A Brief History of Judaism in the Somali Peninsula

Abstract

While Christianity in the Somali peninsula was in the past marginally examined,
Judaism in this world area received far less attention. This negligence is surprising
given the recorded history of Jews peacefully living among Somalis for centuries.
Some of the Jewry in question were open about their faith, while others were crypto-
Jews who practiced their faith in covert ways for fear of persecution. Many of the
Jews who lived or simply traversed in the Somali peninsula as merchants and
religious service providers, like circumcision and kosher slaughter of animals, were
Adenite and Yemenite Jews. Some other Jews came from the Iberian Peninsula or
even directly from modern-day Israel. The purpose of this paper is to document the
often-ignored deep roots of Judaism in the Somali peninsula.

Full text

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| ISSN: 4562-3988
A Brief History of Judaism in the Somali Peninsula
Aweis A. Ali
___________________________________________________________________________
Introduction
While Christianity in the Somali peninsula was in the past marginally examined,
Judaism in this world area received far less attention. This negligence is surprising
given the recorded history of Jews peacefully living among Somalis for centuries.
Some of the Jewry in question were open about their faith, while others were crypto-
Jews who practiced their faith in covert ways for fear of persecution. Many of the
Jews who lived or simply traversed in the Somali peninsula as merchants and
religious service providers, like circumcision and kosher slaughter of animals, were
Adenite and Yemenite Jews. Some other Jews came from the Iberian Peninsula or
even directly from modern-day Israel. The purpose of this paper is to document the
often-ignored deep roots of Judaism in the Somali peninsula.
Ethiopian Judaism entered the Somali peninsula through Somaliland while southern
Arabia Judaism entered the peninsula primarily through southern Somalia and also
through Somaliland albeit with limited arrivals. While there is no strong evidence of
any Somali clans embracing Judaism during the pre-Islamic era, the conversion of
individuals and families cannot be ruled out. The Hebrew heritage of the
marginalized Somali clans including the Yibir is an ancient one which goes back to
the Beta-Israel, Ethiopian Jews. Somalis were, at least nominally, entirely Islamized
by the beginning of the 16th century.
1
Islam remained very shallow in the interiors of
the Somali peninsula until the 1800s.
2
Since 1500, no large scale of indigenous
Somalis practicing a religion other than Islam has been reported.
The Greater Ethiopia Influence
One of the five Somali inhabited regions in the Somali peninsula is part of modern-
day Ethiopia. While the population of this Somali region is a negligible 6,000,000
people compared to the overall Ethiopian population of 110,000,000, the landmass
of this Somali region is about 1/3rd of the total Ethiopian landmass. It should be noted
however, under its old name of Abyssinia, Ethiopia had ruled much of modern-day
Somaliland, including sections of the semi-autonomous region of Puntland.
3
Zeila
town in Somaliland was ruled by the Axumite Kingdom as early as the 900s before
losing the strategic town to local Muslims and their Arab co-religionists. The Axumite
1
Ali Abdirahman Hersi, The Arab Factor in Somali History: The Origins and the
Development of Arab Enterprise and Cultural Influence in the Somali Peninsula. University of
California, Los Angeles: Ph.D. Dissertation, 1977, 141.
2
Abdi Mohamed Kusow, The Genesis of the Somali Civil War: A New Perspective. In
Proceedings of the Sixth Michigan State University Conference on Northeast Africa. Edited by John
Hinnant & B. Fine. East Lansing, MI, USA: (Michigan State University, 1992), 189.
3
Ali Abdirahman Hersi, The Arab Factor in Somali History. 117.

