"A very disorganized miracle" was the way a Jewish Agency official summarized Operation Solomon, the two-day Israeli airlift of 14,310 Ethiopian Jews to the Holy Land in May 1991.

Many consider the aliyah a brilliant success, and that story is told well in Stephen Spector's new book, "Operation Solomon: The Daring Rescue of the Ethiopian Jews."

For centuries Ethiopian Jews, known as Beta Israel, have claimed descent from the ancient Hebrews and longed for their home in Jerusalem. Spector, an English professor at the State University of New York in Stony Brook, writes: "The Ethiopian Jews' biological connection to the people of King Solomon may be in question, but their spiritual commitment to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is not."

Forewarned that Ethiopia presented "a rich world of trickery in storytelling," Spector heard different versions of the aliyah-related events. "Operation Solomon" conscientiously represents many perspectives for readers to judge for themselves.

In 1990, 2,000 Ethiopians from the northern region of Gondar descended on Addis Ababa, "the sprawling, impoverished shantytown that is the capital city," in the hope of immigrating to Israel. Susan Pollack of the American Association for Ethiopian Jews believed they were in imminent danger in Gondar due to poverty, disease and a raging civil war; other witnesses disagreed.

In overcrowded Addis, at any rate, the Ethiopians lived in squalor, ridden with disease (primarily HIV) and demoralized by the political climate. As the Ethiopians' flight to Israel was delayed, their numbers swelled to 20,000. Fortunately, the North American Conference of Ethiopian Jewry was able to assist them.

The airlift was staged against a background of shifting international sands — from the opening of the Israeli Consulate in Addis Ababa in 1956 through the overthrow of Emperor Haile Selassie in 1974. From that coup emerged President Mengistu Haile Mariam, widely known as a bloody and duplicitous tyrant. A more interesting character is Kassa Kebede, his secretary for foreign relations, a brilliant and enigmatic negotiator whose strategy "shaped most of the rest of this history."

The author describes the attempts of the tottering Ethiopian government to set a price on the Jews' release, demanding first weapons from Israel and then money. American Jewish agencies finally agreed to pay them $35 million, but the fate of that payment remains a mystery.

Once Operation Solomon was under way, there were tragic scenes at the airport: When overcrowding threatened to crush small children, the mob had to be beaten back by the same people who were dedicated to helping them. Despite the obstacles, the airlift was a success, with exemplary cooperation from the passengers crowded aboard 42 planes.

On Oct. 16, 2001, the United Nations repealed its infamous "Zionism is racism" resolution of 1975, following a speech by Asher Naim, Israeli ambassador to Ethiopia. He held up Operation Solomon as proof to the world that Zionism is colorblind. Spector believes the repeal was really due to pressure from the United States, though Naim made a cogent point.

I would recommend Spector's book, which dramatically coordinates scenes that took place in different parts of the world, as both a historical document and a thriller.




"Operation Solomon: The Daring Rescue of the Ethiopian Jews," by Stephen Spector (279 pages, Oxford University Press, $28).