Israel is moving Lost Tribe Jews from India

Israel has approved a plan to take the last 5,800 Bnei Menashe Jews from Mizoram and Manipur in India's northeast to the Jewish country by 2030.

- BY S VENKAT NARAYAN

The Israeli government seeks to settle them primarily in Nof HaGalil and other towns in northern Galilee region in Israel that borders Lebanon. These Indians will be resettled in conflict-hit areas with a considerable Arab population to bolster security.

The move, Israel says, is aimed at resettling the Jewish population in the underdeveloped and sparsely populated region, which has also been affected by conflict, forcing many Israelis to flee.

This aim of the move is both religious repatriation, which will not only "Judaize" the Galilee, but also bolster national security in the Upper Galilee region by "strengthening the periphery", which has a significant Arab population.

The region has been heavily affected by conflict with Lebanon's Hezbollah, with tens of thousands of residents leaving the area in recent years, Germany's DW News reported.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the move "an important and Zionist decision that will also strengthen the North and the Galilee," The Times of Israel reported.

Roughly 1,200 from the Bnei Menashe community will reach Israel by the end of 2026, with the rest coming in a second wave by 2030.

The Bnei Menashe, who trace their ancestry to one of the 10 Lost Tribes of Israel, claim to have been exiled from present-day Israel following the defeat of the Kingdom of Israel in 722 BC. The Bene Israel Jews are believed to have landed in India after a shipwreck.

In 1950, Israel's Parliament (the Knesset) passed the Law of Return, allowing all non-Israeli Jews and converts to Judaism to settle in Israel and become its citizens. Since then, the Israeli government has been flying in persecuted Jews from all over the world to Israel.