According to an announcement by the official Bahrain News Agency on Thursday, King Hamad ibn Isa Al-Khalifah has issued a decree appointing Houda Ezra Nonoo, a Jewish woman, as an ambassador. Where she will be posted has not yet been officially stated, but she confirmed in a phone interview with the Associated Press that she will serve as ambassador to the United States. Believed to be the first Jew ever appointed to serve as an ambassador in the Arab world, Nonoo says she is proud to serve her country, “first of all as a Bahraini,” reported the AP.
Nonoo is a member of the Shura Council, Bahrain’s 40-member parliament, whose members are appointed by the king, and has served as president of the Bahrain Human Rights Watch Society.
Once said to number nearly 1,500, the size of the Jewish community in Bahrain is now estimated to range between 36 and 50. Benjamin of Tudela (or Binyamin MiTudela), a 12th century rabbi and explorer, noted that there were nearly 500 Jews in Qays, and approximately 5,000 residing in Al-Qatifa (now part of Saudi Arabia).
According to Nancy Khedouri, the Bahraini Jewish author of From Our Beginning to Present Day, as quoted by the Gulf News, “Bahrain has practiced religious tolerance all these years.” She notes, “how privileged everyone should feel to be living in this beautiful Kingdom, which has always offered and will continue to offer peace and security to all its citizens.”
Bahrain has no diplomatic ties with Israel, and there have been tensions in the past between the Jewish community and Bahraini society, including riots leading up to Israel’s declaration of Independence in 1947-1948, and during the 1967 Six Day War, but in general the Bahraini Jewish community lives in relative harmony with its neighbors.
According to the U.S. State Department’s 2006 International Religious Freedom Report on Bahrain, there is no forced religious conversion to Islam, and, “There were no acts of physical violence or harassment of Jews or vandalism of Jewish community institutions, such as schools, cemeteries, or the synagogue. The Government has not enacted any laws protecting the right of Jews to religious freedom; however, it has not interfered with their freedom to practice. The Government makes no effort specifically to promote antibias and tolerance education. Some anti-Semitic political commentary and editorial cartoons appeared, usually linked to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Jews practiced their faith privately without interference from the Government.”
A relative of Nonoo’s, Ibrahim Daoud Nonoo, also served as a member of the Shura Council.
Bahrain is home to the only Synagogue in the Persian Gulf Region.
