Yad L’Achim’s Surprising Video Makes Waves on Arab Social Networks
A most unusual video clip released this week by Yad L’Achim in Arabic, has been making waves on the Arab social networks.
The organization’s counter-assimilation department receives frequent requests from families regarding loved ones who long ago married minority members and are still in Arab villages where they’ve raised children and grandchildren.
In some cases, the descendants of these Jewish women know nothing of their Jewish origins. Some live in other Arab countries, having emigrated from Yehudah, Shomron and Gaza.
The counter-assimilation department set up a “Roots Unit” with the aim of establishing contract with these women and their children, to remind them of their Judaism and to let them know that the door is always open for them to return home. For many of the descendants, the video is an introduction to Judaism.
This effort involves a Facebook page in Arabic called “Return to Jewish Roots” that is maintained by Yad L’Achim activists who speak Arabic fluently. In this way, a virtual family was formed, in which some Jewish-Arabs are getting in touch with their roots via virtual classes on Judaism.
Out of a desire to reach the widest possible audience, Yad L’Achim approached the singer-poet Ziv Yechezkel who is very well known in the Arab world, and asked him to make a special film that explains in Arabic about the holiday of Shavuos, the receiving of the Torah, the ethereal significance of the Ten Commandments and our uniqueness as the Jewish nation.
Yad L’Achim hails Yechezkel for gladly accepting the challenge to use the social network to reach out to Jews in the Arab world. His video clip quickly became a success on the Arab social networks.
The organization notes that the film was released in advance of Shavuos, when the Jewish people again draws closer to its G-d and His Torah.
The new film in the Arabic language.
