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India’s Bnei Menashe community in crisis as ethnic violence burns synagogues and displaces hundreds
(JTA) — For the past several years, life was good for Lalam Hangshing as president of the Bnei Menashe Council, the governing body for Jewish communities in the Indian states of Manipur and Mizoram.
While living at his parents’ house, he and his wife enjoyed the clean air and beautiful scenery of Manipur, a state in northeast India home to close to 3 million people. Miles away, Hangshing rented out a newly-built four-story home to a film production company.
Everything changed on May 3, when rioting broke out between the ethnic majority Meiteis and the tribal minority Kukis, a violent conflagration that had been building up for years. Local groups say Meiteis began targeting Kuki institutions and razing homes to the ground, and Hangshing — also the general secretary of a Kuki-led political party — feared his house was next.
“When the problems started on the third of May, with military precision, the mobs went straight to [Kuki] houses,” Hangshing said. “They ransacked them and vandalized them and they burned each and every house in Imphal city within one and a half days.”
According to Shavei Israel, an NGO that helps “lost tribe” Jewish communities immigrate to Israel, over 1,000 members of the community, or 20% of their total, have been displaced. One community member was killed, and another was shot in the chest and is hospitalized. Two synagogues and mikvahs, or ritual baths, were burned down.
(Degel Menashe, an Israeli NGO that is dedicated to supporting the Bnei Menashe and has a longstanding feud with Shavei Israel, said one synagogue was burned.)
Hangshing is Kuki, as are the thousands of other Bnei Menashe Jews in Manipur. On May 4, Hangshing left his home and over a month later, has yet to return.
He spoke with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency from Delhi, more than 1,000 miles from his home. His four-story house has been completely destroyed, but his parents’ home is somehow still standing. He worries about family possessions, such as religious books belonging to his father — who had helped found Manipur’s Jewish community — and a favorite set of golf clubs left behind, all in danger of being looted or destroyed any day now.
Another estimated 292 Bnei Menashe families have fled to Kuki-majority hill areas within Manipur or to the nearby state of Mizoram, according to Shavei Israel.
In Mizoram, over 100 Jews initially took refuge in the Shalom Tzion synagogue in Aizawl, in the houses of other Jewish families or at hotels, but most have moved to a paramilitary camp nearby. Community leaders say the refugees are not facing any immediate danger and have enough food and supplies thanks to the tens of thousands of dollars in aid rolling in from Shavei Israel and Degel Menashe.
“They basically just fled with their documents, and they have prayer books, their tefillin and ritual items, and the clothes on their back,” said Asaf Renthlei, a Mizoram Jewish community member and Degel Menashe volunteer. At relief camps, he said, community members have observed Shabbat every week since they fled.
“This is one of the gravest crises the Bnei Menashe in India have ever experienced,” said Michael Freund, who has been chairman of Shavei Israel since he founded the organization in 2002.
Over 100 Bnei Menashe have taken shelter in a synagogue in Mizoram. (Shavei Israel)
“A state gone rogue”
Violence broke out in Manipur state in early May when tribal groups launched a protest against the Meitei’s demand for Scheduled Tribe status, which is traditionally reserved for minority tribes such as the Kukis and ensures certain rights to education, government jobs and other privileges. The Kukis (which make up about 16% of the population and are majority Christian) say that the Meiteis (who make up 53% and are majority Hindu) already have outsized privilege and political representation.
The May 3 protest was only the spark that has ignited a conflict based on long-standing grievances against the Kuki minority, said Sushant Singh, a senior research fellow at India’s Centre for Policy Research.
“At the core of it, it is about Meiteis claiming that they are the original inhabitants of the state, Kukis are illegal immigrants, and… [the Meiteis] have been forced to occupy only 10% of the land,” Singh said. “And because of the special privileges that tribes have in India, they cannot go and occupy the land occupied by Kukis.”
