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Wednesday, March 05, 2014

Egyptians feel threatened by history book about Egyptian Jews

Haaretz reports:

Fortuna Cassuto, a beautiful young woman from Alexandria, Egypt, worked as the house model at a prestigious fashion house. The plant made clothes for Queen Farida, the wife of King Farouk, as well as luxury lines for Egypt’s well to do.

...Thanks to her activity in the Zionist movement Hehalutz Hatzair, Cassuto met her future husband, from the Masri-Mishori family. They celebrated their engagement at a performance of the Palestine Symphony Orchestra conducted by Toscanini. In March 1946 they married in Alexandria’s Eliyahu Hanavi Synagogue.

On the day the State of Israel was declared, May 14, 1948, Fortuna’s husband was arrested; she was pregnant at the time

...The story of the Masri-Mishori family appears in the new book “The Golden Age of the Jews from Egypt – Uprooting and Revival in Israel,“ edited by Ada Aharoni, who researches the history of Egyptian Jewry.

The book records the destruction of the Egyptian Jewish community through the stories of 73 Egyptian Jews, who were expelled from their homeland at the outbreak of the Israeli War of Independence.

...Another key figure in the book is Guido Asher, a star of the Egyptian national basketball team. Asher, born in 1916, began his career at the Alexandria sports club. He later became a star of the local Maccabi team and was invited to play for the Egyptian national team.

He was the pride of Egypt's Jews, was the best player on the team, and was showered with praise by the Egyptian press, wrote his son, Itzik Asher. He led the Egyptian team to victories in the European championships.

According to his son, Asher also sailed and rode a motorcycle; at 32 he was killed in a motorcycle accident. “Mourning in Egyptian sports: Basketball has lost a first-class player,” wrote a newspaper of the period.
The book sounds very interesting.

This book is mentioned in Egypt's Korabia website, but it assumes a dangerous motive for the book's release.

Here is how they describe this book:

Israel continues its attempts to steal Egyptian history through stories published about Jewish achievements that have occurred in Egypt and considered as part of the history, surprisingly .
A new book published in Israel under the name of "The Golden Age of the Jews from Egypt," talks about the tales of the Zionist people and their families during their presence in Egypt and before their migration, in order to demonstrate that Jews have had control over all areas of success in Egypt, artistically , socially and athletically.

The funny part was that last year an Egyptian filmmaker made a documentary about the Jews of Egypt that, by all accounts, was well received by most Egyptians (after it was first banned and then allowed.)