(Author: Gwynne Schrire, Vol. 78, #3, Spring-Summer 2023)
The wandering Jews have always been on the move, usually fleeing persecution, prejudice and poverty, searching for security and a better economic future. They first moved into the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 1907, little thinking that fifty years later they would be on the move again.[1]
The colonisation of the Congo had begun in 1885 when Belgium’s King Leopold II established the Congo Free State as his own personal possession. The Belgian government did not favor colonial expansion, so Leopold decided to establish his own state by ruthlessly seizing it and even obtained international recognition; after all he was civilizing the natives by bringing in missionaries.
As it belonged to him, like a horse or a house, Leopold felt he could manage it as he wished and proceeded to enrich himself from the sale of his ivory and his rubber. If his indigenous Congolese corralled into a forced labour system did not work hard enough to fulfill their quota harvesting and processing his rubber, murder and mutilation followed.
Finally, intense international pressure over the brutality of his behaviour to the tribes living in his African possession forced Leopold II in 1908 to turn his Congo Free State over to Belgium, which renamed it the Belgian Congo. Even then no one thought it strange that European powers could just decide to take over a foreign land from the original inhabitants.
From 1911 the early Jewish immigrants from Eastern European were followed by Sephardi Jews from the island of Rhodes, who the same year established a communal centre, Communauté du Congo Belge et du Ruanda-Urundi. In 1930 a synagogue in Elisabethville (now Lubumbashi) was built and the community had Zionist organisations under the Association Sioniste du Congo Belge.
Exploitation did not cease once the Belgium government took over since not only was the Congo rich in rubber and ivory, it also contained a tremendously rich lode of uranium pitchblende. Two-thirds of the uranium for the Hiroshima bomb and most of the plutonium for the Nagasaki bomb came from the small Congolese city of Shinkolobwe. The bombs killed between 129 000 and 226 000 people. They also killed the miners and people living in Shinkolobwe, who are still suffering from the cancers, inherited in-utero malformations and illnesses caused by working without protection with the highly radioactive material.
During the Second World War Shinkolobwe became another gigantic forced-labour camp with miners, including children, working 24/7 in the radioactive open pit, sending tons of uranium ore to the US every month. There was little in the way of health and safety precautions, medical aid or compensation. It was all carried out under a blanket of secrecy, so as not to alert the Nazi government and many official US, British and Belgian records are still classified. Even the location of Shinkolobwe was removed from maps and journalists were denied access to the mine and official information.[3]
Once again the profits did not go to the workers or to the Congo, but to the shareholders of the Belgian Union Minière. Today it is abandoned, apart from some illegal miners who risk their lives to dig in what is regarded as one of the most potentially dangerous places in the world, where cell phones burn out and television sets do not work. Very little is known about the Congolese contribution to the Allied victory, never mind the disastrous environmental and health impact that the mine has had on the area. [4]
In the 1930s, German Jews fleeing Hitler’s Europe moved into the Congo and after the Shoah some Auschwitz survivors from Rhodes Island joined their Congolese families. French-speaking Jews expelled from Egypt after the 1956 Suez crisis also arrived, with one suitcase each, having been forced to sign declarations “donating” their property to the Egyptian government.[5] By 30 June 1960, when the Congo became independent from Belgium, the Jewish community numbered 2500, half of whom lived in Elizabethville while 70 Jewish families lived in the capital, Kinshasa. Jewish children were taught Hebrew and Judaism in public schools.
Aside from the devastation on Shinkolobwe, the war had other impacts on the Congo. One was that conscripted African soldiers emerged with a deeper political awareness and the expectation of greater respect and self-determination, which was left largely unfulfilled. Wars being expensive, another was that the colonial powers could no longer afford their African colonies, hence starting with French Morocco and Tunisia in 1956 colonies started to gain their independence. In 1960 the United Nations Declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and peoples declared that colonial exploitation is a denial of human rights and power should be transferred back to the territories concerned.
Educated Congolese elites began to push for immediate and complete independence from Belgium and political parties like the Parti Solidaire Africain developed. After riots in Leopoldville on 4 January 1959 spread into the rural populations, the Belgian government decided to hold men-only elections hoping to place Congolese puppets in power to end talk of independence. However, the Parti Solidaire Africain started an election boycott, refusing to register to vote. In return the Belgian administration threatened seven days in prison and a fine of 500 francs but the boycott was so successful the Congo became ungovernable. In addition Belgium was facing international pressure to give up their colonies [6] and following a conference the following month it announced that it would grant independence gradually over three or four years.