As the conflict enters its second month, over 100 deaths have been recorded and an estimated 40,000 people have been displaced; some entire villages are destroyed and over 200 churches have been burned, as well as the two synagogues in the Imphal area. A statewide internet blackout has been in place since the beginning of May.
While both Kukis and Meiteis have participated in the violence, Kukis have “suffered the most,” and state police and security forces have joined Meitei groups in targeting Kukis, Singh said. Human Rights Watch has called on India to investigate police violence in Manipur, which local groups have disputed.
“It has essentially been a state gone rogue acting against a minority community,” Singh said.
Though the government has called for a ceasefire and established a peace committee, those efforts to quell the violence have been unsuccessful. The military has implemented security measures and evacuated Kukis further into the hills and Meiteis into the plains, but Singh said this has only reinforced geographical divides, instead of facilitating a solution that could allow the two groups to live alongside one another in the future.
Citing the government’s failure to protect them, Kukis have called for separation from the state of Manipur. As the conflict stretches into its second month, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has yet to comment on the crisis in his country’s northeast.
“The army has been called in but they are very ineffective because it’s a civil war. They can’t take sides. They just stand around and when the firing gets too heavy, they stand aside so it’s left to us to fend for ourselves,” Hangshing said.
According to one organization, two of the community’s synagogues have burned down and another Torah scroll was torched. (Shavei Israel)
An appeal to Israel
The Bnei Menashe identify as descendants of a “lost tribe” group, tracing their origins to the Israelite tribe of Menasseh. In 2005, a chief rabbi of Israel affirmed their identity as a “lost tribe” group with historic Jewish ties, but researchers have not found sufficient evidence to back the claim. Bnei Menashe Jews began immigrating to Israel in the 1990s, and because of their “lost tribe” status, they all undergo formal Orthodox conversions upon arrival. Around 5,000 remain in the states of Manipur and Mizoram today, and about 5,000 have already immigrated to Israel.
Many have struggled to gain entry into Israel over the past two decades, and they are now asking the Jewish state to expedite the immigration process to help them escape the violence. But despite recent celebrations surrounding the opening of a new Indian-Jewish cultural center in central Israel, to which Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog sent recorded blessings, Jerusalem has yet to publicly respond to the situation.
Israel’s foreign minister, Eli Cohen, visited India last month on a planned trip aimed at strengthening ties between the two countries. He did not comment on the matter, and his visit was cut short due to a military operation in Israel.
“I think under [Benjamin] Netanyahu, particularly in this stint as prime minister, there are very few expectations. He is very close to Mr. Modi’s government, so I don’t think anybody expects anything from Netanyahu,” Singh said.
The Bnei Menashe’s “grey zone” religious status, in the words of Renthlei, makes their immigration to Israel more complicated for them than most. Before the Bnei Menashe can even apply to immigrate, they must face a panel of rabbis — who usually come all the way to India — for interviews.
“It’s not like Ukraine. The Ukrainians are Jewish without any doubt. But the Bnei Menashe, we are in some gray zone of not exactly not Jews, but not exactly Jews also,” Renthlei said. “It’s unlikely that the Bnei Menashe would just be able to make aliyah, even in this situation, unlike the Ukrainians.” Thousands of Ukrainian Jews have immigrated to Israel since Russia’s invasion began in February 2022.
The Jewish Agency for Israel, which helps facilitate immigration, and the UJA-Federation of New York have provided funding to Shavei Israel to help displaced persons, representatives from Shavei said. The Jewish Agency, the ministry of aliyah and integration, and the Israeli consulate in India did not respond to JTA’s requests for comment.
“We’re too small to matter, I suppose,” said Isaac Thangjom, director of Degel Menashe. Thangjom, who lives in Israel, has been in contact with officials in the ministry of aliyah and integration.
“They are very concerned, but they haven’t given me any explicit answer despite my proddings,” he said. “Their responses have been very tepid.”
