1. Israel, Central Bureau of Statistics, Population and Housing Census, 1961, Publication No. 13, Demographic Characteristics of the Population, Part III (Jerusalem, 1963), Table G, pp. xxx-xxxi. This figure does not include Egypt-ians who reached Israel but died before 1961 or Israeli-born children of Egypt-ians. Hence, the size of the Egyptian Jewish community and the total number of those who immigrated to Israel are somewhat larger. The Sudanese component of this figure is quite small, and some Sudanese Jews were of Egyptian origins.

2. Shlomo Kohen-Tzidon, “Kehilat yehudei kahir,” Mahanayim 114 (Adar bet 5727/1967):44.

3. Ibid.

4. Ibid.

5. Shlomo Kohen-Tzidon, Dramah be-aleksandriah ve-shnei harugei malkhut: mehandes sh. ’azar ve-doktor m. marzuk (Tel Aviv: Sgi’al, 1965), jacket copy, p. 13.

6. Information about Sami “Atiyah and his political activities is based on my interview with his son, Eliyahu ‘Atiyah, and daughter, Sarah ‘Atiyah Rayten, Holon, Jan. 12, 1993, and the following texts: Irgun Nifga‘ei ha-Redifot ha-Anti-Yehudiot be-Mitzrayim, Du‘ah le-shnat 1971 (Holon: [ha-Irgun], 1972), MHT D-11/69.2; Irgun nifga‘ei ha-redifot ha-anti-yehudiot be-mitzrayim (1958–1978): 20 shanah shel pe‘ilut mevurakhat shel ha-yo‘r sami ‘atiyah ve-haverei ha-mo‘etza (Holon: [ha-Irgun], 1978); Ronen Bergman, ‘Kamah haviyot neft shavah mishpahat qattawi,” Musaf ha-aretz, Dec. 15, 1996, pp. 52–53.

7. Irgun nifga‘ei ha-redifot ha-anti-yehudiot be-mitzrayim (1958–1978), pp. 20–21.

8. Bergman, “Kamah haviyot neft shavah mishpahat qattawi,” p. 54.

9. Ibid.

10. Shlomo Barad et al. (eds.), Haganah yehudit be-artzot ha-mizrah: rav siah shlishi, ha-ha‘apalah ve-ha-haganah be-mitzrayim, 25 be-februar 1985 (Efal: Yad Tabenkin, ha-Makhon le-Heker ha-Tnu‘ah ha-Tzionit ve-ha-Halutzit be-Artzot ha-Mizrah, ha-Makhon le-Heker Koah ha-Magen, 1986).

11. Shlomo Barad, interview, Kibutz Karmiah, Jan. 3, 1996.

12. Shlomo Barad, “ha-Pe‘ilut ha-tzionit be-mitzrayim, 1917–1952,” Shorashim ba-mizrah 2 (1989):65–127; Michael M. Laskier, The Jews of Egypt, 1920–1970: In the Midst of Zionism, Anti-Semitism, and the Middle East Conflict (New York: New York University Press, 1992) largely follows and elaborates on Barad's narrative.

13. Barad, “ha-Pe‘ilut ha-tzionit be-mitzrayim,” pp. 115–16.

14. Ada Aharoni, “Ha-tzionut lo yuva le-mitrayim-hi haytah sham,” in Barad et al. (eds.), Haganah yehudit be-artzot ha-mizrah, pp. 20–21.

15. David Harel, “Ha-shomer ha-tza‘ir be-mitzrayim,” in Barad et al. (eds.), Haganah yehudit be-artzot ha-mizrah, pp. 44–48.

16. Judith Sudilovsky, “The 3,500-Year Exodus,” Jerusalem Post, Passover supplement, Mar. 25, 1994, p. 10. David Harel reiterated and expanded on this point in interviews with me in Tel Aviv on Mar. 18 and 25, 1993.