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Kingdom reconquered Zeila in the early 15th century.
4
The Ethiopian rule in most of
Somaliland seems to have concluded by the 13th century.
5
Ethiopia, with its famous indigenous Jewish community, Beta-Israel,
6
took with it its
brand of Orthodox Christianity and elements of Judaism wherever it ruled, including
Somaliland.
7
Ethiopia, which was traditionally ruled by the northern Orthodox clans
of the Amhara and the Tigray, was also once ruled with an iron fist by Queen Gudit,
who was an Ethiopian Jew.
8
The Jewish faith of the Queen is affirmed by ancient
Geez manuscripts.
9
This Damot Kingdom, which laid the southwest of Axumite
Kingdom, targeted the Ethiopian Orthodox Church with a vengeance.
10
The Queen
eventually ransacked Axum in 979.
11
While the exact seat of the Damot Kingdom
may be disputed, its reach and rule are not. For example, Paul Balisky is of the
opinion that the seat of the Damot Kingdom was near the Gibe River Valley,
currently inhabited by the Gurage and the Oromo people groups.
12
It is not surprising that the Somali peninsula, especially areas still ruled or once ruled
by Ethiopia, is littered with Jewish archeological evidence. The Dhubato village in the
Hargeisa region, Somaliland, has ancient cemeteries embossed with the Star of
David.
13
Dire Dawa, part of the Somali peninsula in Ethiopia, also has a long history
of a thriving Jewish community of Adenite and Yemenite extraction.
14
Some of the
Jews reportedly hailed from India and Greece. However, their ancestry could still
have been Adenite or Yemenite. With its metal door embossed with the Star of
David, one of the citys synagogues now operates as a cafeteria. This ex-synagogue
is located in the Dire Dawa neighborhood of Dechatu.
4
David Levine, Greater Ethiopia. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1974), 71
5
Timothy Insoll, The Archaeology of Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa. (Cambridge University
Press, 2003), 59.
6
The Ethiopian Jewish community calls itself as Beta-Israel. Some outsiders call them
Falasha, which is a derogatory term.
7
Sada Mire, Mapping the Archaeology of Somaliland: Religion, Art, Script, Time, Urbanism,
Trade and Empire. Afr Archaeol Rev 32, 111136, 2015. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10437-015-9184-9
(accessed 08 March 2021).
8
J. Spencer Trimingham, Islam in Ethiopia. (London: Oxford University Press 1952), 52
9
Sergew Hable Selassie. Ancient and Medieval Ethiopian History to 1270. Addis Abeba.
(Haile Selassie I University, 1972), 225-232.
10
Belaeh Michael, The declie f Akmie Emie ad he Rie f Warrior Queen Yodit (ሳቶ)
The Fie. Addi Heald, 24 Jl 2019.
https://www.addisherald.com/the-decline-of-aksumite-empire-and-the-rise-of-worrior-queen-yodit-
%E1%8A%A5%E1%88%B3%E1%89%B6-the-fire/ (accessed 08 March 2021)
11
Taddesse Tamrat, Church and State in Ethiopia. In Oxford Studies in African Affairs.
General Editors John D. Hargreaves and George Sherperson. Oxford. (Clarendon Press, 1972), 40-
43.
12
Paul E. Balisky, Wolaitta Evangelists: A Study of Religious Innovations in Southern
Ethiopia, 1937-1975. PhD. Thesis, Scotland. (University of Aberdeen, 1997), 8-9.
13
Sada Mire, Mapping the Archaeology of Somaliland,124.
14
Ofd Afica Ameica Sdie Cee. Iaac, Ehaim. 31 Ma 2013.
https://doi.org/10.1093/acref/9780195301731.013.38569 (accessed 11 March 2021).

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The Jews of Djibouti
The Jews of Djibouti belong to the influential Adenite and Yemenite Jewish diaspora,
just like the Jewish communities in the rest of the Somali peninsula and Eritrea.
While Jews initially settled in Obock, a small port town in the northern part of the Gulf
of Tadjoura, they later moved to Djibouti City after the British handed the Gulf of
Tadjoura over to the French in 1884.
15
The first documented significant Jewish presence in Djibouti was in the 1800s, which
coincides with the French development of Djiboutis port city in the latter years of the
19th century. Djibouti was at this time known as the Côte Française des Somalis.
16
The Jewish community played a significant role in the development of Djibouti City.
These professional Jews emigrated from Aden. However, it is unknown whether
these Jews were indeed from the Adenite community or were Baladi (from the north)
who simply passed through Aden. Both communities share minhag.
17
There were 50 Jewish families in Djibouti in 1901 and 111 in 1921.
18
Many of the
Jews were traders, craftsmen, and jewelers. The several synagogues they
frequented included the grand synagogue in the heart of the city in Rue de Rome.
The Jews of Djibouti were known as expert Hahamim;
19
they were renowned for their
superior halakhic knowledge.
20
The most prominent of the last few Rabbis of Djibouti
was the prominent Haham Yoseph Moshe, who also ministered to the Jews of
Asmara and Addis Ababa as a skilled mohel performing Jewish rituals, including
circumcisions.
21
As the number of Jews in Djibouti dwindled in the 20th century, two phenomena were
evident: increased intermarriage between the Jews and natives and the latters
conversion to Judaism. Both anomalies vanished from 1948 -1950 when the majority
of the Jews made aliyah to Israel. Operation Magic Carpet, which the new State of
Israel organized in 1949, evacuated 45,000 Yemenite Jews to Israel. This group
included 200 Jews from Djibouti who were also threatened by political unrest. A
member of the Jews of Djibouti, Moshe Sion, later recalled, a plane came from
15
Aa Rad, P e e de Aabe de Db, 1896-1977. Cae dde
africaines. 1997, 37: 319334.
16
Fec Ca f e Sa Sa: Dhulka Soomaaliyeed ee Faransiiska. France later
renamed this territory the French Somaliland.
17
Hebrew: גהנמ  ,c . , is an accepted Jewish tradition or group of traditions.
18
Gabriel Angoulvant and Sylvain Vignéras, Djibouti, Mer Rouge, Abyssinie. Paris. 1902,
415.
19
Hahamim, pl of Hakham is a term in Judaism, meaning a sage or skillful, wise man; it is
often used for gifted Torah scholars.
20
Halakha is the collective body of Jewish religious laws, practices, and piety.
21
ZfA ad A Geea, N Va S I Db (PDF). Maca. 391: 56
62. January 2012.
http://halachicadventures.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/djibouti-mishpacha.pdf
(accessed 07 March 2021).

