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Syrian-American cantor Henry Hamra on the Central Synagogue of Aleppo, as soon as the middle of a thriving Jewish group within the northern Syrian metropolis. The Syrian authorities transferred management of Jewish websites in December to Hamra’s Jewish heritage group.
Jane Arraf/NPR
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Jane Arraf/NPR
ALEPPO, Syria — Many years after virtually your complete Syrian Jewish group left the nation, Henry Hamra of Brooklyn, N.Y., stands on the metallic door of a small synagogue on this historic Syrian metropolis, actually holding the keys to a potential return of Jewish residents.
Hamra was 15 years previous when his household left Damascus within the early Nineties after the Assad regime lifted a ban on journey. Most of the Syrian Jews have been unable to promote their properties earlier than they left. Among the properties ended up occupied by different Syrians whereas the federal government took cost of the synagogues and colleges.
In December, simply days earlier than Hamra’s go to to Aleppo, the Syrian authorities licensed a Jewish heritage basis he leads, transferring management of Jewish spiritual properties from the federal government to the group.
The group may even assist restore personal property appropriated when the Jewish group left to its Jewish house owners.
Henry Hamra unlocks the door of a synagogue in Aleppo, Syria, deserted after virtually your complete remaining Jewish group left the nation within the early Nineties. Hamra and his father, the final rabbi to go away Syria, are working with the Syrian authorities to revive property to Jewish residents.
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“What we’re making an attempt to do is come see the properties, come see the synagogues and see what is the situation,” says Hamra, now 48. “I am calling on all of the individuals who have properties to come back and we’ll assist them discover them and provides them again to them.”
A outstanding journey over the previous 12 months largely engineered by Syrian-American activist Mouaz Moustafa has led Hamra to today, taking custody of the keys to Jewish properties by the newest in a sequence of caretakers over many years and envisioning a time when Syrian Jews would possibly return.
On Hamra’s first go to to Syria together with his father final 12 months, Syrian authorities officers pledged assist in restoring properties again to their Jewish house owners.
In a wrinkle of historical past, the brand new Syrian president restoring Jewish rights, Ahmed al-Sharaa, is a onetime al-Qaida commander who renounced the militant Islamist group’s ideology.
Aleppo, in northern Syria, had one of many greatest Jewish communities on this various however principally Arab nation — relationship again not less than 2,000 years.
Henry Hamra examines centuries-old tombstones of rabbis buried at Aleppo’s important synagogue whereas his son Joseph (left) says a prayer. For a whole lot of years, the synagogue held the oldest recognized surviving manuscript of the Hebrew Bible.
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Earlier than the creation of Israel in 1948, there have been an estimated 30,000 Jews in Syria. Syrian Jews in fashionable historical past have been capable of apply their religion however confronted the identical repressive insurance policies underneath the closed regime as different residents. When President Hafez al-Assad, underneath U.S. stress, lifted journey restrictions particularly for Jewish residents starting in 1992, most of them left completely.
Hamra’s father, Yusuf Hamra, was the final rabbi to go away Syria. With out somebody to carry out ceremonies, Jewish spiritual life right here died.
Now, solely six Syrian Jews — all aged — are recognized to nonetheless dwell within the nation, says Hamra. When Rabbi Hamra made his first journey to Damascus final 12 months since leaving three many years in the past, there weren’t sufficient Jews even together with his visiting delegation to have the ability to maintain prayers.
Henry Hamra examines spiritual texts in a small Jewish faculty in Aleppo, Syria.
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On this journey, Henry Hamra has introduced his 21-year-old son, Joseph, with him.
Hamra opens the door to a small synagogue with layers of mud coating the heavy burgundy velvet curtains. Subsequent to it’s a small faculty. Dim mild filtering by way of grime-coated home windows reveals stacks of desks piled up on scuffed wood tables.
The synagogue is in an Aleppo neighborhood closely broken in Syria’s 14-year-long civil conflict. That battle ended when opposition fighters toppled authoritarian President Bashar al-Assad in December 2024.
Subsequent door, the proprietor of a tiny neighboring plumbing provide store says he’s comfortable that Syria helps Jewish residents return.
The view from the ladies’s part at Aleppo’s Central Synagogue, often known as al-Bandara Synagogue. The iron grates on the second ground allowed ladies to attend prayers with out being seen by male worshippers.
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“They have been our buddies,” says Abu Alaa al-Muhandis, 75. “We hope they may come again, they may convey life again to town.”
Whereas Israel, which has seized extra Syrian territory and launched common airstrikes, is controversial in Syria, Syrian American Jews are considered for probably the most half merely as Syrian.
“At all times in Syria you realize we had church buildings, synagogues and mosques collectively in the identical space as a result of folks used to dwell collectively, as neighbors,” says Maissa Kabbani, the founding father of a Syrian justice group. She factors out a broken mosque near the synagogue.
Throughout city, Hamra is proven for the primary time the jewel of Aleppo’s once-thriving Jewish group — the Central Synagogue, often known as the al-Bandara Synagogue, named after the neighborhood it is positioned in.
The size of the 1,500-year-old synagogue speaks to a as soon as giant and vibrant Jewish group in a metropolis that for many centuries was a thriving commerce heart.
Inside, stone arches prime Roman columns overlooking courtyard after courtyard. There are marble-tile flooring and an ornate ladies’s part on the second ground, the place ladies and ladies might take part in prayers behind ornamental iron screens with out being seen.
In New York, Hamra’s household is within the menswear enterprise. In spiritual life he’s a cantor — a clergy member who leads the congregation in prayers and music.
Hamra wanders by way of the open areas of the synagogue, stepping up onto an elevated marble platform the place cantors have stood over the centuries.
“Wow,” he says repeatedly, seemingly at a lack of phrases over his environment.
The central synagogue was additionally for a whole lot of years the house to a Hebrew manuscript generally known as the Aleppo Codex. The 1,000-year-old manuscript is the oldest recognized surviving copy of the Hebrew Bible. The codex was smuggled to Israel within the Fifties though solely partially intact.
Syrian President Sharaa has been eager to reassure the West that minorities will likely be protected within the new Syria. The Syrian authorities, in saying that it was handing over Jewish spiritual properties, stated it was an indication that each one minorities have been welcome.
The varsity and adjoining synagogue have been deserted in any case Aleppo Jews emigrated within the early Nineties.
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In Washington, D.C., the Syrian Jewish group represented by the Hamras, working with Mouaz Moustafa’s Syrian Emergency Job Pressure, have proved efficient advocates for lifting U.S. sanctions towards Syria. The U.S. eliminated the final of the devastating commerce sanctions in December.
Mouaz Moustafa, the manager director of the Syrian Emergency Job Pressure, speaks throughout an interview in Washington, D.C., on Dec. 19, 2024.
Celal Gunes/Anadolu through Getty Photographs
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Celal Gunes/Anadolu through Getty Photographs
That advocacy has generated controversy amongst some Syrian-American Jews who consider that Sharaa and his authorities can’t be trusted to guard Jews or different Syrian minorities.
“It’ll take lots of time for Syria to come back again,” says Hamra, citing an absence of electrical energy, working water and in locations like Aleppo, safety.
In Damascus and Aleppo, the small delegation is accompanied by younger Syrian authorities fighters with rifles. Some ask to pose for selfies with Hamra.
Hamra grew up talking Arabic at house. He refers to Syria as “the previous nation.”
He says whereas it’s a stretch now to check Syrian Jews transferring right here, he says many would cherish the chance to go to.
“There’s lots of issues we used to do over right here we do not do within the U.S. — just like the interplay with folks,” he says. “Syrian individuals are very loving folks and so they’re very welcoming.”
His son Joseph says he cannot cease smiling.
“You see my face?” he asks. “I’ve by no means had this face in my life. It is loopy.”
Joseph Hamra says, for his half, he can envision youthful Syrian Jews coming to dwell.
“I am planning on making a visit with all my buddies quickly to see all their roots, like the place their mother and father and grandparents grew up, the place a few of their grandparents are buried,” he says. “They might 100% suppose behind their heads, ‘Wow think about constructing one thing right here.'”
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