Flight from Babylon: Iraq, Iran, Israel, America

The author recounts his childhood in Iraq, the Nazi-inspired attacks on Iraqi Jews in the late thirties, and the events which forced him and his family to emigrate to Israel

As the spirited teenage son of an Iraqi Jewish family in the 1940s, Haddad refused to passively accept the persecution of Jews by Muslims and joined underground groups such as the Zionist organization Haganah. At 15, he was admitted to medical school in Baghdad; he eventually earned the first doctorate in medicine awarded in modern Israel. Now an ophthalmologist in the U.S., he (with the help of magazine writer Rosenteur) here recounts in absorbing detail his Baghdad childhood, conversion to Zionism, and involvement in the smuggling of Jews to Palestine until he himself was forced to flee to Tel Aviv. Haddad's experiences cause him to doubt that coexistence between Arabs and Jews is possible, and he maintains that it was the prejudice of western Jews in Israel against those from the East and Africa that motivated his move to America.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The precocious son of a wealthy Iraqi-Jewish family, Haddad at 15 earned the highest grade in Iraq on the high school examinations, ensuring his acceptance in medical school as one of only 10 Jews admitted under quotas. Yet academic pursuits were not his only interest. By 12 he was actively involved in underground activities to defend Baghdad's Jews from Moslem attacks and help those who wished to emigrate to Israel. Eventually Haddad was also forced to flee his homeland. In this narrative the reader is treated not only to the author's adventurous life, but also to an intimate account of Iraqui-Jewish life, a rich culture of which little is known in the West. For large public libraries and Judaica collections. Andrea Caron Kempf, Johnson Cty. Community Coll. Lib., Overland Park, Kan.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.