Strangers in the Land of the Free
Iranian Jews are a refugee community, and they see the ban as a tragedy for the country they now claim as their own.
Half of the members of my congregation in Los Angeles are Iranian Jews, most of whom fled from Ayatollah Khomeini in 1978, during and after the fall of the Shah. The revolution took their businesses, their independence, and, in more than one case, the lives of those whom they loved. This is a remarkable community, passionate and driven, which almost instantly achieved success in America both in business and in a range of professional fields.
Iranian Jews have complicated feelings about the Muslim world. Many
