Learn about Sephardic Jews here.

Mizrahi Jews come from Middle Eastern ancestry. Their earliest communities date from Late Antiquity, and the oldest and largest of these communities were in modern Iraq (Babylonia), Iran (Persia), and Yemen.

Mizrahi Jews - from Edot Hamizrach, Hebrew for “Jewish communities of the [Middle] East” -  descend from ancient indigenous Jewish settlements outside Israel that existed for more than 2,500 years.

Mizrahi Jews are often confused with Sephardic Jews, who following the Spanish Inquisitions, were integrated into preexisting Mizrahi communities in the Middle East and North Africa.

The oldest and largest of the original Mizrahi communities were in modern Iraq (Babylonia) and Iraqi Kurdistan (Assyria), Iran (Persia), and Yemen. Other Mizrahi communities include Syrian Jews, Egyptian Jews, Lebanese Jews, Georgian Jews, Mountain Jews from Dagestan and Azerbaijan, and Bukharan Jews from Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.

After the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, in the 1950s and 1960s Arab governments either expelled their Jewish populations, or anti-Jewish actions caused many Mizrahi Jews to leave.

Today, most Mizrahi Jews live either in Israel or the United States. In their new homes, Mizrahi Jews are more likely than other Jews to maintain particularly strong ties with others from their family’s nation of origin. It is common, for example, to find a specifically Persian or Bukharan synagogue. Mizrahi Jews are also not united by a single Jewish language; each subgroup spoke its own tongue.

Mizrahi Jews largely arrived in Los Angeles between 1948 and the late 1970s, during this mass exodus from Middle Eastern countries.

More than 500,000 settled in Israel and 200,000 settled in Europe and North America, including Los Angeles. In 1979, after the fall of the shah’s regime and Ayatollah Khomeini’s takeover, the vast majority of Iran’s 80,000-100,000 Jews left the country, which had been home to the world’s oldest continuous Diaspora community. Approximately 30,000 moved to Los Angeles, which became the world’s largest Iranian Jewish community outside Israel.

Longstanding Mizrahi congregations include Sephardic Magen David, originally founded by Syrian and Egyptian Jews; Kahal Joseph, by Iraquis; Eretz Cultural Center and Nessah Congregation, by Iranians; Adat Yeshurun Valley Sephardic Congregation, Em Habanim, Pinto Congregation and Baba Sale Congregation, by Moroccan and North African Jews; and Tiferet Teman, by those from Yemen.

Reference Source: My Jewish Learning, Stephen Sass

Top right image "BEGIN MAJESTY" Chloe Pourmorady Ensemble