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Jewish News Platform Acknowledges Biafran Jews

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A Jewish Newsplatform The Times Of Israel has acknowledged the Biafran Jews planned sit-at-home order on May 30th marking the Biafra Day celebration.

Biafra agitators, the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, and the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra, MASSOB had called on citizens of the South-East to stay at home on May 30 to observe their anniversary and honour their fallen heroes who lost their lives in the struggle for a sovereign state of Biafra.

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Fifty years ago, the Igbo people of south-east Nigeria seceded, declaring an independent Republic of Biafra and sparking a brutal civil war that left about one million people dead.

 With tension building up in the south-east states following Tuesday’s sit at home order, the Jewish tabloid notes that Biafra remains an extremely sensitive subject in Nigeria. They wrote:

“Nigeria on Tuesday marks 50 years since the declaration of an independent Republic of Biafra plunged the country into a civil war, amid renewed tensions and fresh calls for a separate state.

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“The main pro-independence groups — the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), and the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) — have called for a day of reflection.

“Among the IPOB are one of the largest ethnic groups in the central African nation, the Igbo people, and among them is a small minority of practicing Jews, who believe they are descended from the tribes of Israel.

“During the last 30 years or so, many Igbo Jews have moved to match their tradition of Jewish descent with the practice of rabbinic Judaism, the learning of Hebrew, observance of kosher dietary laws and observance of Jewish holidays. Many Igbo Jews are passionately Zionist.

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“In 1970, after nearly three years of fighting, Biafran soldiers, who were outnumbered 10 to one by federal troops and under-equipped, laid down their arms.

“The conflict caused an estimated million deaths, many of them by starvation after the secessionist region was blockaded.

“With surrender went their dreams of a separate state for the Igbo people, who are the majority in the southeast.

“Half a century later, Biafra remains an extremely sensitive subject in Nigeria.”

It is widely believed among the Igbos that they are descendants of the Jews. The argument for Jewish ancestry first gained international attention in the 18th century following the arrival of Christian missionaries in Igbo land who discovered many cultural similarities between the Igbo and the Jewish traditions.

One of the missionaries, George Thomas Basden, even wrote a book on these cultural comparisons and in it proposed that the word ‘Igbo evolved as a corruption of the word ‘hebrew’.

Asides cultural resemblances, some historians claim it is not improbable that some of the tribes of Israel migrated to parts of Africa after the Assyrians invaded Israel’s northern kingdom in the eighth century B.C. and forced 10 tribes into exile.

From generation to generation, some Igbo have passed down various versions of a migration story framed around Jacob, a patriarch of Judaism.

A popular version of the narrative holds that Gad, the seventh son of Jacob, had three sons who settled in present-day southeastern Nigeria, which is predominantly inhabited by the Igbo. Those sons, Eri, Arodi and Areli (as mentioned in the book of Genesis), are said to have fathered clans, established kingdoms and founded towns still in existence in southeastern Nigeria today, including Owerri, Umuleri, Arochukwu and Aguleri.