On 20 January 1960, members of 13 different political parties were invited to the month-long Brussels Round Table talks. The Congolese rejected the Belgian offer and demanded immediate independence. The date for Congo’s full independence was set: 30 June 1960 with free elections on 22 May.
Already in February 1959 the Johannesburg newspaper The Star reported that a number of Belgians in Congo were enquiring with South African employment agencies about the possibility of immigrating to South Africa and South Africans living there were worrying about their future after independence. [7]
In April 1960, the SA consul in Leopoldville noted that due to an increase of organised political activity, perceived as anti-European, many white people were “extremely concerned about their future” in Congo, and many seriously considered South Africa “as a possible haven”. The SA Consulate discussed proposed arrangements with the SA Defence Force in case the need arose to evacuate its citizens. Letters were also distributed to South African citizens advising them on what to do “in event of serious disturbances” while also stating that the consulate did not believe that there would be “any violent anti-European activity”, but instead expected “shows of arrogance and insulting behaviour”.[8] An example of the apartheid mindset – concern that the Congolese, who had suffered so much from white rule, might treat them the way white officials treated black people in South Africa, with arrogance and insulting behaviour.
In May the consulate reported that there was undoubtedly a feeling of uncertainty, many Europeans having left for good, and many others sending their wives and children out of the Congo for the time being, or in anticipation of leave. During the first week of independence, with signs of unrest the South African Consulates received a significant increase in visa applications. This surge reached its peak on 8 and 9 July 1960, just after the official announcement that South Africa’s diplomatic representation in Congo would end.[9]
As feared, the new government under the Parti Solidaire Africain with Joseph Kasavubu as president and Patrice Lumumba as prime minister began to fall apart along issues of ideology, power differences, and ethnicity. The independence celebrations were followed on 5 July by a mutiny by Congolese soldiers in the Force Publique against their white Belgian commanders seeking higher pay as well as greater opportunity and authority. The mutiny quickly spread to other bases and violence broke out across the nation.[10] A hundred thousand people are believed to have been killed in the political upheaval and conflict between 1960 and 1965.
Unable to control the indigenous army, the Belgians brought in troops to restore order without seeking permission from either Kasavubu or Lumumba. In response, the Congolese government appealed directly to the United Nations to provide troops and demanded the removal of Belgian troops. On 13 July, the United Nations approved a resolution authorising the creation of an intervention force and calling for the withdrawal of all Belgian troops.
As reports of attacks against Europeans in Congo spread, the European population began to flee into the neighboring territories. Nissim Angel [11] lived in a small village outside Elizabethville near the Rhodesian border. One evening they noticed an unusual number of cars speeding past. His father learnt that there was a revolution in the city so they immediately loaded their car with as much as would fit and set off at 11 p.m. for Salisbury where they had friends. Joseph Mallels lived in Elizabethville and when they heard firing, they got in the car and fled to the border. There they were prevented from leaving until Belgian soldiers interceded and opened the gate. They then drove to Salisbury where the Jewish community welcomed them.[12]
A large-scale airlift to fly white refugees to safety was immediately set up by Belgium, Italy, Portugal, the Netherlands and France. A Jewish businessman who was on one of the last aircraft to pass through the Leopoldville airport en route to Europe complained that children cried throughout the night. [13]
During the riots Israeli officials took no steps to interfere on behalf of Jews who were not Israeli citizens. Jews were generally left unharmed because Africans had nothing against them although they might have been mistaken for Belgians. Jewish businessmen often put up signs saying “Israelien” to avoid being attacked although their properties suffered considerable damage.[14]
Ten days after independence was declared, the English Consulate and Italian Embassy called for immediate evacuation. The most common route for refugees who ended up in South Africa was via the Rhodesias. The Jewish community fled in convoys escorted by Belgian troops, refugees once again, often fleeing with only the clothes they wore, abandoning their houses, shops and possessions.[15] The Zionist Record reported on 15 July that relief trains were arriving regularly in Bulawayo, the first, with 500 passengers, mostly children, a percentage of whom were Jewish, having steamed in on the 13th.[16]
Sammy Angel remembered that his mother and two sisters came to Northern Rhodesia in August in a convoy escorted by the United Nations.[17] They were scared but excited. In order to avoid a bottleneck situation on the Copperbelt, the Northern Rhodesian authorities systematically moved the incoming refugees to Southern Rhodesia’s urban centres of Salisbury and Bulawayo. Sammy’s family were taken to a large hall in Salisbury where the Rhodesian Jews gave them clothes. Next they went by bus to Pretoria, where they were housed in a hotel and cared for by the “unbelievably generous” Pretoria Jewish community.
