The interrupted airlift in 1984 left 900 Ethiopian Jewish refugees stranded at the Sudanese border. AAEJ activists, armed with copies of David S. Wyman’s just-released book, The Abandonment of the Jews, lobbied members of Congress and the Reagan administration to intervene, arguing that the United States should not repeat the mistake it made during the Holocaust.
Senators Rudy Boschwitz and Alan Cranston, and Congressman Stephen Solarz, played key roles in these efforts, which persuaded Vice President George Bush to order a U.S. airlift of the refugees. In the years to follow, Israeli rescue missions resumed and the rest of the Ethiopian Jewish community was saved – including an incredible 14,000 in a single day in May 1991.
It is doubtful any of this would have happened had it not been for Howard Lenhoff and his colleagues, who constantly prodded Israeli, U.S., and American Jewish leaders to take action. One can only hope this book will help bring these unsung heroes the recognition they so richly deserve – not because they want or need it, but because of the powerful lessons their experiences can teach the next generation.