The Red Sea Diving Resort is the story of Mossad agents who in 1984 established a fake resort named “Arous on the Red Sea” up the coast from Port Sudan, as their base for the operation to rescue and evacuate Jewish-Ethiopians to Israel from Sudan.
The biographical drama, written and directed by Gideon Raff (Homeland), stars Chris Evans, Michael K. Williams, Haley Bennett, Michiel Huisman, Alessandro Nivola, Greg Kinnear and Ben Kingsley. It is based on the book Mossad Exodus by Gad Shimron.
The Red Sea Diving Resort will have its world premiere at the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival on July 28, and is scheduled to be released by Netflix on July 31.
Watch the trailer on Netflix – warning: some strong language.
From 1979 to 1983, Aliyah activists and Mossad agents operating in Sudan encouraged the Beta Israel communities in Ethiopia to come to the Sudan, and from the Sudan they would be taken to Israel via Europe. Jewish Ethiopian refugees from the Ethiopian Civil War of the mid 1970s began to arrive at the refugee camps in Sudan.
In 1983, the governor of Gondar province in north-western Ethiopia was ousted and his successor removed the restrictions on travel. Beta Israel began to arrive in large numbers, and the Mossad was unable to evacuate them in time. Because of poor conditions in the Sudanese camps, many refugees died of disease and hunger. In late 1984, the Sudanese government, under US pressure, allowed 7,200 Beta Israel refugees to leave. The Mossad Operation Moses, from November 20, 1984, until January 20, 1985, brought 6,500 people to Israel, and another 494 Beta Israel refugees were flown to Israel by the US Air Force.
