WASHINGTON (JTA) — The government of Yemen will relocate a Jewish community for safety reasons.
A Jewish man from Yemen’s Amran province was murdered last month, and members of the 266-person community have been the victim of verbal and stone-throwing assaults since the Israeli invasion of Gaza began, according to Yemeni press reports.
The Yemeni government has allocated buildings to house the Jews in the capital of Sana’a, and also will give each of the approximately 50 families being relocated two million riyals, the equivalent of about $10,000. The relocation is scheduled to take place Sunday.
The government said the houses and other property of the relocated Jews in Amran will remain theirs, and they can sell it if they wish.
The Amran Jews will join the 66 Jews who moved to Sana’a in 2006 after a Shi’ite rebel leader in the northern portion of the country evicted them from his province. The two communities are the only Jews remaining in the African country. About 50,000 Yemeni Jews immigrated to Israel in Operation Magic Carpet in 1949 and 1950
