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The same phrase said inalmost the same place underdifferent circumstancescould have a very differentmeaning. We recently

returned from a trip to Ethiopia wherewe visited the Adenite Jews of AddisAbaba and the remnants of the BetaIsrael/Falash Mura community inGondar. We had “been there, donethat” before, but this trip, as each tripends up being, was unique. The peoplewe met and the activity we saw trulyinspired us.

Malka Dessi also just returned from atrip to Ethiopia. She is originally fromEthiopia, has been living here for 17years and this was her first trip back.Our paths had crossed in Ethiopiamore than two decades ago and againon this trip, but we were all in very dif-ferent circumstances this time around.

Our initial contact with EthiopianJews was in 1983 when, as college stu-dents, we received an urgent tele-phone call from a Jewish studentorganization that needed immediatehelp. We were told that a youngEthiopian Jewish couple had beensmuggled out of Ethiopia via Sudanand were on a speaking tour of univer-sities in the northeastern US. Theirdriver/escort had to leave suddenlyand if they could not find a replace-ment to accompany them, the tourwould have to be canceled.

At six the next morning, we were ona flight to Providence, Rhode Island.When we arrived at the motel, we didnot immediately find them, but as wewalked around the motel a youngblack couple approached and with ourback turned to them, one of us sort offurtively muttered “shalom.” Theirimmediate response of “shalom ale-ichem” told us we had found our cou-ple and ignited a relationship for uswith the Jews of Ethiopia that contin-ues until today.

PRIOR TO that whirlwind speakingtour, we knew relatively little aboutEthiopia or its Jews. In facilitatingtheir speaking tour, we had an on-the-job crash course in the subject, butrealized that there was ever so muchmore to learn and do. We made con-tact with the North American Confer-ence on Ethiopian Jewry and its hero-ic director, Barbara Ribikove Gordon,and signed up for a mission toEthiopia in 1987. Then we went on asecond mission in 1988. The Israeliswere then trying to get the people out.

Others had trekked to Sudan, a trekthat cost many lives.

In those days the dictatorial Mengis-tu government was oppressing thenation and our people in particular.The Jews were afraid of torture andimprisonment. We arrived in BaharDar, a city on the southern end of LakeTana, having been briefed to try tofind a certain Sheffero Dessi andinform him that the “bus stop inSudan” – evidently a known collectionpoint for the refugees by the Israelis –“was no longer active.” We went to asimple house with a dirt floor that wewere told was his house, and it wasdefinitely a house and not a tukul, tra-ditional straw hut, like the Jews in thevillages in Gondar lived in.

On the mostly bare wall was aposter of a scantily clad whitewoman, which, as was evident fromthe Hebrew writing, they had clearlyhung up because it was from anIsraeli newspaper. We knew we hadreached our destination. Shefferoinvited us to his house the next day,and we met part of his family andexchanged addresses. The oldestdaughter had already made her way

to Israel, but the other eight childrenwere still with the parents. We partedways with “lehitraot ba’aretz” – maywe see each other in the Land ofIsrael. We knew we were headedstraight to Israel, a land we knewwell. For them, Israel was a distantdream, a religious aspiration, anunknown place that they had neverseen and knew nothing about.

Ari Greenspan made aliya shortlythereafter; Sheffero and family camelater, piecemeal. Four of the childrenescaped to Sudan and were airlifted out in1990, while the parents and other chil-dren came as part of Operation Solomonin 1991, at which point Greenspanreconnected with them. Over the years,Greenspan, as a dentist, has treated Shef-faro’s son, and just two years ago, hehelped an Ethiopian mother of two withsome dental care and totally by chanceshe turned out to be Sheffero’s oldestdaughter.

When Ari Zivotofsky came on aliyaseveral years later, he moved to BeitShemesh and Greenspan informed himthat Sheffero Dessi and family livedthere, and he visited them with his chil-dren.

WHEN WE decided to return toEthiopia in July, we called Sheffero tosee if he had any relatives still there.To our surprise, his youngest daughterTziona answered the house phone andtold us that her mother, Malka, was atthat moment back in Ethiopia visitinga brother she had not seen in decades.We knew then that we had to meet herand close this circle of 25 years. Whatbrought her back to Ethiopia? We weretold that she had a brother who had“disappeared” in Sudan and had nowbeen “found,” and it was he whomMalka had returned to visit.

