'Lost tribe' members can settle in Israel after converting to orthodox Judaism
About 700 of India's Bnei Menashe Jews - reputedly descended from one of the lost tribes of Israel - have been formally converted to orthodox Judaism, giving them the right to return to their 'homeland' of Israel.
The conversions, about 500 of which were carried out yesterday, came after Shlomo Amar, Israel's Sephardic chief rabbi, announced in April that he accepted the Bnei Menashe, or the 'Children of Manasseh', as one of the 10 lost tribes.
India's 9,000 Bnei Menashe Jews are now eagerly awaiting conversion and the chance to escape the impoverished northeastern states of Mizoram and Manipur.
A Beit Din, or rabbinical court, arrived in India last week on a mission to convert the Bnei Menashe.
Last week in Mizoram, about 200 were converted. Lyon Fanai, a Bnei Menashe leader there, said: 'This time only a small population of us are being converted in India. But Beit Din will return to India again to conduct similar conversions in future. We all will finally get the right of aliyah [return to Israel] and settle in our long-lost homeland.'
David Haokip, 23, a Bnei Menashe youth leader who embraced Judaism five years ago and goes to the synagogue to pray three times every day, said: 'When we knew we were recognised by the Chief Rabbinate it was the happiest news of my life. Now the Beit Din will change my life [by] selecting me for the conversion, I hope.'
Mr Haokip will face the Beit Din in Churachandpur today. He hopes to settle in Israel and join the defence force there.
Shavei Israel, a Jerusalem-based group that has been trying to locate descendants of lost Jewish tribes and bring them to Israel, believes that all Chins in Myanmar, Mizos in Mizoram and Kukis in Manipur - three prominent tribes of the region - are descendants of Manasseh, a son of the patriarch Joseph.
According to the organisation, there are up to 2 million Bnei Menashe in the hilly regions of Myanmar and northeastern India.
After an Assyrian invasion around 722BC, Jewish tradition says, 10 tribes from Israel were enslaved. Later the tribes fled Assyria and wandered through Afghanistan, Tibet and China.
Around AD100, one group moved southward from China and settled around northeastern India and Myanmar. These Chin-Mizo-Kuki people, who speak Tibeto-Burman dialects and resemble Mongols, are believed to be the Bnei Menashe.
After almost a decade-long investigation that included DNA tests of the people, Israeli authorities became convinced that the Jews of northeastern India are one of the lost tribes.
In Mizoram, about 1,000 Bnei Menashe applied for conversion last week, but more than 800 were rejected. In Manipur, 2,000 applied, but 500 were to be converted.
L. Thanggur, a church leader in Churachandpur, said conversion to Judaism virtually guarantees a passport of Israel. 'They are economic refugees. If they had better employment and income prospects here, they would have never dreamed of going to Israel and jostled for this conversion.'
