This extraordinary history of the Falashas, the Black Jews of Ethiopia, is chronicled by the former Israeli ambassador to Ethiopia. Naim also recounts the rescue mission in 1991 that delivered them to the safety of Israel. 8-page full-color photo insert with b&w photos throughout.

Five friends are in a race against time in this action-adventure story involving ancient tribal artifacts that hold the fate of the universe in the balance. None of these trailblazers imagined their ordinary parents as scientists on a secret mission. But when their parents go missing, they are forced into unfathomable circumstances and learn of a history that is best left unknown, for they are catalysts in an ancient score that must be settled. As the chaos unfolds, opportunities arise that involve cracking codes and anticipating their next moves. This book unfolds sturdy, accurate scientific facts and history knowledge where readers will surely become participants.

"In 1977, Israel's Mossad spy agency was given an assignment from former Prime Minister Menachem Begin to rescue thousands of Ethiopian Jewish refugees in Sudan and "deliver them" in the Jewish state. No stranger to action in enemy countries, the agency established a covert forward base in a deserted holiday village in Sudan, and deployed a handful of operatives to launch and oversee the exodus of the refugees to the Promised Land, by sea and by air, in the early 1980s. Gad Shimron, the author of this book, was one of their number. Shimron offers a thrilling firsthand account of how the operation was put in place, and how the Mossad team in Sudan brought it off, despite great personal risk, running a partying vacation spot for wealthy tourists by day as they stole through the Sudanese desert to rescue desperate refugees by night"--

The Myth of the Twelve Tribes of Israel is the first study to treat the history of claims to an Israelite identity as an ongoing historical phenomenon from biblical times to the present. By treating the Hebrew Bible's accounts of Israel as one of many efforts to construct an Israelite history, rather than source material for later legends, Andrew Tobolowsky brings a long-term comparative approach to biblical and nonbiblical “Israelite” histories. In the process, he sheds new light on how the structure of the twelve tribes tradition enables the creation of so many different visions of Israel, and generates new questions: How can we explain the enduring power of the myth of the twelve tribes of Israel? How does “becoming Israel” work, why has it proven so popular, and how did it change over time? Finally, what can the changing shape of Israel itself reveal about those who claimed it?

Funny, raw, dark, sometimes outrageous, the twenty-five contributors to Lost Tribe explore themes such as conflicted identities, sexual fetishes, religious intolerance, and even the troubled legacy of the Holocaust to create a stirring picture of contemporary Jewish life. Lost Tribe features stories and commentary from a brilliant mixture of critically acclaimed and emerging writers. Steve Almond Aimee Bender Gabriel Brownstein Judy Budnitz Nathan Englander Jonathan Safran Foer Myla Goldberg Ehud Havazelet Dara Horn Rachel Kadish Gloria DeVidas Kirchheimer Binnie Kirshenbaum Joan Leegant Michael Lowenthal Ellen Miller Tova Mirvis Peter Orner Jon Papernick Nelly Reifler Ben Schrank Suzan Sherman Gary Shteyngart Aryeh Lev Stollman Ellen Umansky Simone Zelitch

Two years before this story begins, the Liawep were living deep in the jungle of Papua, New Guinea, long forgotten by the outside world. Numbering seventy-nine men, women, and children, the tribe worshipped a mountain, dressed in leaves, and hid when planes flew overhead, believing them to be evil sanguma birds. Their discovery by a missionary hit the headlines in 1993. Galvanized by the reports of people living in Stone Age conditions, Edward Marriott set out to find the Liawep. Banned from visiting the tribe by the New Guinea government, he assembled his own ragtag patrol and ventured illegally into the wilderness in search of his quarry. Nothing could have prepared him for what he found or for the dramatic events that followed. A thrilling, superbly written adventure, The Lost Tribe is a memorable account of what happens when good intentions go awry, when rational man meets primal beliefs, and when a small, primitive people are ensnared by the predations of civilization.

Michael F. Robinson traces the rise and fall of the Hamitic Hypothesis, the theory that whites had lived in Africa since antiquity, which held sway in Europe and in Africa in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.