The Black Hebrews (or African Hebrew Israelite Nation of Jerusalem) is a small religious group whose members believe they are descended from the ten lost tribes of Israel. Most members live in their own community in Dimona, Israel, and they now number over 2000, reportedly boosting their numbers through polygamy. Dimona is an Israeli city in the Negev desert, 36 kilometers to the south of Beer-Sheva and 35 kilometers west of the Dead Sea in the Southern District of Israel. ... Polygamy, literally many marriages in ancient Greek, is a marital practice in which a person has more than one spouse simultaneously (as opposed to monogamy where each person has a maximum of one spouse at any one time). ...

The group was founded in Chicago by a former steel worker named Ben Carter, who changed his name to Ben-Ami Ben Israel upon his arrival in Israel. Carter claims he had a "vision", in which the archangel Gabriel revealed to him that African-Americans were descended from the "lost tribe of Judah", Israelites who were expelled from Jerusalem in 70 A.D. and, after migrating for 1,000 years ended up in West Africa, later transported to America as slaves. Chicago (officially named the City of Chicago) is the third largest city in the United States (after New York City and Los Angeles), with an official population of 2,896,016, as of the 2000 census. ... Gabriel delivering the Annunciation. ... African Americans, also known as Afro-Americans or black Americans, are an ethnic group in the United States of America whose ancestors, usually in predominant part, were indigenous to Sub-Saharan and West Africa. ... Jerusalem (Hebrew: יְרוּשָׁלַיִם Yerushalayim; Arabic: القدس al-Quds; see also names of Jerusalem) is an ancient Middle Eastern city of key importance to the religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. ... West Africa is the region of western Africa generally considered to include these countries: Benin Burkina Faso Cameroon Côte dIvoire (Ivory Coast) Equatorial Guinea Gabon The Gambia Ghana Guinea Guinea-Bissau Liberia Mali Niger Nigeria Republic of the Congo (Congo-Brazzaville) Senegal Sierra Leone Togo Chad, Mauritania, and...

Carter and 30 of his followers first settled in Liberia, and in 1969, began moving to Israel, entering the country on temporary visas that were periodically renewed. As their numbers grew, the Chief Rabbinate of Israel ruled that they were not Jews, and therefore not entitled to Israeli citizenship under the Law of Return. However, members of the group continued to arrive and settled in the desert community of Dimona anyway. For two decades their population grew, through natural increase and illegal immigration. The Israeli government refused to grant them citizenship, yet also refused to deport them. In May 1990 they reached an agreement with the government whereby they were granted tourist status with a B/1 visa that entitled them to work; in 1991 they were given temporary resident status (A/5) for a period of five years, which in 1995 was extended for another three years. At the beginning of 2004, they were granted residency status by the interior ministry, which exempted them from mandatory military service. The Law of Return is Israeli legislation that allows Jews to settle in the State of Israel and gain citizenship. ... Dimona is an Israeli city in the Negev desert, 36 kilometers to the south of Beer-Sheva and 35 kilometers west of the Dead Sea in the Southern District of Israel. ...

Most of the group live communally in what used to be an absorption center. It is an open community which receives hundreds of visitors each year and is a favorite shortcut for Dimona high school students. The group maintains a vegan vegetarian diet and abstinence from alcohol, other than wine that they make themselves, and both illegal and pharmaceutical drugs. The group also owns and runs a chain of vegetarian restaurants throughout the country. In its adjective form, vegan describes: a philosophy and practise of respect for animals, which avoids the use of animals for food, clothing, and other human purposes people who ascribe to such a philosophy and practise food, clothing, other products, or diets that avoid the use of animals in line...

The group rejects the Talmud and the idea that Judaism is passed down through a person's mother. They also believe that modern-day Jews are not the descendants of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, and that white Jews have stolen the religion, language and culture of the "true Jews," drawing comparison to both cults and the white power movement. The first page of the Talmud, in the standard Vilna edition. ... For a discussion of Jews as an ethnicity or ethnic group see the article on Jew. ... This is a list of the Tribes of Israel. ... In traditional usage, the cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings (scriptures), its theology or myths, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety. ... White Power is a phrase thought to have been coined by George Lincoln Rockwell during a white supremacist rally in Marquedt Park, Illinois in 1967 (whereby the term began being uttered sponteniously). ...

They are unrelated to Beta Israel, Jews from Ethiopia. The Beta Israel (or House of Israel), known by outsiders by the Ethiopian origin. ...

External links

• Official site (http://www.kingdomofyah.com/)
• Description from Jewish Virtual Library (http://www.us-israel.org/jsource/Society_&_Culture/Black_Hebrews.html)