Syria has a history that dates back to Biblical times, and its Jews have survived the countless empires that have conquered it. At their peak, the Jewish quarters in Damascus and Aleppo once boasted over 20 synagogues and an estimated quarter-million Jews, primarily a mix of Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews.

These communities persisted into the Ottoman period, but began to wane around the latter half of the 19 century after the completion of the Suez Canal, and the resulting declining commercial importance of Damascus and Aleppo as major Middle Eastern trade routes. In World War I, the Ottomans lost control of their empire, and required Jewish men to serve in the army to fight in the Balkan Wars. Overnight, Jewish men were secretly being sent away to avoid military service and the population largely emigrated. There were attacks against Jews, who remained in the Syria after World War I.

After the birth of the State of Israel in 1948, persecution of Jews remaining in Syria was common. The Muslim dhimmi laws were strictly enforced. The new government imposed restrictions on Jews reminiscent of those enacted across Europe prior to the Holocaust less than ten years earlier: Jews were not allowed to work for the government or banks, could not acquire telephones or driver’s licenses, and were barred from buying and selling property.

Several Jewish bank accounts were frozen or liquidated, an airport road was built over an ancient Jewish cemetery in Damascus, and many Jewish schools were ordered closed. Teaching Hebrew was forbidden, and a Mossawi (“Jew” in Arabic) stamp was imprinted in big red letters on all Syrian Jews’ identification cards.

Those Jews who were permitted to travel for business purposes could not travel with family members because the Syrian government feared that they would flee. Jews who tried to leave the country often tortured or killed.

The Eli Cohen spying affair in 1965 and Six Day War in 1967 caused further reprisals and attacks Jews and their property. After the Yom Kippur War in 1973, the Syrian Jews remained isolated. In the 1970s, Judy Feld Carr started her covert escape operation to help these Jews escape. Through bribes and escapes, she was able to arrange to smuggle out exactly 3,228 Jews. In 1992, there was also an airlift operation organized by the New York Syrian Jewish community, in which as many as 5,000 Syrian Jews were flown out of the country en masse in secret. Today there are probably less than a dozen old Jews left.