Bearded sages wearing ancient robes mingled with sturdy, open-shirt youths and girls clad in gay dance costumes as Israel, last night, celebrated here the tenth anniversary of “Operation Magic Carpet, ” through which the entire Jewish population of Yemen was flown to Israel in 1949.
In one of the most colorful assemblies ever held here, government officials joined members of Israel’s Yemenite community in the celebration. “Operation Magic Carpet” consisted of a series of air lifts that brought 50, 000 Yemenite Jews to Israel, under the aegis of the Joint Distribution Committee and the Jewish Agency. Many thousands of the Yemenite Jews had hiked afoot through the deserts to the British Protectorate of Aden, whence chartered planes flew them to this country.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
