periwinkle blue
Posted on 05/06/2015 5:33:43 PM PDT by SJackson
Dorin Cioba the leader of three million Roma around the world, landed in Israel on Wednesday. Roma are widely known as Gypsies.
On his first visit to Israel, Cioba, who is president of the International Romani Union, plans to visit the Roma community in Jerusalem as well as the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.
The photographer Roni Ben-Ari invited Cioaba to Israel for the opening of her exhibit that documents the life of Gypsies in the city of Lugoj, Romania.
The exhibit opens on Thursday at the Museum of Israeli Art in Ramat Gan.
"This is the first time that I have the opportunity to see the Roma community in Israel, and I am excited to be in the Holy Land to unite with my people," Cioba said on Wednesday.
Gypsies were targeted by the Nazis during World War II and estimates of the number who were killed range between 220,000 to 1,500,000.
Gypsies in Israel
The community in Israel lives in crowded, dilapidated apartments around the Lion’s Gate in the Old City. Some Gypsies, priced out of the Old City, live in the Shuafat refugee camp in the capital’s north. There is another small community in the Gaza Strip.
The Gypsies are Muslim but do not identify as Arabs or Palestinians, a leader of the community told The Jerusalem Post in 2012. They have Jerusalem residency, but not citizenship, similar to the majority of east Jerusalem Arabs.
Jerusalem’s Gypsies trace their roots back 1,000 years to northern Iraq, where a powerful tribe known as the Bnei Murra lived. A bloody war with a neighboring tribe – according to legend, over the death of a beloved camel belonging to the daughter of the tribal chief – scattered the tribe across the world.
Some went to Europe, converted to Christianity, and became the Roma Gypsies. Others traveled across the Middle East and became Muslim.
Gypsies arrived in Jerusalem along with the Muslim conqueror Saladin in 1187, and fought against the Crusaders. The Gypsies stayed in the area, living in tents similar to the Beduin but as part of a separate tribe.
The Gypsies lived on the slopes of the Mount of Olives for hundreds of years, in what today is part of the A-Suware neighborhood.
Following the Six Day War, many Gypsies fled to Jordan. Others moved out of their tents into cramped apartments in the Old City. There are Gypsy populations in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Yemen and Iraq.
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Didn't know the Roma had any "centralized" leadership, as in "King". Didn't know they were native to Jerusalem. Didn't know there were large(?) numbers of Muslim Gypsies. I thought they were dispersed Indians (country), which I suppose doesn't conflict with arriving with Saladin.
I know this doesn't seem important, but with the erasure of cultures currently endemic in the Middle East, it is.
Is he there to demand land for his people?
“Is he there to demand land for his people?”
Give him Gaza.
Is he accompanied by six fat ladies ... two to distract, two to fight and two with full dresses stuffed with everything from clothes to washing machines ... ?
Doh....... they are making up the amusing horsehit as they go along. They will say whatever they think will placate their “marks”
If you throw a party for them count your silverware!!!
Sell them Syria for $24
King Of The Gypsies
First person I thought of was Bill Clinton.
....and even your fingers.
There is a detailed description of Gypsies in Sir Walter Scot’s book “Quentin Durward”.
I later looked it up and his description was about as good as any. He said they probably originated in Egypt tho they claim to be from Romania.
Have not read that. I always assumed they were eastern European. But probably based on movies. Egyptian would work. I will look up the book
Any thing not nailed down is bye-bye.
periwinkle blue
That’s the infamous gypsie Brad Pitt!! Lock Stock snatch etc
Bingo!!!
What about the Tramps and Thieves.
1971
Remember, periwinkle blue.
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