SYRIA - After Decades, Jews Visit Damascus
For the first time in three decades, Rabbi Joseph Hamra and his son Henry read from a Torah scroll in a synagogue in the heart of Syria’s capital Damascus, carefully passing their thumbs over the handwritten text as if still in awe they were back home.
The father and son fled Syria in the 1990s, after then-Syrian president Hafez al-Assad lifted a travel ban on the country’s historic Jewish community, which had faced decades of restrictions including on owning property or holding jobs.
The new authorities have said all of Syria’s communities will play a role in their country’s future. But incidents of religious intolerance and reports of conservative Islamists proselytizing in public have kept more secular-minded Syrians and members of minority communities on edge.
Henry Hamra, now aged 48, said Syria’s foreign ministry had now pledged to protect Jewish heritage.
Walking through the narrow passages of the Old City, a UNESCO-listed World Heritage Site, Henry and Joseph ran into their onetime neighbors—Palestinian Syrians—and later marveled at hand-painted Hebrew lettering at several synagogues.
“I want to see my kids come back and see this beautiful synagogue. It’s a work of art,” said Henry.
But some things were missing, he said, including a golden-lettered Torah from one of the synagogues that was now stored in a library in Israel, to where thousands of Syrian Jews fled throughout the 20th century.
-www.reuters.com, 19 February 2025
Arno's Commentary
Damascus is considered one of the world’s oldest cities, although not continuously occupied. From the Bible, we know that Tiglath-Pileser III destroyed Damascus (747-727 BC). Today, there are many voices within the theological world that hold to the future destruction of Damascus, based on Isaiah 17:1: “The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.” Fulfilled, or to be fulfilled? Based on our understanding, it was fulfilled. Even today, archaeologists have a difficult time accurately establishing some of the remnant foundations of the ancient city of Damascus.
For Jews visiting Damascus, it is a rediscovering of their roots.
Syrians are closely related to the Israelites; thus, it’s not surprising that they are bitter enemies of Israel. Here the words apply, “Family feuds are worse than war.” The future? “Whom the LORD of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel mine inheritance” (Isaiah 19:25).
Arno Froese is the executive director of Midnight Call Ministries and editor-in-chief of the acclaimed prophetic magazines Midnight Call and News From Israel. He has authored a number of well-received books, and has sponsored many prophecy conferences in the U.S., Canada, and Israel. His extensive travels have contributed to his keen insight into Bible prophecy, as he sees it from an international perspective.
