Many people from Turkey’s
Jewish community are leaving the country after increased threats and attacks, a
businessman from the community has written in an article for the Istanbul-based
Jewish newspaper Şalom,
according to Hurriyet
Daily News.
“We
face threats, attacks and harassment every day. Hope is fading. Is it necessary
for a ‘Hrant among us’ to be shot to make the government, the opposition, civil
society, our neighbors and jurists see this?” Mois Gabay wrote, referring to
the murder of Armenian-Turkish journalist Hrant Dink in 2007.
Gabay,
a professional in the tourism industry, added that increasing numbers of
Turkish Jews are making plans to move abroad. “Around 37 percent of school
graduates from the Jewish community in Turkey prefer to go abroad for higher
education … The number doubled this year,” he wrote.
The
Turkish-Jewish population has dwindled to an estimated 17,000 from 23,000 a few
years ago, due to large-scale emigration prompted by antisemitism and a
declining birth rate.
Gabay’s
column came a few days after a sign reading “to be demolished” was stuck on the
entrance of the Neve Shalom Synagogue in Istanbul’s Beyoğlu district, which has
been previously attacked with explosives in 1986, 1992 and 2003.
“Last
week, when I was talking to two of my friends on separate occasions, the
conversation turned to our search for another country to move to. That is to
say, my generation is also thinking more about leaving this country,” Gabay
wrote.
