How Egypt's last 3 Jews will mark Hanukkah, and make sure their culture doesn't 'disappear' with them.
By Ahmed ShawkatThe head of the Egyptian Jewish community in Cairo, Magda Haroun, poses for a picture at the Shaar Hashamayim Synagogue in downtown Cairo, in an October 3, 2016 file photo. — More than 10 million people live in Egypt's capital, but only three of them — all older women — are Egyptian Jews. At 70, Magda Haroun is the youngest, and the leader of Cairo's now virtually extinct native Jewish community.
After being elected leader of the community in 2013, Haroun gathered the other women in the synagogue to celebrate Hanukkah. She turned to Google to look up instructions to lead the service and tried to read the prayers. All Jewish men between the age 18 and 60 were arrested, she said. They were given a choice:"You can go to the airport and your family will join you, or you will stay in jail."
Magda Haroun, the head of the Egyptian Jewish community in Cairo and one of the very last members of that community, stands in her office in front of pictures of her late father.Haroun still works from his old office, and on her right wrist she has a tattoo of the phrase"My father's daughter," in Arabic. She said her father knew that she would one day end up looking after Egypt's Jewish community, because he knew his family would never abandon the country.
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