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Aden, and we all got on and flew to Israel.
22
While in Djibouti, Moshes father
ministered as a mohel, hazzan, posek, and sofer.
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency report nonchalantly states, All but three Jews of the
Jewish community in French Somaliland [Djibouti] have immigrated to Israel,
according to information received here by the organization department of the World
Jewish Congress.
23
The report adds, A letter written by one of the three Jews
remaining in French Somaliland to Dr. I. Schwarzbart, director of the W.J.C.
organization department, reveals that the three have stayed in Djibouti in order to
liquidate the affairs of their co-religionists after all other members of the community
left for Israel.
24
The Jews living in Djibouti today are expatriates with Jewish roots as
well as just a few isolated, unaffiliated Jews.
25
The Jews of Somalia
There are records which indicate that 100-200 Jews moved to Somalia as traders
around 1900.
26
Some of these entrepreneuring Jews may have settled the port town
of Berbera where Arab, Indian and Jewish trading communities once lived.
27
Other
Somali coastal towns of Yemenite Jewish presence included Zeila, Mogadishu, and
Brava. Hussein A. Bulhan asserts that there are indications that Jewish merchants
traded in seaports along the Red Sea and established pockets of small communities
wherever commerce and peace prevailed.
28
Oral tradition has it that the last Jewish
family left Berbera in 1951 and headed for Djibouti.
29
A debilitated synagogue still
defies anti-Semitism in Berbera.
30
The Jewish neighborhood of Berbera still retains
22
Ziv; A G. O O A. J A, 2011.
https://jewishaction.com/jewish-world/travel/out_of_africa/ (accessed 07 March 2021)
23
J T A, O T J R  S; A O M
 C W  I. 15 A 1949.
https://www.jta.org/1949/08/15/archive/only-three-jews-remain-in-somaliland-all-other-
members-of-community-went-to-israel (accessed 07 March 2021).
24
J T A, O T J R  S; A O M
of Commun W  I. 15 A 1949.
https://www.jta.org/1949/08/15/archive/only-three-jews-remain-in-somaliland-all-other-
members-of-community-went-to-israel (accessed 07 March 2021)
25
, A; G, A, N V S I D. M. J 2012,
391: 5662.
http://halachicadventures.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/djibouti-mishpacha.pdf
(accessed 07 March 2021).
26
N H K, T L T J  M: L U A S F.
New Rochelle, NY. (MultiEducator, 2017), 17.
27
I P: B B F  C P. BBC, 04 J 2015
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-32978845 (accessed 08 March 2021)
28
Hussein A. Bulhan, In-Between Three Civilizations: Archeology of Social Amnesia and
Triple Heritage of Somali. Volume 1. Bethesda, Maryland. (Tayosan International Publishing, 2013),
159.
29
T B S   J P  S. S, 11 F
2018.
https://www.somalispot.com/threads/the-berbera-synagogue-and-the-jewish-presence-in-
somalia.37613/ (accessed 08 March 2021).
30
T B S   J P  S. S, 11 F
2018.

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its name, Sakatul Yuhuud.
31
Apparently, Somalias current hateful anti-Semitism is a
new phenomenon that came to Somalia with the mother of radical Islam, the Muslim
Brotherhood, in the 1970s.
A report by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) published in 1949 states, 
are no Jews left in Italian and British Somaliland, according to information received
here by the organization department of the World Jewish Congress.
32
Italian Somali
Somaliland and British Somaliland united in 1960 to form the Republic of Somalia.
Despite the JTAs pessimistic view of the existence of Somalia Jewry post-1949,
there is indisputable evidence that both traditional (publicly known) and crypto-Jews
resided in Somalia well after 1949. Up until the 19th century, Somalia was home to a
diverse trading network, which extended from New York to Yemen to Somalia and
continued all the way to Indonesia.
33
However, a significant Somalia Jewish
community resided in Somalia until shortly before Somalias independence in 1960.
Interestingly enough, Israel was the first country to recognize Somalias
independence from Great Britain and Italy. Somalia did not return that favor but
instead dispossessed and deported Jews from Somalia in 1967 in response to the
Six-Day Arab-Israeli War.
34
While people know about the traditional (publicly known) Jewry in Somalia, little is
known of the crypto-Jews who appear like any other Somali Muslim but practice their
faith discreetly. Nancy Hartevelt Kobrin corresponded with two crypto-Jews of
Yemenite descent in Mogadishu from 2007-2010. Kobrin exchanged more than 300
emails with the mom, Ashira Haybi, and her adult son, Rami. Ramis dad, Shamul,
was killed in the civil war that toppled the Somali government in 1991. This Jewish
family has roots in Somalia that exceed a century. Ramis dad traces his ancestry to
Aden, and his mom to Taiz, both in Yemen. Ashira was a successful textile
businesswoman before the civil war. She kept a kosher home, was Shabbat
observant and raised Rami to continue the tradition. They fought vigorously to
https://www.somalispot.com/threads/the-berbera-synagogue-and-the-jewish-presence-in-
somalia.37613/ (accessed 08 March 2021).
31
Abaa M. D, J Hc Pc  Saa. T T  Ia. 26
April 2019
https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/jews-historic-presence-in-somaliland/ (accessed 08 March
2021)
32
J Tac Ac, O T J Ra  Saa; A O Mb
 C W  Ia. 15 A 1949.
https://www.jta.org/1949/08/15/archive/only-three-jews-remain-in-somaliland-all-other-
members-of-community-went-to-israel (accessed 07 March 2021).
33
Nac Ha Kb, Ia Oa C: W D S G H V?
Clarion Project, 18 November 2018.
https://www.academia.edu/37798893/Ilhan_Omar_Controversy_Where_Does_She_Get_Her_Views_
Clarion_Project (accessed 08 March 2021).
34
Nac Ha Kb, Ia Oa C: W D S G H V?
Clarion Project, 18 November 2018.
https://www.academia.edu/37798893/Ilhan_Omar_Controversy_Where_Does_She_Get_Her_Views_
Clarion_Project (accessed 08 March 2021).

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preserve their Judaism under extreme duress.
35
Kobrin received the last email in
2010 and has no idea what happened to the mother and her son.
The most challenging group of the Somalia Jews to document is the crypto-Jews,
most of whom are of Adenite or Yemenite origin. These are Jews who practice
Judaism discreetly but outwardly appear to be practicing Muslims. A prominent
wealthy business family from Mogadishu is often rumored to be Yemeni Jews, but
the family denies this by claiming to be Ashraaf, descendants of Prophet
Muhammad. The home of the late patriarch of this family was looted in 1991after the
collapse of Somalias central government. According to multiple sources, the looted
goods including Jewish scriptures and other religious books, were hidden away in a
secret basement.
36
According to Nancy Kobrin, it was common for Yemenite Jews
for families to own their own Torah scroll. Rami talked about how they had such an
old Torah that they could no longer read the letters but they knew it was sacrilegious
to write or fill in the faded inked letters.
37
This crypto-Jewish family cannot be
named in this paper for their own safety.
The Yibir Clan
The Yibir, the most loathed among the despised Somali minority clans, is probably of
an Ethiopian Jewish heritage.
38
The Yibir clans ancestral home appears to be either
Harar or Jigjiga.
39
Both cities are located in eastern Ethiopia and are in close
proximity. Xantaale, the wife of a powerful Yibir King, Buur Baayr, who ruled parts of
northern Somalia around the 12th century, is buried in Harar. However, some think
her actual resting place might be in Jigjiga. Xantaales alleged tomb in Harar attracts
a steady stream of Yibir pilgrims.
40
The Yibir are known as ritual specialists with
mighty magical powers, thus the fear and suspicion most Somalis harbor against
them.
41
It is noteworthy that the Iibire clan of the Rendille in North-East Kenya, close
cousins of the Somalis, are also ritual specialists with alleged powerful curses.
However, the Iibire are honored among the Rendiile and are not thus despised.
Iibire and Yibir belong to the same etymological root. In fact, F.L. James, a 19th-
century British explorer who visited Somaliland, spelled Yibir as Ebir in his book,
The Unknown Horn of Africa.
42
35
Nancy Harteel Kbi, Wha? Thee Wee Je i Smalia?! The Jealem P. 28
January 2018.
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/what-there-were-jews-in-somalia-540076 (accessed 08 March
2021).
36
Abdul Mohamed, phone conversation with the author, 08 March 2021.
37
Nac Kbi, Wdefl Aicle. Meage  Aei A. Ali. 12 Mach 2021. Email.
38
Yibi i a Smali ci f Hebe.
39
Ben I. Aram, Smalia Jde-Christian Heritage: A Preliminary Survey. Africa Journal of
Evangelical Theology. 2003, 18-19.
40
I. M. Lewis. Peoples of the Horn of Africa: Somali, Afar, and Saho. Ethnographic Survey of
Africa, North-Eastern Africa. Part I. ed. D. Ford. London: (International African Institute, 1969), 54-55.
41
G. Schlee. Identities on the Move: Clanship and Pastoralism in Northern Kenya. Nairobi,
Kenya: (Gideon S. Were Press, 1994), 10-11, 241-242.
42
F.L. James. The Unknown Horn of Africa. (London: G. Philip & Son. 1888), 70.

30
Volume II | Issue 1, June 2021
| ISSN: 4562-3988
King Buur Baayr, who also served as the High Priest, was eventually dethroned by
a Somali Muslim preacher, Sheikh Aw-Barkhadle, also known as Sheikh Yusuf
Ahmad Kawneyn. Sheikh Aw-Barkhadle was a prominent Somali Muslim scholar,
43
whose native pedigree has been confirmed by competent authorities, including H.
Altenmüller,
44
Richard Bulliet,
45
and the Royal Geographical Society.
46
The power
encounter between the two men is immortalized in the Somali psyche.
47
The King
and his subjects practiced at the time a pre-Islamic religion.
48
The Yibir seem to have
practiced a syncretic form of Judaism and traditional religion. The Yibir to this day
harbor persistent resentment against Islam.
49
The Yibir today are between a rock
and a hard place. The fact that fellow Somalis marginalize them because of their
supposed clan inferiority is bad enough. However, their Hebraic heritage is also used
against them by some Somali Muslims.
50
Some members of the Yibir clan coined
various names for their clan to get rid of the name Yibir because of its Hebrew origin.
The alternative names minted include Anaas. No Somali would call a Yibir Anaas.
The Yibir to this day collect payments, known as samanyo from dominant clans
during weddings or when a baby boy is born.
51
If they are denied the age-old
payment, they supposedly use their magical powers to harm those who denied them
the traditional payment.
52
During the power encounter between the Muslim preacher and the King-High Priest,
Buur Baar, the King went through a mountain multiple times until Kawneyn begged
Allah to imprison the King in the mountain. In one version of the legend, the Kings
sons later demanded from Kawneyn the blood money of their murdered dad.
Kawneyn asked them whether they wanted an immediate payment or preferred to
be paid in the future for every newborn boy and for every marriage; they opted for
the second, and this is the explanation for the samanyo paid by the Somalis to the
43
I. M. Lewis, Saints and Somalis: Popular Islam in a Clan-based Society. (Red Sea Press.
1998), 89.
44
H. Alenmlle, J. O., Hnick, R.S. OFahe, and B. Sple. The Writings of the Muslim
Peoples of Northeastern Africa, Part 1, Volume 13. Leiden [u.a.]: (Brill, 2003), 174.
45
Richard Bulliet, History of the World to 1500 CE (Session 22). Tropical Africa and Asia.
Youtube.com. 23 November 2010. Retrieved 23 September 2013.
46
Royal Geogaphical Socie. The Jonal of he Roal Geogaphical Socie. Volme 19,
1849, 61.
47
Sada Mire, Wagar, Fertility and Phallic Stelae: Cushitic Sky-God Belief and the Site of Saint
Aw-Barkhadle, Somaliland. 22 March 2015, 103.
file:///Users/nomadmac/Downloads/Wagar_Fertility_and_Phallic_Stelae_Cushitic_Sky-Go.pdf
(accessed 21 January 2021).
48
The King-High Priest was later given the Muslim name, Mohamed Hanif after his death by
the Yibir, who later converted to Islam. The name change was probably an attempt by the Yibir to
remove their clan from the stigma of the anti-Islam Jewish King.
49
Ben I. Aram, Somalia Jdeo-Christian Heritage: A Preliminary Survey. Africa Journal of
Evangelical Theology. 2003, 19.
50
Elia Vitturini, The Gaboye of Somaliland: Legacies of Marginality, Trajectories of
Emancipation. University of Milan-Bicocca. Riccado Maa Depamen of Hman Science fo
Education. Doctoral Programme in Cultural and Social Anthropology. PhD Thesis, 2017, 53.
51
The Yibi em fo amano i ananimo.
52
Elia Vitturini, The Gaboye of Somaliland: Legacies of Marginality, 25.