On 12 July 1960, the first groups arrived in Salisbury, where the authorities had organised a refugee centre at the local showground. The first reported Congo refugees from Brazzaville arrived at Jan Smuts International Airport in Johannesburg where the co-ordination committee gave them coffee, sandwiches, blankets and warm clothes, and took them to Johannesburg’s refugee centre in Braamfontein. On 13 July the South African government announced that it would provide aid and administrative assistance for prospective immigrants from the Congo. Prime Minister Verwoerd asked the public for assistance and ordered the formation of a specialised co-ordination committee, consisting of representatives of different government departments to work together with the newly formed SA Immigration Trust to aid and co-ordinate the expected flow of refugees and assist them to settle permanently. Pretoria sent representatives to Salisbury, Nairobi, Luanda, and Brazzaville, and ordered all South African emissaries in neighboring territories to assist and convince refugees to immigrate to South Africa. South Africa wanted to increase the number of white citizens, setting up offices in Bulawayo and Salisbury, but had always been choosy as to whom it regarded as suitable citizens – Catholics and Jews were not. Salisbury High Commissioner Harold Taswell reported that a ‘considerable number’ of refugees on the Copperbelt would want to immigrate to South Africa, but many were “not of the most desirable type”. These were “mostly Greek, Maltese, Cypriot and Italians”, noting that many of “them look like the real ducktail type”.[18] He probably would have included Jews in his undesirable list.
Despite their best efforts, there was little initial response from refugees – not surprising after the negative coverage the disastrous Sharpeville massacre three months earlier had received internationally after police opened fire on unarmed protesters, killing 69, and a state of emergency was proclaimed. The United Nations Security Council had passed Resolution 134 condemning South Africa which began to find itself increasingly isolated. So even desirable immigrants might not have viewed South Africa as a desirable destination. Instead of an expected 200 refugees from Bulawayo signing up to come to South Africa, the offices had only processed 48 adults and 18 children by late July.
On 18 July a mission from the Rhodesian Jewish Board of Deputies flew from Bulawayo to Northern Rhodesia to arrange all possible assistance to Jewish refugees reaching there.[19] By the end of the month 600-700 Jews, mainly women and children, had crossed the border into Rhodesia. The men remained behind, leaving about 100 Jews in the Congo, most of who were in Elizabethville.[20]
Dorothy Kowen, a Salisbury school girl, remembered the sudden arrival of Congolese children at her school and cheder. The children kept to themselves and spoke French to each other during breaks. What impressed her was that they had American bazooka gum, not available in Rhodesia and one girl gave her a piece in return for teaching her the Shema. There was much social distance between the Ashkenazi and Sephardi communities in Salisbury so her parents never encouraged her to invite them over.[21]
A network of support structures and committees were set up in refugee centres in the major cities. People offered up their homes to house refugees, or donated clothing, blankets, money, and groceries. The first stop for most refugees travelling by car was Pretoria’s City Hall, which processed 94 men, 70 women, and 82 children between 19 and 23 July. It was reported that an average of 60 people arrived there daily by the end of July 1960.
