The visit of the Regent Abd al-Ilah in Amara, Iraq 1940

Amara

Amarah; al Amarah; in Arabic: العمارة‎

A district town on the banks of the lower Tigris river, south-east Iraq.

Amara was founded in 1861, when the government set up large military barracks at the place following riots against the Ottoman regime. Within a short time, a settlement by the name of Urdi (barracks in Turkish) developed around the barracks, which later became an urban centre (Amara in Arabic).

Jews began to settle at Amara in 1870, following the liberal policy of Midhat Pasha, the governor of Baghdad, who was appointed to the post in 1869. In 1877 there were some 60 Jewish families who had come from Baghdad. Plagues that broke out in Baghdad and Basra in 1893 brought to Amara many refugees who became integrated in the community. In 1900 the number of the Jews at Amara rose to 1,400 and remained the same also in 1910 (some 200 families).

The first Jews at Amara engaged in trade. Most of them handled groceries and some traded in hides and feathers. In 1920 the number of the Jews at Amara was about 2,000 and they had two synagogues. One was dedicated in 1881 and the other in 1896. Both stood in the center of the Jewish quarter in Share’a Al-torat (Torah street). In 1906 Rabbi Ezra Abraham Shohet from Basra came to Amara to serve as the hakham bashi (head of the community). He held the post until his death in 1940. In 1918 a rabbinical bet-din (judicial court) was set up by Rabbi Moshe Meridich from Baghdad. He served as the chief rabbi of Amara until 1923. He was followed by Rabbi Joseph Fat’hi S’hayek. In complicated halakhah problems the community referred to the rabbis of Baghdad.

The management of the community was in the hands of a committee of 11 members, elected every 4 years by the members of the community who had reached the age of 18 years. The elections were conducted under supervision of a representative of the authorities. The officers of the committee were the chairman, his deputy, and the treasurer. The revenue of the community came from a tax on the ritual slaughtering, from rent derived from apartments and shops owned by the community, from school fees, and from contributions of rich members. The committee was responsible for the upkeep of the community’s club, for the hevra kaddisha, the school, the mikvehs, and the appointment of hazzanim, (cantors), gabbaim (wardens) and dayanim (rabbinical judge), shohatim (ritual slaughterers), and mohalim (circumcisers).

At the beginning the school consisted of kindergarten classes in the style of a “heder”, and the 4 lower classes. Boys and girls learned separately. The heder for boys (ages 3-4), which functioned until 1933, also had a preparatory class for the first year of school. In 1910 the alliance organization opened a school for boys, consisting of the first 4 classes. With time it accepted also girls. In 1938 the school became a full elementary school (7 or 8 classes). The first headmaster was Hasson. In 1941 the teaching of Jewish subjects was greatly reduced under pressure of the authorities. In the early 1940’s the alliance schools were turned over to the community. In 1950 there were 6 classes in each, with 8 teachers. The number of the pupils was then 200 boys and 150 girls.

In the 1930’s the number of the Jewish inhabitants of Amara increased. The majority of them lived in a special quarter. They were shopkeepers, wholesalers, and money lenders. In 1938 the community numbered over 2,000 members, later the number was reduced. In 1945 there were 300 Jewish families (about 1,800 persons) at Amara. In an official census in 1947 1,753 Jews were counted at Amara and in the whole of the Amara district 2,131 Jews.

The social structure of the Jews of Amara in the 1940’s was as follows: 5% poor people, unskilled; 15% lower middle class, engaged in selling food and in peddling; 60% middle class, shopkeepers, craftsmen, manufacturers, and artists; 15% upper middle class, professional people, teachers, and officials; 5% rich people, business people, merchants, bankers, and money changers.

Among the leaders of the community from the end of the 19th century until the 1940’s were: Joseph Haim Shahrabani (1880-1940), who held the title of pasha, and in 1890 was a member of the managing committee of the community in charge of the collection of revenue; Abudi Salman Tueig, entitled pasha by the Sultan Abd Al-Hamid; Rabbi Isaac b. Abraham Ikri, a liturgical poet and a preacher, who served as the community’s mukhtar (elder, official representative) until his death in 1931; Nissim Cohen, a merchant, banker and philanthropist.

Zionist activity started at Amara in 1920, by the initiative of the merchant David Haim Rachel-Imenu, who began collecting money for the Jewish national fund. He founded the Histadrut Benei Jehuda (the Sons of Jehuda organisation) at Amara, which until 1925 was affiliated to the Zionist association of Baghdad (from 1924 called the Zionist Organisation of Mesopotamia). In 1928 the community’s club was opened under the name of Nadi Al-Shabiba al Isra’iliya (the club of the Jewish youth). In 1933 a direct link with the Jewish national fund was established through the community’s Rabbi Joseph Fat’hi S’hayek and the fund raising was continued at least until 1938, now in the framework of the club of the Jewish youth. The club had 85 members. Emissaries from Eretz Israel were active in the club and it was the base for the activity of the Jewish underground. A few families emigrated to Eretz Israel between the years 1940-1945. In 1947 a branch of the Hehalutz movement, called Amir, began to function in the framework of the club. It was founded by Zionist activists from Basra. In the years 1950-1951 all the Jews of Amara left for Baghdad, on their way to Israel. The property of the community was seized by the government and the community was liquidated