Videos

With the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, hundreds of thousands of immigrants moved to Egypt, drawn by its promise of prosperity. Among them were many Jews who joined the established community, whose origins date back to the time of the Pyramids. Until 1956, the Egyptian Jewish community experienced its golden age, contributing in all fields. A new book, Jews of Egypt, tells you everything you need to know about the Jewish community – its organisation, demographics, movements and associations, synagogues, rabbis and prominent figures. The story is brought to life with many photographs, most as yet unpublished.

'4000 years of presence in Egypt - since Moses'. Up to the 1950s tens of thousands of Jews were living in Egypt. Following the wars with Israel, most Jews left the country. Magda Haroun, head of the Egyptian Jewish Community Council speaks in the empty Sha'ar-Hashamayim-Synagogue, describing the present situation of Jews in Egypt. She is worried about what will happen to the synagogues when the last Jews in Egypt have died.

In 1979, the Islamic Revolution in Iran brought a twenty-five- hundred-year-old history to a close for the Jews who left their homeland for America. Uncertain about their safety and fearing religious persecution in Khomeini's Islamic Theocracy, an estimated 80,000 of Iran's 100,000 Jews fled the country. This documentary tells the story of those Jews who reestablished a tight knit community in Los Angeles.

This program retraces the history of Jews in Egypt, their contribution to the political, economic, and artistic development of the country, and the decline of the community following the birth of the state of Israel. The presentation takes you on a virtual tour of Jewish Egypt today, to show what remains of this once illustrious community, including the rededication of the iconic Eliahu Hanavi Synagogue in Alexandria.

After decades of decline that saw Egyptian Jewry nearly disappear, there are today just 20 Jews living in Egypt, from a population that reached 80,000 in 1948.

Egypt, a Love Song focuses on the life of Souad Zaki, a famous Jewish-Arabic singer in 1940s Egypt, told through the lens of her granddaughter Iris Zaki.