Despite these efforts by the SA government and public, the Belgian consul in Cape Town complained that the overall organisation was largely a failure as nothing was seriously planned and remained largely improvised. From the estimated 1500 Belgians who moved from Congo to South Africa only one in five decided to stay, and those who did hoped to return to the Congo when it was safe. The spontaneous enthusiasm of many South Africans also lessened as homeowners became tired of housing refugees, and the organisations whose spaces were transformed into refugee centres wanted them back.[22]
The reminiscences of Alberto Hasson typified the experiences of many. He fled by car with his mother and a friend of his late father and they were welcomed by the British colonial authorities in Ndola, Northern Rhodesia, and its small Jewish community. A few days later they drove to Salisbury, staying with the friend’s family. The next month they returned to the Congo to find their house looted, leaving them with nothing. Alberto was then sent to Cape Town where, after five grueling days by train, he was admitted to Oranjia and placed in Herzlia High School. He found his separation from his mother very difficult because he did not know how long it would last. In 1962 his mother and sister arrived in Cape Town, found work and moved into an apartment in Sea Point. He joined them here in 1963.[23]
How did the South African Jewish community respond? The Jewish Times reported that when the refugees started to ‘infiltrate’ (unfortunate word that), the Cape Committee of the SA Jewish Board of Deputies, the Jewish Board of Education, the Union of Jewish Women and the Cape Jewish Orphanage offered to service the central organisation dealing with refugees in Cape Town. In Johannesburg, Jewish welfare institutions such as the Witwatersrand Jewish Aged Home, the Arcadia Jewish Orphanage, Our Parents Home, and the Hostel for Jewish Deaf mobilised support through the Transvaal Jewish Welfare Council. The Pretoria UJW was also very active at the reception depot. [24]
Many Jews came down to Cape Town, which they knew from previous summer holidays.[25] A group of schoolchildren, both Jewish and not Jewish, were sent there by their parents, ostensibly for the holidays but actually to see what the future might unfold for the white population. It was a 5-day trip by train back to Elisabethville and it was months before most of them were able to go back to see their parents.[26] The Cape Jewish Orphanage sent a cable to the South African Immigration Trust in Pretoria offering to accommodate 30-35 children, Jewish ones preferably, and was represented by Julius Schochet at meetings to organise refugee work under the chairmanship of Senator Costa.[27]
On 22 July the Jewish Board of Deputies issued the following statement:
We warmly commend the energetic steps taken by our Government in offering hospitality and assistance to the refugees from the Congo who wish to find temporary asylum or to settle permanently in the Union. We are confident that in common with their fellow citizens, the members of the Jewish community will respond generously to the appeals for aid irrespective of their nationality or creed. Many Congo Jews may go to Israel. The Cape Committee of the SAJBD has offered its services to the central organisations dealing with refugees in Cape Town and the Jewish orphanages has prepared facilities for refugees.[28]
Reading between the lines, one can see how carefully worded the statement was, in order to reassure the Government of their gratitude and that the Jewish community would not only assist Jews. SAJBD Chairman Namie Philips thanked it for its policy which “was a completely open door for the Congo refugees with no distinction concerning race or creed”. [29] The Board was well aware of the closed-door policy shown previously by South Africa to the Jews from Eastern Europe, to the German Jews from Nazi Europe, to the Holocaust survivors, to the Hungarian refugees.
It is probable that the willingness of the apartheid government to help was because, in its eyes, this was an object lesson in the correctness of their policy, showing the dangers of black rule and one man one vote elections. If it could happen in the Congo, it could happen in South Africa, hence the need to continue its policy of oppression of the black majority and to welcome the fleeing white Congolese. It was a form of justification to its imposition of a state of emergency, with the detention of more than 18 000 people after the Sharpeville massacre. At the same time events in the Congo made the Government aware of the socio-political changes in their no longer passive majority black population as well as of the political transformation in Europe and the African continent. If they could increase the white minority with desirable Belgians, so much the better.
On 5 August Philips told a Board of Deputies meeting that they were providing immediate help. Its general secretary, Gustav Saron had gone to the Rhodesian copper belt to arrange urgent help for the Jews, many of whom had escaped with only the clothes they wore. He thought the most pathetic of the refugees were Egyptian Jews who had migrated to the Congo because of Nasserism only a few years previously and now had to seek new homes and livelihood once again. He said that some refugees had already gone back to their homes while others intended to follow as soon as they were assured that law and security had been restored. Some of the refugees intended to settle in Rhodesia, some in South Africa, while others would go to Israel whose Consulate was speeding facilities for those in transit there. He called on the Jewish community to contribute to the public funds which the Government had established to help Congo refugees. Meanwhile, several Jewish homes were extending shelter to the Congo refugees, while hotels were making rooms available.[30]
Rifka Harris, who owned Crosby Residence in Sea Point, put up several families in her hotel and in a nearby apartment and established warm relationships with them. Her daughter Cynthia Marsden[31], then a schoolgirl, said her mother, who had come to Cape Town from the Lithuanian shtetl Dugalisik with nothing, felt great compassion for the refugees and wanted to embrace and do all she could for them. She also hosted a Pesach Seder for the refugees, who spoke no English. The only Hebrew one family knew was kol yisrael arevim zeh bazeh [32]. Cynthia’s brother taught their daughter English and when she grew up she asked Cynthia’s young son to be page boy at her wedding. Some came with money and stayed with her mother for a month before finding their own accommodation.
