History of the Jews in Hadramaut

The history of the Jews in Hadramaut stretches back to ancient times.

The community was very old,[1][2] and, after the rise of Islam and the expulsion of the Hejazi Jews, the main centers of Jewish population in Arabia were in Hadhramaut and in Aden.

However, the Jews of Hadhramaut were much more isolated than their counterparts in Aden, and the community only became known to the outside world in the 1940s.

The Jews of Hadhramaut lived in Seiyun, Tarim, Mukalla and al-Shihr.

After the union between South Yemen and the Yemen Arab Republic in the North, and because of the strict tribal system, most of these families melted into the tribes of Arabia by renaming their laqab ("family name") after a well-known Muslim tribe to avoid discrimination based on their former Jewish roots.