SATURDAY OILPRESSERS :

India's children of Israel find their roots (RASHMEE Z AHMED, JULY 20, 2002, Times of India)

More than 2,000 years after they first claimed to have set foot in India, the mystery of the world's most obscure Jewish community - the Marathi-speaking Bene Israel - may finally have been solved with genetic carbon-dating revealing they carry the unusual Moses gene that would make them, literally, the original children of Israel.

Four years of DNA tests on the 4,000-strong Bene Israel, now mainly based in Mumbai, Pune, Thane and Ahmedabad, indicates they are probable descendants of a small group of hereditary Israelite priests or Cohanim, according to new results exclusively made available to the Sunday Times of India. [...]

The name Bene Israel literally means Children of Israel and their unsubstantiated legend of origin holds their ancestors to be Jews fleeing persecution in Palestine in 175 BC.

According to the legend, seven men and seven women survived a shipwreck near Navgaon village on the Konkan coast. Their descendants became thoroughly Indian except for observing Saturday, the Jewish sabbath, as a weekly holiday. The practice led them to be known as Shanwar Teli, Marathi for 'Saturday oilpressers'.

It was only in 1964, that the Israeli prime minister declared they were genuinely Jewish and should be allowed to return home (to Israel) and inter-marry.

But now, the new study goes one better. By studying certain genetic markers on the DNA chain, found only in male descendants of Aaron, Moses' elder brother, who founded the line of Jewish priests, the Bene Israel could well claim to be the purest of the pure.

One of the most noble moments in Judaism's long history came with Operation Solomon, when a similar lost tribe, the falasha of Ethiopia, were airlifted to Israel. How few times in history has a society gone to such effort to import a minority? Posted by Orrin Judd at July 24, 2002 8:39 AM