CLO SE UP
gagement, Israel may be ex-
pected to help the Ethiopi-
ans against the advancing
armies of the Eritreans and
the Tigreans.
Prominent Ethiopia ex-
pert Olga Kapuliuk, of
Hebrew University, believes
that the Soviet Union gave
its full blessing to Ethiopia's
move. She told an inter-
viewer, "now there's a good
chance for a mass aliyah in
an organized and safe way,
without such terrible losses
as in 1985."
According to the latest
reports from Ethiopia, hun-
dreds of Jews from the Gon-
dar area are pouring into
Addis Ababa to the south in
anticipation of a low-keyed
"Operation . Moses." There
are already some 3,000 Jews
living in an impoverished
quarter of the capital, where
they fled from the chaos in
the north caused by years of
civil war in Tigre and
Eritrea, a new drought and
famine, and Mengistu's re-
pressive rural collectiviza-
tion policies. Until now, Is-
rael and Jewish organiza-
tions have only managed to
give limited aid to the Jew-
ish refugees.
Rahamim Elazar, an Ethi-
opian community leader who
heads Israel Radio's Amhar-
ic-language section, said he
doubts there will be another
Operation Magic Carpet —
the airlift rescue from Aden
of 50,000 Yemenite Jews in
the early 1950s — because of
the possible Arab reaction:
"Moslems now comprise 40
per cent of Ethiopia's popu-
lation, and the Arabs are al-
ready giving massive sup-
port to the Eritrean rebels."
The community leader
added that "in order to serve
our cause, we have to be pa-
tient and realistic, to give
the renewed ties a chance to
develop. All the while, we
have to continue to push our
government here, to make
sure they are not just paying
lip service to completing the
aliya of Ethiopian Jewry."
Elazar also commented on
the wave of euphoria that
has swept the community
here: "We care about Ethio-
pia. Many Israeli Ethiopians
will now be willing to go to
Ethiopia with the Israeli
mission to share their
knowledge in agriculture
and other fields."
Uri Gordon, head of the
Jewish Agency's Aliya De-
partment, said that the
`master plan' for absorption
of Ethiopian Jews will now
undergo emergency revi-
An Ethiopian Jewish woman and her child.
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
27