Finding Malka would be much easierthis time – we all had our cellphoneswith us in this more modern and freeEthiopia. The family reunion was tak-ing place in Gondar, and we told herwhat day we were scheduled to arrivethere. We called Malka from the AddisAbaba airport after our 6 a.m. flightwas postponed to 10 a.m., and contin-ued to update her as the Air Ethiopiaflight was continually delayed untiltakeoff for the 45-minute flight finallyoccurred at 4 p.m.

Arriving in Gondar as it was gettingdark, we dropped our bags at our hoteland headed immediately to the citycenter, excited to meet her and herlong-lost brother in the hotel wherethey were staying. The hotel was notfancy and there was no electricity thatevening due to a power outage, analmost nightly occurrence. The storywe had heard was that her brother haddisappeared 20 years ago in Sudan andhad not been heard from since. Sud-denly he appeared after being releasedfrom a Sudanese prison and she hadgone to meet him. Yet when wearrived at the hotel, we saw her with ateenager whom she introduced as herbrother.

We were temporarily confused untilshe clarified that she had come to seenot one but two long-lost brothers.Her parents, who are no longer alive,had separated when she was young.Her mother had remarried, and it wasthis son who she had known and whohad disappeared in Sudan. He hadspent a year in a Sudanese jail, twoyears in an Egyptian jail and thenmany more years in Sudan. Finally,last year he had returned to Ethiopia,and they had now reunited. However,we missed that reunion which hadtaken place several days earlier inAddis Ababa.

Her father had also remarried, andhad given Malka a brother – theteenager we saw her with and whomshe had never previously met.

WE ASSUMED that for her this visit toEthiopia must have been like cominghome. She speaks the language, knowsthe customs and has family. We won-dered whether she would be happy tobe back. Might she have regrets abouthaving left and moving to new chal-lenges in Israel?

The answer was obvious from themoment we saw each other. She wasthrilled to see us, but so homesick forIsrael that it was painful. Her new 15-year-old brother sat by her side notwanting to let go of her. She, however,wanted nothing but to go home – toBeit Shemesh.

So there we were, closing an amazingcircle of life. Having been there 21years ago to try to help people escapethe oppression of Ethiopia and get tothe Holy Land, we now met by choice,both lucky tourists visiting a spectacu-lar but sad place.

As we said good-bye in Gondar, wesadly left her to her obvious lonelinessand despair. We asked her when shewas going to Israel and she answeredvery sorrowfully that it was two moreweeks. The two weeks she had leftwere going to be tough. When weasked her how it was for her, sheresponded that she loved Israel andthat it was the best thing that had hap-pened to her. Her family’s absorptionhas not been without its difficulties,but they are glad that they are inIsrael.

Her brothers in Ethiopia have noconnection with Judaism while herfamily in Israel is in close contact withthe Ethiopian kesim (religious leaders)and although they are not religious inthe Western sense, they feel a connec-tion to Judaism.

Her trip was difficult in manyregards: financially, leaving the family,having to meet and then leave herbrothers, but she felt it was importantto go. The time in Ethiopia was evenmore difficult that expected, and sherescheduled and went home less thana week later.

When we parted it was with smilesand the wish of “lehitraot ba’aretz” –this time knowing that we all livedthere and were all headed home in ashort time. And indeed, several weeksafter returning we met again, this timein Israel.

Ethiopia revisitedTwo friends close circlesin a more than 25-year

relationship withEthiopian Jews

FAMILY REUNION. (From left) Ari Greenspan, Malka Dessi and her newly found brother, and Ari Zivotofsky in Ethiopia.

THE DESSIS in Israel, 2000.

THE DESSIS in Ethiopia, 1988.

