Meet Mark, The Jew from Kuwait Growing up in Kuwait, I had the best of everything. Although we were Muslims like everyone else, we were totally secular and my father always aimed to shield us from religious people whom he described as crazies. In the summer of 1990, when I was 12 years old, our lives changed completely. We were on vacation when Saddam Hussein invaded and annexed Kuwait. My fathers business – along with much of the country – was ravaged. Our savings became worthless pieces of paper. We could not go back to Kuwait, so we immigrated to Canada. Of my family, I’m the only one who stayed in Canada. One evening in 2003, I was studying at the university library in London, Ontario, when I happened to notice an older man. From his chassidic garb, he looked like a religious Jew. My curiosity was aroused, so I approached him and asked, Are you Jewish? With a gentle smile on his face, he said, No, but I like to dress this way. I didnt know whether he was joking or not. All the religious people I had come across in the past were pretty scary. Are Jews supposed to be funny? His name was Dr. Yitzhak Block, a retired professor of philosophy. We exchanged a few words and then he asked about my background. My family history is pretty complex, and I get a headache every time I have to explain it all. So I simply told him that Im an Arab from Kuwait, and mentioned that my grandmother from my mother’s side is Jewish. Standing there in the university library, this religious Jew, Dr. Block, looked at me and said, “In Muslim law, you’re considered Muslim, since the religion goes by the father. But according to Jewish law, you’re Jewish, since Jewish identity is transmitted by the mother.” My head started to spin and memories of my childhood in Kuwait began to surface. I recalled how my grandmother had a funny name on her documents, Mizrachi, which I never heard before. (She also had a small prayer book with Hebrew letters, and she prayed in the dark crying. (I thought the Wailing Wall was so named because crying was a part of prayer.) Aside from a vague family legend, my grandmother never mentioned anything about being Jewish – but now the pieces were fitting into place. I thanked Dr. Block for the conversation, and ran home to tell my roommate what I heard. He smiled and said, “So youre a Mus-Jew!” I was not amused. I decided to call my grandmother myself and bring up the subject. I beat around the bush a bit – after all, she’d been denying it for the past 50 years – and then finally blurted out, “Grandma, are you Jewish?” She didn’t answer the question directly, but she started crying and spoke about the years of Arab-Israeli conflict. She told me how her brother Zaki had been killed in Jerusalem before the rebirth of the State. To me that was sufficient confirmation of her Jewishness and I decided to leave it at that... About a year later, I was rollerblading one day in my neighborhood when I took a hard fall and badly sprained my wrist. Because my wrist was heavily bandaged, I was forced to take off work for a few days. Dr. Block had mentioned to me before the name of his synagogue, so because i had plenty of time I decided to go check out the scene. I called a cab and got dropped off at the synagogue. As I walked in, the first person I saw looked Indian. He shook my hand, said “Shabbat Shalom,” and handed me a kippah. Then I saw a black man which really surprised me. And Dr. Block was there, too. I was handed a prayer book, shown the proper page, and before I knew it everyone was praying. Something hit me and I felt as though I knew this melody. I just stood there taking in the sounds, the smells and the sights. Everything felt whole and perfect. It was the opposite of everything Id ever heard about Jews or Judaism. At this point my tears were streaming in freefall. After the services finished, I met everyone over Kiddush. I spoke with an Egyptian couple and we shared our personal stories. Jews from all backgrounds were gathered together and I was another piece of this puzzle. After Kiddush, I accepted Dr. Block’s invitation to join him for lunch. I told him: “I can’t believe Im here, singing and praying in Hebrew. I could never have imagined it.” He smiled and said, Its not so hard to believe. Every Jew is born with a little Torah and a little Menorah inside.” He then pressed his shoulder up against mine and said, “All it takes is for another Jew to bump into him and light it up. My interest grew from there, and I began studying Torah and keeping Shabbat. after that experience I spent a month in Israel touring and studying on Aish HaTorah’s Jerusalem Fellowships program. It was a great “homecoming.” I still keep in close contact with my family and old friends. They’re wonderful people and I love them very much. Yet it’s hard to relate to them on many levels. In the Arab world there are tons of misconceptions and misinformation regarding Israel. So I am working to develop a program to educate Arabs about Jews and Judaism, I hope that my unique background can help bridge some of that divide.
Posted on: Fri, 02 Jan 2015 03:59:55 +0000