Figure 1.-- Here we see a group of Bukharian Jewish children somewhere in Central asia. They look to be at aoing Pioneer simmer camp. Unlike many European Jews because the Red Army stopped the Germans at the Volga. and the Einsatzgruppen never entered Central Asia.

Most of our Disapora country pages are countries that exist today even though some did not exist when Jews lived there. It simply is easier to deal with modern countries. One exception is the Emirate of Bukara meaning an imprtnt of central asia including Samarkand. (the modern country most associated with the Bukharan Emirate.) This is today a Jewish community that no longer exists in ny substantial numbers, a least in its home land of Central Asia. it is defined more than anything by the language they spoke-- Bukhori. This is a dialet of the Tajik-Persian language. The name of the language and community comes from the historic Central Asian Emirate of Bukhara which had a substantial Jewish community. When we talk about the Diaspora, we generally mean the Jews dispersed from Palestine by the Romans. This is in fact how the Jews were dispersed over North Africa and Western Europe and eventually after the Roman era into Eastern Europe. The Roman Diaspora was, however, not the first Diasapra. From a very early time, some Jews traveled into Central asias as merchanbts and traders. Judah and Israel became targets of the ancient imperial powers, especially Assyria and Babalon which practiced population resettlement as part of a policy of securing cinquered lands. And both moved large numbers of Jews east. And than the Persian Empire and subsequent Hellinist empires created conditions for Jews to settle throughout the Near East and Central Asia. This was the same process by which Jews appeared throughout the Roman Empire in the west. Nothing is known about the Jews taken to the Middle East by the Assyrians and Byloobians. Some thanks to Persian Emperor Cyrus the Great were able to return to Palestine, but Cyrus allowed those Jews who chose so to settlend move freely in his Empire, but those who remained in the Middle East are lost to history. We do not see them again until the late Middle Ages And the largest Jewish Community in Central Asia was in the Emirate of Bukhara. The Bukharan Jews have their own tradition of their origins, but in fact there is no historical evidence. The Bukaran Jews were among the most isolated Jewish comminities. and because of Islamist pressures, many lost their knowlegge of Judaism. Over time the Community was forced to convert to Islam or driven from Central Asia, by both Ilamist regimes and Soviet supression of religion. Because of their location, the surviving community survived the Holcaust. The NAZI Einsatzgruppen nevr reached them. Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the great majority of the remaining Bukharian Jews have immigrated to Israel or to the United States (Forest Hills, New York is an important center) with smller numbers to Europe or Australia.

Created: 8:30 PM 12/11/2015
Last updated: 8:30 PM 12/11/2015