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Palestinian Islamic Jihad Said to Be Expanding Military Presence in Syria With Government’s Knowledge
Terrorists stand during the funeral of two Palestinian Islamic Jihad gunmen who were killed in an Israeli raid, in Jenin refugee camp, in the West Bank on May 10, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Raneen Sawafta
The Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorist group is reportedly expanding its military presence in Syria, a move that could put the Syrian government in violation of US conditions for restoring full diplomatic ties and lifting additional economic sanctions.
According to Israeli public broadcaster Kan News, PIJ has expanded its military wing — the al-Quds Brigades — within Syria in recent weeks, notably increasing activity in Palestinian refugee camps near Damascus, apparently with the full knowledge of the Syrian government.
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa is said to have appointed an envoy to oversee PIJ’s activities in the country, responsible for facilitating communications between the Palestinian terrorist group and the government, Kan reported.
However, a government security source denied such accusations, saying there is “no intention to allow military operations against Israel,” which borders Syria.
PIJ also denied reports of intensified activity in Syria, saying they are entirely fabricated and intended to provoke hostility against the Palestinian people and their refugee camps
Following the United States’ recent statements that it does not support Israeli airstrikes in Syria, the embattled Middle Eastern country could now provide a particularly convenient base for PIJ, allowing the group to expand its operations with less risk of Israeli retaliation.
Under the Trump administration, Washington has lifted sanctions on the Syrian government to support the country’s reconstruction efforts and pushed for Damascus to normalize relations with Israel. Earlier this month, US President Donald Trump hosted Sharaa for the first-ever visit by a Syrian president to Washington, DC, vowing to help Syria as the war-ravaged country struggles to come out of decades of international isolation.
To pave the way for the full restoration of US diplomatic relations, deeper economic ties, and the lifting of additional economic sanctions, Washington has set five conditions for the Syrian government, including deporting Palestinian militants, joining the Abraham Accords with Israel, and expelling foreign terrorists.
The government must also help prevent an Islamic State (ISIS) resurgence and take responsibility for detention facilities holding ISIS fighters, supporters, and their families in the northeast.
If the Syrian government is aware of the reported PIJ activity, it risks jeopardizing its relationship with Washington by effectively endorsing the operations of a designated foreign terrorist organization — in open defiance of a key condition for improving bilateral ties.
As Damascus seeks to restore international credibility and strengthen its standing on the global stage, Israeli officials have remained highly cautious of Syria’s new leadership.
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar has previously described the current Syrian regime as “a jihadist Islamist terror group from Idlib that took Damascus by force.”
He has even warned senior European officials that Hamas and PIJ were operating in Syria to create an additional front against Israel
“We will not compromise the security on our border. Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad are acting in Syria to create another front against Israel there,” the top Israeli diplomat said earlier this year.
According to Hebrew media reports, Defense Minister Israel Katz warned lawmakers in Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, this week that armed groups operating inside Syria, including the Yemen-based Houthis, are considering launching attacks on the Golan Heights, a strategic region on Israel’s northern border previously controlled by Syria.
Hamas, PIJ, and the Houthis are all backed by Iran, which provides the internationally designated terrorist groups with arms and funding.
Israel has consistently vowed to prevent the Syrian government from deploying forces in the country’s southern region, along its northeastern border.
Sharaa, a former al Qaeda commander who until recently was sanctioned by the US as a foreign terrorist with a $10 million bounty on his head, became Syria’s transitional president earlier this year after leading a rebel campaign that ousted long-time Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, whose brutal and authoritarian Iran-backed rule had strained ties with the Arab world during the nearly 14-year Syrian war.
The collapse of Assad’s regime was the result of an offensive spearheaded by Sharaa’s Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group, a former al Qaeda affiliate.
Following Assad’s fall in December, Israel moved troops into a buffer zone along the Syrian border to secure a military position to prevent terrorists from launching attacks against the Jewish state.