Sydney Walt, chairman of the Cape Committee of the Board reported that about 80 refugees possessing only the clothes they were in had appealed to their offices for assistance. They had placed the children in Oranjia Orphanage in Montrose Ave and the Herzlia boarding house in Hope Street, given them clothes and medical attention and put them in schools, mainly Herzlia:
“At the present time, while things are settling back to normal, there is a gradual return to the Congo. Some have, however, settled here and jobs have been obtained for them. It is gratifying to note that the SA Jewish Appeal has up to now been able to face the not inconsiderable financial burden imposed on the Community and it has not been necessary to launch an appeal for funds. Herzlia school, Oranjia and the Cape Jewish Aged Home, who have housed some of the refugees are especially to be commended for the willingness and efficiency with which they attended to the needs of some of the cases”. [33]
The Board placed Nissim Angel [34] and his mother in a hotel in Wynberg while his father returned to the Congo. Later his mother moved to an apartment in Sea Point and his father refunded the money the Board had spent supporting them.
Nine children and two adults were placed in Oranjia in August, four left the following month and were replaced by two girls – there were seven girls and one boy, with another boy arriving in October. One of boys was Nissim [35], who was happy there and found it “a very nice place”. He did not enjoy his time at Herzlia. (However, he was to teach maths and science there for 28 years.) One of the Oranjia residents (not from the Congo, but of Sephardi origin) recalled their arrival: “Not only did the Congolese speak Ladino… but their arrival brought music, warmth and foods that were close to my heart. Some of the songs were sung by my late mother, whom I was still missing very much”. [36]
For many of the children the sudden move was traumatic – overnight they had been torn from their homes and families and placed in a “home” that was not their own, where they had to share with strangers, with little privacy, unfamiliar food and an unfamiliar language. Fortunately, many had siblings and cousins with them and they stuck together during “this period of unprepared for, unexpected, lengthened separation from home”.[37]
One reported that his first days were difficult, not only because of the separation from his mother and sister and a new environment, but equally because of the language barrier. He even had to relearn Latin as the order of declensions of nouns was different from the European system taught in the Congo.[38] The English and Dutch languages taught in the Congo were too basic to address daily life let alone follow a school curriculum. He added that some balm was put on his wounds due to the presence of other Jewish children from the Congo although they did not stay very long. Slowly he made friends with the other children.[39]
“Having always had a room of my own, suddenly I had to share a bedroom with four other boys and thus had little privacy. …The food was Ashkenazi and British influenced (white beans in tomato sauce on toast for breakfast) but I got used to it. I developed a taste for gefilte fish…The kiddush on Friday always reminded me of home and the atmosphere surrounding those days…Once a month we received our pocket money and once a month children were allowed to visit family”.[40]
When Joseph Mallel[41] was sent on a train to Cape Town with about thirty other children he was placed in the Herzlia hostel. He was surprised at the ignorance of the children, who did not even know where the Congo was. When they discovered that the newcomers could not speak English, they tried Yiddish, which these Sephardi children did not know either. Nor had the local children heard of Ladino. The next day was Friday and extra tables had to be brought in for the Shabbat dinner. This too was strange to him as in the Congo they would go to shul on Friday but would not have a service at the table afterwards, nor had they seen challah before. They were given soup containing two balls – they looked at the soup and then at each other, hesitant to taste these strange balls. Most of them left the kneidlach uneaten. The chopped liver was even worse, nor would they eat the gefilte fish – nothing like these dishes appeared on their usual Mediterranean Sephardi menu at home. Herring was the only thing he learnt to eat.
They were taken to town to get school uniform and ties (that was very special – they did not wear uniforms in the Congo). All expenses including the uniforms and school books were covered by the Jewish community. Joseph’s first day at school was a disaster. He did not know much Hebrew, English or Afrikaans but was good at maths. Mr Kessel the headmaster was a nice man, and very understanding of their problems. Because Joseph was tall, some of the older boys took him to the field, showed him a rugby ball, let him watch them play, gave him a fifteen-minute lesson in the rules and scrumming using sign language, and he found himself in the Herzlia rugby team, even accompanying them by train to Johannesburg to play against King David School.
