Rowman & Littlefield Lexington Books, December 2024, ISBN: 978-1-66694-070-1

THE YEMENITE CHILDREN AFFAIR: ETHNIC TENSION, IMMIGRATION AND PUBLIC RECORDS IN ISRAEL

Contributions by Dorit Weiss; Shifra Shvarts; Esther Meir-Glitzenstein; Dov Levitan; Adiya Shubi; Yechiel Michael Barilan; Roy Peled; Yaacov Lozowick; Avi Picard; Motti Inbari; Sariel Birnbaum and Nirit Ben Ari

This edited collection brings together leading scholars in their field to discuss the Yemenite Children Affair including the health crisis, the public demand for an investigation, and the public discourse surrounding it. The Yemenite Children Affair was a tragic health crisis in which about 1,000 babies and toddlers died between 1949 and 1954. In most cases, the parents did not witness the death of their children and did not attend their funerals. Over the years, rumors spread that the babies had not died but were kidnapped by the Israeli authorities and sold to childless Ashkenazi or Holocaust survivors in Israel and the United States.

These rumors eventually created a public demand for an investigation. The contributors to this book analyze the policy and health challenges surrounding immigration to Israel in the 1950s, Operation Magic Carpet, the archives on the Yemenite Children Affair and public discourse surrounding it, testimonies at commissions, among other topics. Scholars of Jewish studies, Israel studies, Middle Eastern studies, public health, and political science will find this book of particular interest.

For further details:
https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781666940718/The-Yemenite-Children-Affair-Ethnic-Tensions-Immigration-and-Public-Records-in-Israel

Motti Inbari is a professor of Jewish Studies at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke.