Lebanon’s Jewish community was small, urban and unusual: it was the only Arab country where the Jewish population grew after 1948, and one of the few where the Jewish community was protected by the constitution. Most Lebanese Jews lived in Wadi Abu Jamil, a neighborhood near Beirut’s port, and many families traced their roots to Aleppo, Damascus and the Sephardi cities of the Ottoman Empire. See also Syrian Jews and Egyptian Jews.
Origins
Jews lived on the Lebanese coast in antiquity. There was a Jewish presence in Sidon from the 1st century BCE, and Tyre had an estimated 4,000 Jews before the Arab conquest. In the 7th century the governor Mu’awiya settled Jews in Tripoli.
In the mountains, a Jewish community at Deir al-Qamar is documented from about 1759, made up mostly of traders. It declined after the conflict of 1860 in Mount Lebanon, and its synagogue was sold in 1893.
The Sephardi connection
Modern Lebanese Jewry was built by migration. In the 19th and early 20th centuries Jews moved to Beirut from inland Syria and from Ottoman cities including Izmir, Salonica, Istanbul and Baghdad. Beirut’s community reached about 3,500 by the First World War and grew again with arrivals from Syria, Iraq and Egypt. These families brought the Sephardi rite and rabbinic traditions of Aleppo and the Ottoman Sephardim, which became the community’s own.
Modern era and departure
- 1926. Lebanon’s constitution guaranteed freedom of religion and let the Jewish community run its own civil affairs and schools. The Maghen Abraham Synagogue in Wadi Abu Jamil was founded the same year.
- Schools. Most Jewish children attended Alliance Israélite Universelle schools, which taught in French; the community also ran the Talmud Torah Selim Tarrab school.
- 1948. While Jews were leaving other Arab countries, Lebanon’s Jewish population rose, reaching about 10,000, as Jews from Syria and elsewhere arrived. Beirut alone had about 9,000.
- 1958 onward. After the 1958 crisis many families emigrated; Beirut’s community fell to about 2,500 by 1969.
- 1975–1976. In the civil war about 200 Jews were killed, and most of the remaining 1,800 left in 1976.
- 1980s. During the 1980s community leaders were kidnapped; at least three were murdered by a group linked to Hezbollah.
Religious life
Lebanese Jews prayed in the Sephardi rite, shaped by the customs of Aleppo and Damascus. Maghen Abraham, built in 1926, was the community’s main synagogue. Damaged during the civil war, it was restored from 2010, but it holds no regular services.
Language, music and food
Lebanese Jews spoke Arabic at home and French at school and in business. Their cooking shares much with the Syrian Jewish kitchen of Aleppo and Damascus, from kibbeh to stuffed vegetables. See our Sephardic recipes.
The community today
In 2022, 27 people were registered as Jews (“Israelites”) on Lebanon’s electoral rolls; other estimates put the number at 70 to 100. Wadi Abu Jamil was largely abandoned after 2005. Most Lebanese Jews and their descendants live in France, Brazil, the United States, Canada and Israel.
Notable people
- Edmond Safra 1932–1999 · Beirut Banker, founder of Republic National Bank of New York; his family came from Aleppo.
- Joseph Safra 1938–2020 · Beirut Banker, founder of Banco Safra in São Paulo.
Sources and further reading
- Kirsten E. Schulze, The Jews of Lebanon: Between Coexistence and Conflict (Sussex Academic Press, 2001).
- “History of the Jews in Lebanon”, Wikipedia.
Revised October 2026 to correct errors in an earlier version of this page.
