A Jewish heritage library will be inaugurated in Cairo this week, a joint venture of the local Jewish community and the Israeli Academic Center there.
Although Cairo’s Jewish community numbers no more than 80 people, most of them elderly, the library is an “important expression of cooperation between the Jewish community and the Egyptian authorities, particularly in these days of tension between Cairo and Jerusalem,” Professor Asher Ovadiya, head of the Academic Center, told Ha’aretz.
The library will be housed in the Sha’ar Hashamyim synagogue on Adlei Street.
It already has 9,000 books and ancient manuscripts, among them rare volumes on Kabalah, including the Zohar. The oldest date back to the 16th century. Some were printed in Egypt, others in Turkey, Italy and Palestine.
The library’s goal is 60,000 volumes recounting the history of Egyptian Jewry.
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