31
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| ISSN: 4562-3988
Yibir.
53
The New York Times published in 2000 a widely circulated article titled, Djibouti
Journal; Somalias Hebrews See a Better Day.
54
The author eloquently puts the
challenges the Hebraic Yibir clan faces:
The sultan of the Jews in Somalia is a handsome, silver-haired man named
Ahmed Jama Hersi who does not know the first thing about Judaism. He is a
Muslim, as were his ancestors back at least 800 years. But he and his people
are treated badly, cursed as descendants of Israelites. The name of the tribe
is Yibir, or Hebrew.
55
While the Yibir clans Jewish origin is a widely accepted view among Somalis, there
are few other marginalized Somali clans with alleged Jewish ancestry.
The Tumaal, for example, is another ostracized Somali clan thought to have a
Hebrew origin.
56
The Tumaal are traditionally known as a talented blacksmith. Other
minority clans of alleged Jewish ancestry include the Madhiban and the Gaboye,
Conclusion
Historically, there were Jews in the Somali peninsula and therefore the likelihood of
practicing Jews residing today in this strategic Horn of Africa is very high.
Throughout time Jews have shown great tenacity to survive or even thrive in hostile
environments. The Jews suffered pain, discrimination, and dispossession throughout
history. The very fact that throughout the world there are practicing Jews speaking
Hebrew defies human logic. Not even the Holocaust, in which 6,000,000 Jews were
exterminated, could rob them of their dignity, faith, and language.
Most of the Jews, who lived in the Somali peninsula, including Somalia and
Somaliland, were of Adenite and Yemenite ancestry. There were undoubtedly other
Jews from far-flung areas like India and Greece. Some Jews were also from
Palestine before the rebirth of the State of Israel, but it seems these none-Adenite
and none-Yemenite Jews were in the minority. In fact, most of the Jews Somalis
know about are from these two latter groups.
The Yibir Somali clan is not the only native people group with Hebrew ancestry.
There are other despised minority clans, including the Tumal, Madhiban, and the
Gaboye, which some Somalis view suspiciously because of their rumored Hebrew
roots. All these clans are today practicing Muslims. The Yibir is the last Islamized
clan of these cohorts of minority clans. Unlike any other Somali clan, these minority
53
J.W.C. K, T Yb ad Md  Saad, T Tad ad Dac. Ja
of the Royal African Society 4 (13), 98-99.
54
Ian F, Db Ja; Saa Hb S a B Da. N Y T. 15
August 2000. https://www.nytimes.com/2000/08/15/world/djibouti-journal-somalia-s-hebrews-see-a-
better-day.html (accessed 21 January 2021).
55
Ia F, Db Ja; Saa Hb S a B Da.
56
Sada M, Ma  Aca  Saad: R, A, Sc, T, Uba,
Trade and Empir. Aca Acaca R. 32, Mac 2015, 124.

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clans reside in the five regions of the Somali peninsula: Somalia, Somaliland,
Djibouti, Eastern Ethiopia, and Northeast Kenya.
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_______________
About the author
Aweis A. Ali, PhD, is a missiologist and an authority on the persecuted church in the Muslim
world with special expertise on the Somali Church. Aweis, an ordained elder, has been
ministering in the Muslim world since 1993; he has lived and served in world areas that
include the Horn of Africa, East Africa, West Africa and the United States. Aweis earned a
B.Th. from the Evangelical Theological College in Addis Ababa; an M.Div. from Nazarene
Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Missouri; and a PhD from Africa Nazarene University
in Nairobi. Dr. Aweis can be reached at amazingwisdom@gmail.com.