17. Irgun nifga‘ei ha-redifot ha-anti-yehudiot be-mitzrayim (1958–1978), pp. 28–29.

18. al-Ahram, Nov. 21, 1977, facsimile in ibid., p. 101.

19. Levana Zamir, Ma’akhalim me-eretz ha-nilus (kasher) (Tel Aviv: ha-Kibutz ha-Me’uhad, 1982), p. 9.

20. Ibid., p. 7.

21. Eleven issues appeared from Sept. 1985 to May 1993.

22. “A la rencontre des Juifs d'Egypte,” Le Monde, Dec. 3, 1978.

23. “Retour aux sources en Egypt,” Nahar Misraïm nos. 4–5 (Nov. 1981):28–40.

24. Paula Jacques, Lumière de l'oeil (Paris: Mercure de France, 1980), Un Baiser froid comme la lune (Paris: Mercure de France, 1983), L'Héritage de tante Carlotta (Paris: Gallimard, 1990), Déborah et les anges dissipés (Paris: Mercure de France, 1991).

25. Jacques Hassoun, interview, Paris, May 30, 1994.

26. Jacques Hassoun (ed.), Juifs du nil (Paris: Le Sycomore, 1981). Second edition, revised and expanded: Histoire des Juifs du nil (Paris: Minerve, 1990).

27. Hassoun, interview.

28. Ibid.; R. Stambouli, “Mémoire des juifs d'Egypte,” Information Juive, July 1991, p. 11.

29. Victor D. Sanua, “A Jewish Childhood in Cairo,” in Victor D. Sanua (ed.), Fields of Offerings: Studies in Honor of Raphael Patai (Rutherford, N.J.: Farleigh Dickinson University Press, 1983); Victor D. Sanua, “Emigration of the Sephardic Jews from Egypt after the Arab-Israeli Wars,” Proceedings of the Eleventh World Congress of Jewish Studies, vol. 3 (Jerusalem: World Union of Jewish Studies, 1994), pp. 215–22; Mary Halawani (director and producer), I Miss the Sun (Sphinx Productions, 26 min., 1983).

30. Thirteenth World Congress of Poets [program], Haifa, Sept. 7–10, 1992; Thirteenth World Congress of Poets, The International Shin Shalom Peace Poem Competition-a Selection (Haifa, 1992, mimeographed).

31. The research project was carried out under the auspices of the Shmu’el Neaman Institute of the Technion. Ada Aharoni showed me copies of the questionnaire. Preliminary results of Haifa and Jerusalem respondents were reported by Uri Sharon, “80% me-ha-yehudim yotzei mitzrayim mukhanim levater ‘al shtahim kedei liftor ha-ba‘ayah ha-falestinit,” Davar, Apr. 7, 1993.

32. Ada Aharoni, “The Image of Jewish Life in Egypt in the Writings of Egyptian Jewish Authors in Israel and Abroad,” in Shimon Shamir (ed.), The Jews of Egypt: A Mediterranean Society in Modern Times (Boulder: Westview Press, 1987), p. 197. This essay brought many of the works discussed in this chapter to my attention.

33. Ada Aharoni, “ha-Shalom ve-ha-sfinks,” in Me-ha-piramidot la-karmel; Matehet ve-sigaliyot (Tel Aviv: ‘Eked, 1978), p. 38 (my translation from the Hebrew based on the English version of the poem). Freedom Square should more properly be rendered as Liberation Square, but I have retained this minor error so that the terminology of my translation of the poem coincides with that of the Hebrew version.

34. Ada Aharoni, “What Is Peace to Me?” in From the Pyramids to the Carmel (Tel Aviv: ‘Eked, 1979), pp. 26–27.

35. Ada Aharoni, “Me-haifa le-kahir be-ahavah,” Musaf ha-aretz, June 20, 1975, p. 28. Reprinted in Me-ha-piramidot la-karmel, pp. 75–80. English version: “Letter to Kadreya: From Haifa to Cairo with Love,” in From the Pyramids to the Carmel, pp. 149–58. The letter was originally composed in English.

