Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By richards on December 2, 2014

By Adam Entous

Maj. Avichay Adraee, an Israeli army spokesman, was taken aback when he received a message from a mysterious man writing from the heart of Syria's bloody civil war.

The man, a Sunni Muslim who created a Facebook page called "Jobar Synagogue," said he was on a mission to preserve his town's crown jewel, a centuries-old religious site venerated by the three major religions. Merely contacting the Israelis was an act that could have put his life in danger.

"If we do not move fast to protect this historical heritage, it will be lost forever," he wrote to the Israeli major, via Facebook.

The exchange last year was part of a frantic mission to rescue the synagogue, located in the battle-worn Damascus suburb of Jobar. The man behind the Facebook page, who uses the nom de guerre Abbas Abu Suleiman, got the attention of rabbis in Israel and New York, Syrian exiles in Washington and a Manhattan diamond-district salesman who visited the synagogue as a boy.

Mr. Suleiman hoped the Jewish community would intervene with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad not only to save the site, but to halt the bombardment of his hometown. Safeguarding a part of Syria's multicultural religious heritage, he hoped, might help the country rebuild whenever the war was over.

Maj. Adraee gets as many as 18,000 Facebook messages each day, many berating him for Israel's policies toward its neighbors. After receiving Mr. Suleiman's plea, he didn't know what to think. Was this man an ally? An opportunist? He replied to the Facebook message with a question mark.

Others contacted by Mr. Suleiman had a similar reaction. Jewish leaders on two continents worried about, among other things, whether intervening would endanger the tiny community of aging Jews remaining in Syria.

This account of Mr. Suleiman's quest is based on interviews with him on Skype, transcripts of his Facebook chats and discussions with Muslim and Jewish leaders in the U.S., Syria and Israel. Mr. Suleiman asked The Wall Street Journal not to disclose his real name.

The Eliyahu Hanavi Synagogue in Jobar has been part of Jewish life in Syria for centuries. An inscription that for years was part of the synagogue's wall described it as the shrine of the Prophet Eliyahu Hanavi since 720 B.C. The synagogue has been rebuilt many times over the years, according to the chief rabbi of the Syrian Jews, Avraham Hamra.

More:

One Muslim's Quest to Save a Revered Syrian Synagogue

Category: Synagogue
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