The previously demilitarized zone in the Golan Heights was established under the 1974 Disengagement of Forces Agreement between Damascus and Jerusalem that ended the Yom Kippur War. However, Israel considered the agreement void after the collapse of Assad’s regime.
Now, Israel and Syria are reportedly in the final stages of months-long negotiations over a security agreement that could establish a joint Israeli, Syrian, and US presence at key strategic locations.
Jerusalem and Damascus have agreed to form a joint Israeli-Syrian–American security committee to oversee developments along their shared border and uphold the terms of a proposed deal.
Al-Sharaa told The Washington Post earlier this month that his government has expelled Iranian and Hezbollah forces from Syria and is ready for a new phase of ties with the United States. However, Syria’s reported knowledge of PIJ activity may be a hurdle as talks between Washington, Damascus, and Jerusalem proceed.
Earlier this year, tensions escalated after heavy fighting broke out in Sweida between local Druze fighters and Syrian regime forces amid reports of atrocities against civilians.
At the time, Israel launched an airstrike campaign to protect the Druze, which officials described as a warning to the country’s new leadership over threats to the minority group. The Druze, an Arab minority who practice a religion originally derived from Islam, live in Israel, Syria, and Lebanon. In Israel, many serve in the military and police, including during the war in Gaza.
Jerusalem has pledged to defend the Druze community in Syria with military force if they come under threat — motivated in part by appeals from Israel’s own Druze minority.
But the Syrian government has accused Israel of fueling instability and interfering in its internal affairs, while the new leadership insists it is focused on unifying the country after 14 years of conflict, which began with Assad violently cracking down on anti-government protests in 2011.
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The Dangerous Legacy of the 1840 ‘Damascus Affair’ Blood Libel (PART ONE)
Smoke rises from a building after strikes at Syria’s defense ministry in Damascus, Syria, July 16, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi
According to a recent article in Aish:
On November 11, 2025, Dr. Samar Maqusi, a researcher at the University College London (UCL) proudly stated that in 1838 a group of Jews kidnapped and murdered a priest in Damascus and used his blood in order to make special pancakes for their Feast of the Tabernacles (Sukkot). She added that for Jewish people the blood used in their pancakes must be from a gentile. She asserted that a group of Jews admitted to murdering this priest in order to use his blood in their food.
Her lecture was hosted by UCL’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) titled “The Birth of Zionism.”
The Damascus Affair of 1840 (not 1838) was an infamous blood libel that became international news and led to one of the first instances in which Jewish communities around the world worked together to demand justice for another Jewish community.
The Damascus blood libel is recognized as one of the turning points of modern Jewish history, when Jews around the world realized the importance of uniting to advocate for each other.
The Blood Libel
On February 5, 1840, Father Thomas, an Italian Friar of the Capuchin Order who lived in Damascus, disappeared with his Muslim servant Ibrahim Amara.
They were assumed murdered, possibly by businessmen with whom Thomas had had shady dealings, or by a Muslim who was infuriated by an insult to Islam that Father Thomas had uttered.
But the Jews were to bear the blame, as the Capuchin friars began spreading rumors that the Jews had murdered the two men to use their blood for Passover. This led to one of history’s most famous blood libels, the Damascus Blood Libel, better known as the Damascus Affair of 1840.
Damascus was then under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. Since the Ottoman Empire was weak, the Ottoman governor of Egypt, Muhammad Ali Pasha, primarily ruled over both Egypt and Syria as quasi-independent principalities, with just nominal subordination to the Ottoman Empire. France also retained some measure of control in Syria, as the French had maintained a presence in the region since the time of the Crusades. The Catholics of Syria, including Father Thomas, were officially under French protection.
Due to the French jurisdiction over this case, the French consul, Ulysse de Ratti-Menton, known for his anti-Jewish views, presided over the investigation.
Along with the governor-general, Sharif Pasha, he conducted a short investigation, and a barber named Shlomo Negrin, among others, was arbitrarily arrested and tortured.
