National Archives Unveils Iraqi Jewish Artifacts in Exhibit Opening October 11
Press Release · Friday, October 11, 2013

Washington, DC

Exhibit explores Iraq’s Jewish past and showcases National Archives’ preservation expertise

On Friday, October 11, 2013, the National Archives will unveil a new exhibition, “Discovery and Recovery: Preserving Iraqi Jewish Heritage.” The exhibit details the dramatic recovery of historic materials relating to the Jewish community in Iraq from a flooded basement in Saddam Hussein’s intelligence headquarters, and the National Archives’ ongoing work in support of U.S. Government efforts to preserve these materials. Video sneak preview online [www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZmP0uwzEII] *

Located in the Lawrence F. O’Brien Gallery of the National Archives Building in Washington, DC, “Discovery and Recovery” is free and open to the public and runs through January 5, 2014. In both English and Arabic, the 2,000 square foot exhibit features 24 recovered items and a “behind the scenes” video of the fascinating yet painstaking preservation process. This exhibit marks the first time these items have been on public display.

Read Washington Post reporter Michael Ruane’s rave review of the project.
See incredible “before and after” treatment photos [www.archives.gov/press/press-kits/iraqi-jewish-archive/images.html].

Background

On May 6, 2003, just days after the Coalition forces took over Baghdad, 16 American soldiers from Mobile Exploitation Team Alpha, a group assigned to search for nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons, entered Saddam Hussein’s flooded intelligence building. In the basement, under four feet of water, they found thousands of books and documents relating to the Jewish community of Iraq – materials that had come from synagogues and Jewish organizations in Baghdad.

The water-logged materials quickly became moldy in Baghdad’s intense heat and humidity. Seeking guidance, the Coalition Provisional Authority placed an urgent call to the nation’s foremost conservation experts at the National Archives. Just a week later, National Archives Director of Preservation Programs Doris Hamburg and Conservation Chief Mary Lynn Ritzenthaler arrived in Baghdad via military transport to assess the damage and make recommendations for preservation of the materials.

Given limited treatment options in Baghdad, and with the agreement of Iraqi representatives, the materials were shipped to the United States for preservation and exhibition. Since then, these materials have been vacuum freeze-dried, preserved and digitized under the direction of the National Archives. Peek “behind the scenes” of the state-of-the-art Conservation Lab [www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rzg_FYn_rZg] *

The collection includes more than 2,700 Jewish books and tens of thousands of documents in Hebrew, Arabic, Judeo-Arabic and English, dating from 1540 to the 1970s. A special website to launch this fall will make these historic materials freely available to all online as they are digitized and catalogued. This work was made possible through the assistance of the Department of State, National Endowment for the Humanities, and Center for Jewish History.

The Jews of Iraq have a rich past, extending back 2500 years to Babylonia. These materials provide a tangible link to this community that flourished there, but in the second half of the twentieth century dispersed throughout the world. Today, fewer than five Jews remain.

Display highlights include:

• A Hebrew Bible with Commentaries from 1568 – one of the oldest books in the trove;
• A Babylonian Talmud from 1793;
• A Torah scroll fragment from Genesis - one of the 48 Torah scroll fragments found;
• A Zohar from 1815 – a text for the mystical and spiritual Jewish movement known as “Kabbalah”;
• An official 1918 letter to the Chief Rabbi regarding the allotment of sheep for Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year);
• Materials from Jewish schools in Baghdad, including exam grades and a letter to the College Entrance Examination Board in Princeton regarding SAT scores;
• A Haggadah (Passover script) from 1902, hand lettered and decorated by an Iraqi Jewish youth ; and
• A lunar calendar in both Hebrew and Arabic from the Jewish year 5732 (1972-1973) - one of the last examples of Hebrew printed items produced in Baghdad.

“Discovery and Recovery” is divided into six sections:

Discovery:  The dramatic story of how these materials were found, rescued and preserved is one worthy of a Hollywood blockbuster. A short film captures these heroic efforts. The section includes actual metal foot lockers used to ship the documents to the United States.

Text and Heritage: This section explores Iraqi Jewish history and tradition through recovered texts, including a Torah scroll fragment, a Hebrew Bible with Commentaries from 1568, and a Babylonian Talmud from 1793.

