian Jew girls, members of the Bnei Menashe, or the Children of Menashe, one of the "lost tribes of Israel" from the India's northeastern state of Manipur, suffering from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), look at a mobile phone at a COVID-19 care facility, inside a Gurudwara or a Sikh Temple, in New Delhi, India     Indian Jew girls, members of the Bnei Menashe, or the Children of Menashe, one of the "lost tribes of Israel" from the India's northeastern state of Manipur, suffering from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), look at a mobile phone at a COVID-19 care facility, inside a Gurudwara or a Sikh Temple, in New Delhi, India
    Indian Jew girls, members of the Bnei Menashe, look at a mobile phone at a COVID-19 care facility in New Delhi, India
    (Photo: Reuters)
    With time all that is left is a name -- Manasseh, Menasia or Manmase, an ancestor whose spirit the community invokes to ward off evil.
    That name is then linked to the Israelite tribe of Menashe, one of the biblical "Twelve Tribes of Israel", 10 of which disappeared after the Assyrian invasion.
    While search for conclusive proof of Bnei Menashe's Jewish origins continues, the community says some of their practices were similar to ancient Hebrew traditions.
    Shavei Israel, a Jerusalem-based organization which has been locating descendants of the lost tribes of Israel and bringing them home, has previously called the Bnei Menashe's return a miracle.
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