They managed to extort a “confession” from Negrin that the monk had been killed in the house of David Harari by seven Jews. The men whom he named were arrested and tortured. Two of the detained men died, one converted to Islam to be spared, and the statements made under torture by the others were considered adequate as an admission of guilt.
Bones that were discovered in a sewer were “identified” as those of the monk and buried in a funeral on March 2nd, which increased the anger against the Jews. The inscription on the monk’s tombstone stated that this was the grave of a saint tortured by the Jews.
After the “funeral,” attacks began against the Jews, and Sharif Pasha had to move hundreds of soldiers to protect the Jewish quarter.
The focus of the “investigation” was now on the servant, Ibrahim Amara. More torture extracted the “confession” that he had been murdered by Jews, among them members of the prominent Farhi and Picciotto families, and the authorities sought to arrest them.
Knowing the torture that they would be subjected to, some of the accused tried to hide or escape. Rabbi Yaakov Antebi, accused of having received a bottle of the blood of Thomas, was arrested and tortured, yet he held strong under the torture and would not confess to anything.
More bones were found, and the investigators claimed they were the remains of Ibrahim Amara. However, the physician in Damascus, Dr. Lograso, did not believe they were human bones and, considering the pressure on him, requested that the bones be sent to Europe for examination. Ratti-Menton refused and instead announced that based on the confessions of the accused and the remains found of the victims, the guilt of the Jews in the double murder was proven beyond a doubt.
One of the Jews who was arrested during the second round of accusations was Isaac Levi Picciotto, an Austrian citizen and thus under the protection of the Austrian consul. Initially, he was also subject to torture, but on March 8th, there was a sudden turnabout.
The Austrian vice-consul, Caspar Giovanni Merlato, a personal friend of Picciotto, demanded that Picciotto be returned to Austrian jurisdiction and that the investigation be carried out at the Austrian consulate.
With Merlato’s involvement, things changed dramatically. Picciotto proved he was in a different place the evening of the murder, and a Christian corroborated this. Picciotto now moved from the defensive to the offensive and began accusing officials of instigating this blood libel, carrying out investigations under torture, and openly accusing Ratti-Menton of murder.
He demanded that the Austrian authorities carry out the investigation. As torture methods were seen as unjust, cruel, and backward by Western countries, his accusations put Ratti-Menton and his aides on the defensive.
The Blood Libel Spreads
The predictable result of the accusations was that the Jews of Damascus and other parts of Syria began to suffer from antisemitic mobs. Synagogues were destroyed and looted, cemeteries were desecrated, and Jews were attacked all over the country.
News of the atrocities spread throughout the Jewish world, causing waves of shock and anger at what was going on in Syria.
The first Jewish attempt to intervene in the tragic situation came via a petition initiated by Israel Bak addressed to Muhammad Ali, as he was the governor of Syria. At the same time, the Austrian Consul General in Egypt, Anton Laurin, received a report from the Austrian consul in Damascus. Recognizing the tremendous injustice, Laurin became very involved in the case, and he began by using his influence to petition Muhammad Ali to stop the torture methods used by the investigators.
Muhammad Ali agreed, and instructions were issued accordingly to Damascus by express courier. As a result, the use of torture came to an end on April 25, 1840, which caused a new round of riots in Damascus.
The accusation of murder and blood libel remained, and the investigation against the Jews continued, albeit without torture. Now, Austrian Consul General Laurin attempted to influence the French Consul General in Egypt to order his subordinate, Ratti-Menton, to stop the libel, but this effort was unsuccessful.
At this point, Laurin went against all procedures and decided to send the information he received from Damascus to Baron James de Rothschild, the honorary Austrian consul in Paris.
Baron Rothschild appealed to the French government to stop the injustice, but when his appeals were ignored, he chose to turn to the media and publish the report in newspapers worldwide, creating public pressure to halt this travesty of justice.
