Rabbi Yefet Alemu, the first Ethiopian Conservative rabbi in Israel, spoke on Tuesday in the John B. Davis Lecture Hall to an audience of 65. Rabbi Alemu told the story of his journey from Gondar, a small town in Ethiopia, to Jerusalem.

While working as a nurse in a hospital in Jerusalem, Alemu met Rabbi Bernie Raskas, a visiting professor in Macalester’s Religious Studies department. Raskas spent part of this past summer at a Jerusalem hospital counseling people injured in suicide bombings. Raskas organized Alemu’s trip to the Twin Cities. “I think his coming here is very important to let us know the real story of Ethiopian Jews and, more importantly, what Ethiopian Jews contribute to Israel,” Raskas said.

Rania Suidan ’04 questioned the motivations of bringing Alemu to campus. “Bringing a person to Macalester to speak about the realization of his personal Zionist story to me is not just a life story, it’s a political and social statement. After all, what value does any story have if we can’t draw larger meaning from it? It seems to me that Alenu was brought here to speak in order to affirm to the Macalester community the Zionist ideal of the Promised Land.”

Alemu grew up as a shepherd in Gondar, a town with a large Jewish population. The Jewish community in Ethiopia is a longstanding one that emigrated to Ethiopia thousands of years ago. They lost touch with the rest of the Jewish world before the writing of the Talmud, a core text for most Jews. They, therefore, practice a form of Judaism significantly different than Jews outside of Israel.

During a series of airlifts between 1984 and 1990 the Israeli government moved the majority of Ethiopian Jewry from from Ethiopia to Israel. Alemu, however, left Ethiopia before the airlifts. His presentation focused on his arduous trip.

In Ethiopia Alemu trained to be a nurse. He wished to continue his studies and received a scholarship to go to medical school in the United States. The communist regime, however, would not allow him to leave the country. Alemu described days of police interrogations focusing on his religious beliefs. Eventually he was released, but all his money was taken. More importantly, his identity card was seized. Travelling without that card, according to Alemu, would give any policeman justification to kill him.

Despite these challenges, Alemu decided he would emigrate to Israel. He met the Israeli representative in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and received advice on how to get to Israel and some money to buy food and clothes for his journey. With this Alemu boarded a bus headed toward the Sudanese border. Twice he was stopped by police and twice Alemu describes praying and then being saved by miracles. Alemu then set off on foot, travelling many days to the border. Despite being robbed of all of his possessions on the way, Alemu managed to reach a Red Cross camp in Sudan. “I found a brother and I was so happy,” Alemu remarked.

Once in Israel Alemu received a degree in nursing and then went on to train to be a Conservative Rabbi, becoming the first Ethiopian to be ordained in Israel. Alemu concluded his presentation by saying that if we believe, if we are true, it will all turn out good.

The talk was not without controversy. In the question and answer session Ismail Khalidi ’05 asked Alemu how he could present a story of Ethiopian immigration without talking about the Palestinians that have been displaced by Israel. To this Alemu replied with a lengthy discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a subject not previously addressed in his talk. ject not previously addressed in his talk. Israel, Alemu said, would like peace, but cannot dictate peace to Palestinians that do not share Israel’s desire for peace. Alemu talked about Palestinian media reports that he listens to in Arabic telling children that if they die killing Israelis they will go directly to heaven. He ended his response by saying that Jews had a right to Israel given to them in the Bible.

Khalidi was not happy with the presentation. “I thought [Alemu’s] speech was unrealistic in that he completely avoided the question of Palestine and the existence of Palestinians—in essence he claimed to be apolitical, but by promoting Zionist ideology one is inherently political. In that respect he was neither impressive nor insightful.”

Another Macalester student had a different opinion. “I think it’s good for the campus to hear a personalized story of an Ethiopian Jew—all too often at Macalester we talk about big issues and don’t think about the individual sagas involved. While his personal story was good to hear, I was less happy with Alemu’s brief foray into political analysis. While there were some valid points in his discussion, I think he went too far in saying that Palestinians don’t want peace. It’s important to realize that Alemu didn’t present the Jewish perspective on Israel, there are lots of different Jewish perspectives.”