Sammy Angel[42] and his sisters were first housed in the orphanage – his younger sister was transferred to the sick bay as she had arrived with a very bad cough. Later he was moved to the Herzlia hostel. He has only the warmest feelings about the hospitality and generosity of the Jewish community although he admits that the refugee children had a hard time in the beginning, feeling afraid, unable to communicate in English and having been brought up differently. They were less sophisticated and mature than the urbanised Herzlia boys, were shy and stuck together, most of them being related to each other. Slowly they learned a few words in English and began to adapt to the new lifestyle.
Mrs Pinshaw, the wife of Board secretary Israel Pinshaw, took them to the Young Ideas shop where they were kitted out with shirts, shorts and shoes – they had come with nothing. This experience filled him with wonder. He was overwhelmed by the kindness of the community who invited them to their homes for birthday parties, where they were given little hot-dogs on bread rolls – he had never seen such things at home. They were used to salty foods and sweet foods like tzimmes and gefilte fish were strange to their taste. The community invited them for Shabbat and chaggim and took them to sports events. All this was different to life in the Congo where there was no rugby and they had to attend school on Saturdays – his father went to the synagogue on Friday nights. The shul services and foods were strange although they knew some songs.
The Herzlia hostel in Hope Street was next to the Zionist Hall and Sammy and his friends were invited to all the functions held there. The hostel gave them pocket money of 2/6d a week, which they would spend at Mr Goldberg’s little shop next to the hall – Mr Goldberg was unbelievably kind to them. With his cousin Joseph Mallel and the other refugee boys they would walk down to the Garden Shul to make up a minyan, earning 2/6 pocket money for doing so which they would spend at the Pigalle bioscope in Adderley Street where they could sit all day watching the same film over and over again. They would also go to the Wimpie and share hamburgers – also new food to them. On Fridays they would go to collect clothes for clothing drives – these were sorted in a big hall, some for the Rhodesians, others for Israel. The Jewish community, Sammy repeats, were unbelievable.
When the Congolese refugees settled and found homes and employment, they fetched their children from Oranjia; five left in January 1961 and in March it was decided that the children should be placed elsewhere. Some returned to the Congo when the violence had settled, but many left again in 1967 when more fighting broke out. In 1973 when the government, short of money, nationalised all businesses, nearly all the Jews left the Congo. Joseph Mallel’s brother, who then returned, was shot in 1993 when soldiers raided their home during an uprising against Mobutu over soldiers’ pay.
The Congolese Jews who settled in Cape Town needed once again to be part of a religious community and joined the Green and Sea Point Hebrew Congregation in Marais Road. However, as French- and Ladino-speaking Sephardim they found the Ashkenazi Minhag strange to their ears and approached the synagogue for a room of their own. The congregation allowed them to use one of its Weizmann School classrooms for their 1960 High Festival services conducted by lay leaders under Joseph Rahmani and Moise Israel. The rest of the year they worshipped in Marais Road.
To their great credit the hard-working Congolese Jews, having started again from scratch, were soon once more a settled community. At one time Cape Town had more Rhodes Island Auschwitz survivors than any other city. Many had come down from the Congo – their last survivor passed away in 2023. When the community grew to sixty families, the classroom had become too small and they approached the synagogue again. The synagogue committee agreed to let them use the Weizmann School assembly hall and lent them Sifrei Torah and prayer books.[43] In 1970, 50 representatives of the Sephardi Congregation approached the committee wishing to become members of the synagogue but making it clear that they did not want seats as they would arrange their own services.[44]
Back in the Congo, there are still about a hundred Jews living there, down from 320 in 2013[45], who are represented by a Communaute Israelite du Shaba. Many are Israelis working on short term contracts for development projects. Most live in Lubumbashi with their synagogue and a rabbi, with some in Kinshasa, 2293km away, which has a Chabad, a Talmud Torah, a mikvah and a Yeshiva Gedola served by their rabbinical students who come for a year.[46]
Today fifty years later, the arrival in Cape Town of the Congolese children, refugees from a rebellion, and the warmth and kindness offered to them by the Jewish community has been forgotten by the local Jewish community but not by those refugees. Now settled with English-speaking grandchildren, they are integrated into the community, although still sticking to their Sephardi roots with their own Sephardi synagogue, Kahal Kadosh Shalom and their familiar food. The only Hebrew one family had known was kol yisrael arevim zeh bazeh, and this is one of the reasons why the Jewish people despite centuries of dispersion and persecution, are still here.