His brother in Vienna, Solomon Rothschild, worked alongside him and used his influence to speak to Chancellor Klemens von Metternich about the situation. Metternich ultimately supported his consul, Laurin, since the negative publicity for France, archenemy of the Austro-Hungarian empire, was to his benefit. The British also chose to support the Jews in fighting the libel, and the British Consul General of England in Egypt expressed those policies.
As a result of the advocacy, a message was sent to Damascus on May 3, 1840, ordering protection for the Jews from the violence of Muslim and Christian mobs.
Rabbi Menachem Levine is the CEO of JDBY-YTT, the largest Jewish school in the Midwest. He served as Rabbi of Congregation Am Echad in San Jose, CA from 2007 – 2020. He is a popular speaker and has written for numerous publications. Rabbi Levine’s personal website is https://thinktorah.org. A version of this article was first published at: https://aish.com/the-damascus-affair/
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A Personal Perspective From Israel: The Signs Are Small, But We Are Still at War
An Israeli police officer investigates a crater at the site of a missile attack, launched from Yemen, near Ben Gurion Airport, in Tel Aviv, Israel May 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Avshalom Sassoni
Israel is an unusual place, where we balance war and daily life on a constant basis. So today, I’m taking a moment away from deep analysis, and instead sharing something a bit more personal — my weird/normal life as an Israeli.
In addition to my work at RealityCheck, I also teach as an Adjunct Professor at Reichman University (formerly the “IDC”) in Herzliya, Israel. I absolutely love my students — who are enthusiastic, intelligent, and in many cases, actively risking their lives to protect mine.
Last week, a student came to class in uniform — not מדי א׳ , which is the dress uniform that soldiers typically wear when traveling home for the weekend, but מדי ב׳, which is the full combat uniform. I asked if he was in מילואים (reserves) and he said yes, that he’s serving in Syria right now.
Only later I realized that when he said “right now,” he meant RIGHT now: his commander had given him a special pass to come to class for a few hours, after which he was leaving my classroom and returning straight to Syria. I don’t know what’s more impressive — that my students are out there protecting our safety, or that when they have a moment away from combat, their first priority is to come to class.
This is Israel. These are Israelis.
Though it’s not strictly speaking a part of my course, students ask about the legal status of Israel at The Hague so often that I prepared several slides on the topic. Once, a student asked whether she should expect that her boyfriend (a combat soldier) would get arrested on their upcoming trip to Europe. Fortunately, I had the knowledge to explain that topic, and to recommend certain precautionary measures, which gave her a degree of comfort. Sadly, those same precautionary measures may soon be relevant in New York City.
I sometimes enjoy sitting on my balcony, eating dinner, and watching passenger planes fly across the Mediterranean into Israel on their standard flight path toward Ben Gurion International Airport. Yet the other evening, I noticed something unusual: several aircraft turned away from the Tel Aviv shore at the last moment, and took strange detours. Minutes later I saw (and mostly heard) several fighter jets heading northward, intersecting the commercial flightpath.
Perhaps air traffic control needed to clear the skies for the fighter jets? I may never know for certain, but the next morning, I read about an unusually large IDF operation in Lebanon, across Israel’s northern border.
Other days, I see helicopters heading south, most likely to Gaza. But on one special day, October 13, 2025, I saw the very helicopters that were bringing the hostages back home. All this, right from my window.
These small but striking experiences serve as a constant reminder that we are not really at peace.
For the moment we aren’t dodging rockets, running to bomb shelters, or watching the ominous orange glow of Iranian missiles as they heat up upon re-entry to the Earth’s atmosphere — on their way to strike our cities and communities. Yet Israel is very much still at war on multiple fronts: we see and feel it every day, in the most unusual and ordinary ways.
Daniel Pomerantz is the CEO of RealityCheck, an organization dedicated to deepening public conversation through robust research studies and public speaking.