36. Ada Aharoni, The Second Exodus: A Historical Novel (Bryn Mawr: Dorrance, 1983). Me-ha-nilus la-yarden [From the Nile to the Jordan] (Tel Aviv: Tammuz, 1992) is a slightly expanded and revised version of the original En-glish text. In the Hebrew version, the names of the characters have been changed. I refer to and quote from the English version.

37. Aharoni, The Second Exodus, p. 36.

38. Ibid., p. 54.

39. Ibid., pp. 54, 55, 56.

40. Ibid., p. 27.

41. Ibid., p. ix

42. Ibid., p. 60.

43. Aharoni, From the Pyramids to the Carmel, p. 149.

44. ‘Ali Shalash, al-Yahud wa’l-masun fi misr: dirasa ta’rikhiyya (Cairo: al-Zahra’ li’l-I‘lam al-‘Arabi, 1986). The original articles appeared in al-Majalla in the issues of July 17–23 through Aug. 28-Sept. 3, 1985.

45. Biographical details about Anda Harel-Dagan are drawn from an interview I conducted with her at Kibutz Hatzor, Mar. 9, 1993.

46. Anda Harel-Dagan, Avraham hayah (Tel Aviv: “Traklin” le-yad ‘Eked, 1974), p. 9.

47. Harel-Dagan, interview.

48. Ibid.

49. My translation from the Hebrew. The reference is to Amos 9:13. The Israeli song is “Etz ha-rimon natan rayho” (The pomegranate tree gives forth its fruit), words by Y. Orland, music based on a Bukharan folk song.

50. My translation. The phrase al tira appears in Genesis 15:1, Genesis 26:25, Isaiah 44:2, and elsewhere.

51. Harel-Dagan, interview.

52. Maurice Shammas, Shaykh shabtay wa-hikayat min harat al-yahud (Shafa ‘Amr: al-Mashriq, 1979), pp. 6–7.

53. Maurice Shammas, interview, Jerusalem, May 5, 1994.

54. Shammas, Shaykh shabtay wa-hikayat min harat al-yahud, p. 49.

55. Ibid., p. 52.

56. Ibid., p. 78.

57. Ronit Matalon, Zeh ‘im ha-panim eleynu (Tel Aviv: ‘Am ‘Oved, 1995).

58. The literary traces of this movement have been collected for the first time in any language in Ammiel Alcalay (ed.), Keys to the Garden: New Israeli Writing (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1996).

59. The most extensive review that I have seen is Nisim Kalderon, “Lo ha-kol sipur ehad: ‘al ‘zeh ‘im ha-panim eleynu' shel ronit matalon,” Rehov 2 (Aug. 1995):48–58. See also the interview with Ronit Matalon in Davar in note 73 in this chapter and the references there to positive reviews in Ma‘ariv and ha-Aretz.

60. Matalon, Zeh ‘im ha-panim eleynu, p. 22.

61. Ibid., pp. 254–55.

62. Ibid., p. 28.

63. Ibid., pp. 28, 29.

64. Ibid., p. 266.

65. Ibid., p. 157.

66. Ibid., p. 232.

67. Ibid., p. 261.

68. Ibid., p. 241.

69. Ibid., p. 225.

70. Ibid., pp. 268–69.

71. Ibid., p. 290.

72. Ibid., pp. 294–95.

73. Yitzhak Levtov, “Kismah shel ha-optziah ha-levantinit,” Davar Apr. 28, 1995, p. 13.

74. For example, Rif‘at Sayyid Ahmad, Wasf misr bi’l-‘ibri: tafasil al-ikhtiraq al-isra’ili li’l-‘aql al misri (Cairo: Sina li’l-Nashr, 1989); ‘Arfa ‘Abduh ‘Ali, Gitu isra’ili fi al-qahira (Cairo: Maktabat Madbuli, 1990).

75. Yosef Algazi, “Gam ha-gvul shelanu sagur,” ha-Aretz, Mar. 17, 1996.

76. Ibid.