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Wednesday, April 17, 2013

THE LONG ODYESSY OF AN ETHIOPIAN JEW: Teshome Solomon's arduous, triumphant trek to the Knesset | The Times of Israel

Yesh Atid MK Shimon Solomon (photo credit: Miriam Alster/Flash90)
Yesh Atid MK Shimon Solomon (photo credit: Miriam Alster/Flash90)

When he was 10 years old, Shimon Solomon and his family walked for weeks from Shire Indaselassie, a small town in northern Ethiopia, to the Sudanese border — the start of a journey they believed would end with the life they were meant to live in Israel.

“We walked every day, and sometimes during the night because we had to hide from the regime,” he recalled. “If they caught you, you’d be in big trouble, it was terrible. Sometimes we hid in the bushes during the day, and walked at night.” At one point, after days of trekking through the desert and with no water left in the jerrycan, his father thought the boy would not make it.

“I still remember until today, how my father, as he saw me about to die, spat inside my throat, trying to do something to keep me alive.”

Eventually, fellow voyagers managed to procure some water and today, 23 years after that life-threatening walk to freedom, Solomon is a member of Knesset for Yesh Atid, one of two lawmakers from the new centrist party who were born in Ethiopia...........

FULL ARTICLE HERE: Teshome Solomon's arduous, triumphant trek to the Knesset | The Times of Israel

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