Being Indian, Jewish and South African

NICOLA MILTZ

Here in South Africa, there is a tiny minority of Indian Jews within the local Jewish community who have lived and prospered on our shores for many years.

They were delighted at scenes of Israeli Indian Bollywood dancers, in particular, who took part in a concert held in Tel Aviv in the Prime Minister’s honour.

There may only be a handful flickering in Johannesburg’s northern suburbs, but they are Jewish. They are South African. They are also Indian. Not necessarily in that order. This tiny cluster has happily made South Africa their home while maintaining close ties to family in both Israel and India.

One Johannesburg businessman, (Jewish and Indian-born) who asked to remain anonymous, has met Prime Minister Modi and was part of a delegation that introduced him to Israel several years ago.

This man came to South Africa with his young children for work nearly 30 years ago. His daughter said this week: “I was born in Israel but raised here,“ says the mother of two, “We are very private people, wishing to go about our daily lives as part of the South African Jewish community, attending Jewish day schools and shuls.”

Her father was born in Ahmedabad, India, and her mother, was born in Mumbai. Both were brought up in kosher homes and have maintained a kosher home throughout their marriage. Like most Indian Jews, they made aliya many years ago and met when they were in Israel. They decided to come and live in South Africa almost three decades ago and have never looked back.

A Shabbos or special Yomtov meal is not complete without the traditional Indian cuisine, including a hearty breyani with an array of aromatic vegetarian rice dishes – all carefully prepared without mixing milk and meat.

“My mom is a great cook and has a way of creating dishes that combine typical Jewish foods with Indian and North African spices. There is always challah, but there may be a Moroccan fish dish or a chicken breyani with a twist or a lamb curry and dal.”

“South Africa is our home. When I arrived, Hebrew was my first language; I had to learn to read and write English,” she says. Now, her children attend Jewish day schools and they find the community is very accepting of them.

“We were always welcome in this country, we fitted into the community right from the beginning,” she says. “People may have been fascinated but they were never mean.”

South Africans often mistake her for being an Israeli not Indian and when she is in Israel she is often thought of as being from Yemen or Morocco.

If she is ever questioned by a member of the CSO, she quickly converses in Hebrew and is accepted.

When she was growing up, her parents insisted she marry a Jewish man.

“This was very important to them. They are very old school and it is very important to keep the religion alive after so many years. Marrying out would have been a big thing,” she said.

Her South African husband’s family were very accepting of her Indian ancestry, pleased that she “came from a good Jewish home”, she said.

Our history books are filled with elaborately entwined stories of South African Indian communities dating as far back and further than the Dutch East India Company. But as far as the South African Jewish Indians are concerned, the information is thin. Indian Jews to South Africa rarely chose to settle among other Indian communities, opting instead to live among pockets of Jewish communities.

During his visit, Prime Minister Modi attended a special event in Tel Aviv that gathered about 10 000 Indians living in Israel. The programme included several Bollywood dance performances and a concert.

There are about 80 000 Jews of Indian origin living in Israel, as well as thousands of students and workers. It has become common for Israeli soldiers to visit India on completion of the army.  

Modi ended his historic three-day visit to Israel by asserting that the “successful visit will add more energy to India-Israel relations”.

At present, there are some 6 000 Jews across India. They are busy protecting the last remnants of Jewish heritage in the country, like the 35-odd synagogues spread across India, some cemeteries and schools; they are also known to have made significant entrepreneurial and cultural contributions to India’s rich history.

Chabad has been instrumental in connecting local Indian Jews and Jewish tourists at its centres throughout the country.

According to The Indian Express, the Jewish community in India is one among a large number of groups who had come from outside the country’s modern territorial borders and made India their home. However, “what marks the Jews out is their ability to blend into the local culture of the region”, it says.

Reports suggest that the tiny community in India is trying to demand minority status for itself “more as an attempt to get recognition for the large contributions they have made to India’s socio-cultural life, rather than for distinguishing themselves from the Indian majority”.

Jews in India, unlike those across the globe, are divided into three distinct groups as per their geographical location. There is the Cochin Jews, the Bene Israeli and the Baghdadi Jews.

Each of these three categories arrived at different points in time and formed their own distinct Jewish identities. After Israel’s independence in 1948, a large number of Jews left India in the hope of going back home. While most went in the hope of a better lifestyle and prosperity, breaking the ties with India was apparently not easy.

Modi’s visit to Israel was the first there by an Indian head of government. The visit comes 25 years after the establishment of diplomatic ties between the two countries.

Spokesman for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Marshall Wittmann, said: “Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Israel is a watershed moment that reaffirms the strong political, economic and security ties between two important partners of the United States who share our interests and democratic values.”

Modi, perhaps more than any of his predecessors, believes in engagement with the Indian diaspora. He made a point of meeting with Indian Israelis.

Additional reporting by JTA