• By ARI GREENSPAN

and ARI Z. ZIVOTOFSKY

Dysfunctional government

Israel could not have asked for a more positive begin-ning to US Vice President Joe Biden’s visit this week.Positive body language abounded, with all the requisite

hugs, warm gestures, smiles and general good vibes. There were verbalized emotions, such as the vice presi-

dent’s comment to President Shimon Peres that Israel“captured my heart.” Biden even made declarations withdiplomatic ramifications. The cornerstone of the Israeli-USrelationship, he said on Tuesday, “is our absolute, totalunvarnished commitment to Israel’s security,” and thenmanaged to top even that with the adamant declarationthat “there is no space between the US and Israel when itcomes to Israel’s security.”

After almost a year of distance – most notably contrast-ed with President Barack Obama’s June 2009 Cairo speechthat focused on reconciliation with Islam – the Biden trip,with its private meetings aimed principally at coordinat-ing strategy for thwarting Iran’s nuclear drive, was turningout to be everything that an embattled, nervous Jewishnation could dream of.

As Israeli Apartheid Week draws to a close, it sometimesseems that the only real friend Israel has in the entireworld is the good old US of A, and the Biden visit was con-firmation of that partnership. By sundown Tuesday, itwould have been fitting to note that on another Tuesday,the third day of creation, God said “and it was good”twice.

But then it happened. A three-year chain of bureaucrat-ic events climaxed to spectacularly damaging effect. In astaggering example of diplomatic obtuseness, the InteriorMinistry’s Jerusalem Regional Planning and ConstructionCommission announced the approval of 1,600 additionalhousing units in Ramat Shlomo, a haredi neighborhood of20,000 in northeast Jerusalem – inside the sovereign citylimits, but squarely over the pre-1967 Green Line.

Safeguards that some previous governments had put inplace to ensure the careful handling of such sensitiveissues were plainly not in effect this time. Interior Minis-ter Eli Yishai (Shas), preoccupied with a coalition crisisover conversion policy legislation, said he was notinformed of the decision, nor would he have expected tobe. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu had evidentlyfailed to make it clear that he wished to be informed ofany such developments, and thus was not alerted ahead ofthe announcement.

Biden and his wife Jill arrived over an hour late to dinnerwith Netanyahu and his wife Sarah on Tuesday night. Andwhen they finally did show up, they brought with themwhat constituted a major league castigation. “I condemnthe decision by the government of Israel to advance plan-ning for new housing units in east Jerusalem,” Biden said,in a statement released during dinner. “The substance andtiming of the announcement, particularly with the launch-ing of proximity talks, is precisely the kind of step thatundermines the trust we need right now and runs counterto the constructive discussions that I’ve had here in Israel.”

SUCH RIGHT-hand-not-knowing-what-the-left-hand-is-doing blunders strike a blow to Israel’s image, and a blowon more substantive levels too.

For a start, the Netanyahu government looks complete-ly incompetent. If the announcement on Ramat Shlomohad been a calculated, coherent decision aimed at torpe-doing the fledgling “proximity talks”, or aimed at express-ing an unshakable commitment to the fast-growing hare-di population desperately in need of housing, its merits orfailings could have been legitimately discussed.

But the reality is much more prosaic – and worrying. Theexpansion of Ramat Shlomo accords with broad govern-ment policy. Differently timed, and ideally quietlyexplained to Washington ahead of time, it might haveprompted public displeasure from the United States – thatthe administration had tried and failed to persuadeNetanyahu to extend the settlement-building moratoriumto east Jerusalem – but likely no more than that.

Instead, because of sheer ineptitude, the timing of theannouncement immediately threatened the “proximitytalks” in which Netanyahu has stressed Israel has a pro-found interest. It united the Palestinians, the Arab worldand much of the international community in a chorus ofanti-Israel condemnation.

And most unhappily of all, it embarrassed our mostimportant ally at a time when this ally, as represented byBiden, was making a heartfelt effort to improve relationsand assure Israel of its abiding support.

It seem fair to assume that, in the long run, the trulydeep and significant bonds between our two countries willendure. The shared values and interests, many of themencapsulated in the commitment to freedom and democ-racy, plainly outweigh even significant missteps like thisone. But to attain these common goals requires avoidingserious mistakes that embarrass our friends and strength-en our enemies. To attain these common goals requiresprofound trust between allies.

Now Israel must set about rebuilding that trust.