Indonesian Jews hold multifaith seder

Fifty Indonesian Jews gathered for a Passover seder in Jakarta on Friday night, with a guest list that included US Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken and several local Muslim clerics, the Times of Israel reports: 

The festive Jewish ceremony took on special significance in the world’s largest Muslim-majority country, just three years after radical Islamists pressured authorities to shut down the only synagogue in the Indonesian capital.

Members of the country’s tiny Jewish community, which numbers only about 200 people, have kept a low profile following the closure of the Ohel Yaakov synagogue and a series of anti-Semitic attacks.

Indonesian Jews are mostly descendants of Iraqi and Dutch Jews who immigrated in the 1920s, according to the (Hebrew) news report.

Since Judaism is not recognized as one of the country’s official faiths, the identity cards of most of the country’s Jews identify them as Christians.

An Indonesian Jewish woman, who was not named in the TV report, said Indonesian people’s perceived hatred of Israel and Judaism stems from ignorance.

“When they say ‘I hate Jews, I hate Israel,’ you can’t really judge them, because they haven’t actually met any Jews at all,” she said.

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