Gwynne Schrire, a veteran contributor to Jewish Affairs and a long-serving member of its editorial board, is a former Deputy Director of the SA Jewish Board of Deputies – Cape Council. She has authored, co-written and edited over twenty books on aspects of South African Jewish and Western Cape history.
NOTES
1 History of the Jews in the Democratic Republic of the CongoWikipedia; https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › History_of_
2 African Synagogues; https://www.africansynagogues.org › html › drc › drc1
3 The writer of this article has worked closely with Isaiah Mombilo, chairperson of the Congolese Civil society of South Africa to bring attention to this.The forgotten mine that built the atomic bomb. BBC https://www.bbc.com › future › article › 20200803-th.
4 A United Nations inter-agency mission, led by the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the United Nations Environment Programme, visited the mine in 2006 and concluded: Shinkolobwe was representative of similar situations in Africa and elsewhere in the developing world.
5 https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › 1956–1957_exodus_…
6 Congolese win independence from the Belgian Empire, 1959-60Global Nonviolent Action Databasehttps://nvdatabase.swarthmore.edu › content › congole…
7 Congo People Want to Come Here’, The Star, 16 February 1959.
8 Passemiers, Lazlo Patrick Christian, South Africa and the ‘Congo Crisis’, 1960-1965 University of the Free State https://scholar.ufs.ac.za › handle › Passemiers LPC
9 Brooks Marmon,Operation Refugee: The Congo Crisis and the End of Humanitarian Imperialism in Southern Rhodesia, 1960, Department of Historical & Heritage Studies, University of Pretoria, Pretoria,2022, https://repository.up.ac.za/bitstream/handle/2263/84772/Marmon_Operation_2022.pdf?sequence=1
10 The Congo, Decolonization, and the Cold War, 1960–1965MILESTONES: 1961–1968State Department (.gov) https://history.state.gov › milestones › congo-decolonizat…
11 Nissim Angell, Interviewed, 1.9.2023
12 Joseph Mallel, interviewed 12.9.2023
13 Congo Jewry in New exile: The Historic Jewish community of the Belgian Congo has again gone into exile”. Zionist Record, 15.7.1960
14 Zionist Record, 22.7.1960
15 South African Jewish Times, 29.7.1960
16 Zionist Record, op cit, 15.7.1960
17 Sammy Angel, interviewed 20.11.2024
18 Brooks Marmon, op cit
19 Jews from Congo Continue to Reach Belgium; Many Flee …https://www.jta.org › archive › jews-from-congo-conti
20 Belling, op cit, 66
21 Dorothy Kowen, Interview, 27.8.2023
22 Brooks Marmon, op cit
23 Belling, Veronica, From the Cape Jewish Orphanage to Oranjia Jewish Child and Youth Centre : A hundred years of caring for our children, Oranjia Jewish Child & Youth Centre, Cape Town, 2014, 169
24 South African Jewish Times, 26.8.1960
25 Schrire, Gwynne, The Congo crisis – Sephardi congregation finds a home, University of Cape Town https://humanities.uct.ac.za › kaplan-centre › congo-cr…
26 Zmira Cohen, by e-mail, 3.9.2023. Her husband Eliakim was one of the children.
27 Belling, op cit, 66
28 Zionist Record and South African Jewish Chronicle, 22.7.1960
29 The South African Jewish Yearbook, 1960/61, p 61,62
30 Graphic Report on Congo Jewish Refugees Presented in So. Africa August 5, 1960; Jewish Telegraphic Agency https://www.jta.org › archive › graphic-report-on-con…
31 Cynthia Marsden Interviewed on23.8.2023
32 All of Israel are responsible for One Another
33 South African Jewish Year Book 1960/61, 62
34 Nissim Angel, interviewed 1.9.2023
35 Nissim Angel, op cit
36 Florentine Blumenthal Saavedra, quoted in Belling, op cit,62
37 Zmira Cohen, op cit
38 Zmira Cohen, op cit
39 Alberto Hasson, quoted in Belling, op cit, 66
40 Alberto Hasson, quoted in Belling, op cit, 67
41 Joseph Mallel, op cit
42 Sammy Angel, op cit
43 Minute book of Green and Sea Point Hebrew Congregation, 28.9.1967
44 Minute book of Green and Sea Point Hebrew Congregation, 24.11.1970
45 Jewish population by country, Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Jewish_population_b.
46 World Jewish Congress https://www.worldjewishcongress.org › communities Community in Congo – World Jewish Congress