Iraqi Jewish Life: Constancy and Change:  Using recovered texts, this section explores the pattern of Jewish life in Iraq. Highlights include a Haggadah (Passover script), siddur (prayer book) and an illustrated lunar calendar in both Hebrew and Arabic (one of about 20 found, dating from 1959-1973).

Personal and Communal Life:  Selected correspondence and publications illustrate the range and complexity of Iraqi Jewish life in the 19th and 20th centuries. Original documents and facsimiles in flipbooks range from school primers to international business correspondence from the Sassoon family.

After the Millennia:  Iraqi Jewish life unraveled in the mid-20th century, with the rise of Nazism and proliferation of anti-Jewish propaganda. In June 1941, 180 Jews were killed and hundreds injured in an anti-Jewish attack in Baghdad. Persecution increased when Iraq entered the war against the new State of Israel in 1948. In 1950 and 1951, many Iraqi Jews were stripped of their citizenship and assets and the community fled the county en masse. This section includes the 1951 law freezing assets of Iraqi Jews.

Preserving the Past:  It is not surprising that the Coalition Forces turned to National Archives conservators for help. Learn about transformation of these materials from moldy, water-logged masses to a carefully preserved, enduring historic legacy. View the National Archives’ state-of-the-art treatment, preservation, and digitization of these materials.

The Fall issue of Prologue Magazine, the Archives’ flagship publication, will feature two articles on “Discovery and Recovery.” Prologue is available in the Archives Shop.

Related Programs

Thursday, October 17, at 7 p.m., William G. McGowan Theater
PANEL DISCUSSION:  Discovery and Recovery: Eyewitness Accounts
Director of Preservation Programs Doris Hamburg and Conservation Chief Mary Lynn Ritzenthaler from the National Archives; Maurice Shohet, analyst at the Middle East Media Research Institute; and William D. Cavness, Jr., retired Foreign Service Officer, will chronicle the dramatic story behind the exhibit and discuss the historic significance of the items saved. Larry Abramson, National Security Correspondent for NPR, will moderate the discussion.

Tuesday, December 3, 2013, at noon, William G. McGowan Theater
BOOK TALK: New Babylonians:  A History of Jews in Modern Iraq
Although Iraqi Jews saw themselves as Iraqi patriots, their community—which had existed in Iraq for more than 2,500 years—was displaced following the establishment of the state of Israel. New Babylonians, by historian Orit Bashkin, chronicles the lives of these Jews, their urban Arab culture, and their hopes for a democratic nation-state. It studies their ideas about Judaism, Islam, secularism, modernity, and reform, focusing on Iraqi Jews who internalized narratives of Arab and Iraqi nationalisms and on those who turned to communism in the 1940s.
A book signing will follow the program.

Public tours

Guided tours for the public will be given on Tuesday, Friday and Sunday at 11 a.m. while the exhibition is on view; reservations may be made through www.recreation.gov starting September 20, 2013.

Preservation at the National Archives

The Preservation Programs department cares for the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and other founding documents, as well as billions of other records. Preservation staff assess the condition of records and identify strategies for preserving them. In state-of-the-art conservation and preservation labs, experts stabilize and treat documents in a wide range of formats to prepare them for digitization, exhibition, and use by researchers, and by reformatting them. Visit our Preservation portal [www.archives.gov/preservation] for information about how the Archives cares for the nation’s treasures, and on taking care of your personal possessions, whether of sentimental or monetary value.

• View the conservation and re-encasement of the original Declaration of Independence:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9ovu0a6pL8 *
   
• See astounding conservation work on the 1297 Magna Carta as staff use ultra-violet photography to reveal previously illegible writing, remove old repairs, fill areas of loss with conservation paper, and humidify and flatten the document:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqQVY1Zn0oM *
   
• Go behind-the-scenes to see the state-of-the-art preservation lab at the new National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, MO. A fire in the former facility in 1973 destroyed millions of military personnel files. Watch preservation technicians arduously treat records for damage and mold, piece together burnt paper fragments, and see how text seemingly lost to fire damage can be restored to legibility:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xNvAudiRwU *

The National Archives is located on the National Mall on Constitution Avenue at 9th Street, NW. Hours are 10 AM-5 PM.

*These videos are in the public domain and not subject to any copyright restrictions. The National Archives encourages their use and free distribution.

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For more information on or to obtain images of items included in the exhibition, call the National Archives Public Affairs staff at 202-357-5300.

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