Israel’s First Ethiopian Jewish Doctor
by Judy Siegel-Itzkovich
On November 10, 1999, 27-year-old Avraham Yitzhak became the first Ethiopian immigrant to earn an MD degree in Israel. His first assignment was working as an itern at the Soroka Hospital in Beersheba and afterwards he served as a physician in the Israel Defense Forces.
After nearly nine years in Israel, Yitzhak
graduated from the medical school of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in
Be'er Sheva and officialy became the first Ethiopian immigrant to earn an MD degree. Not only
does he speak perfect Hebrew, but his high marks placed him among the ten best
students in his graduating class, and he was asked to deliver the valedictory
address.
Extremely bright, Yitzhak graduated from high school in
Addis Ababa at the age of 15, and before emigrating from Ethiopia in 1991, he
was the only Jew in Addis Ababa University Medical School. Now, at age 28, Dr.
Yitzhak has the broad smile of a man who has found his way home and the
assurance and self-confidence lacking in many recent immigrants. He is also a
family man, married to fellow-immigrant Genet, a social worker, who gave birth
to their second child not long after his graduation. Currently doing his
internship at Soroka Hospital in Be'er Sheva, he is due soon to start his
military service as a physician. He wants to specialize in internal medicine
or in surgery.
Yitzhak arrived here alone three weeks before the famous Operation
Solomon, which brought 15,000 Ethiopian
Jews in a mass airlift; he was one of the last in his family to immigrate.
His father, who had been an educator and head of the Addis branch of ORT
(Organization for Relief through Training), and his four siblings had to leave
Ethiopia because of earlier pro-Israel activities.
When Avraham was in his third year of studies in Addis, his
father returned for a visit, and they had an emotional reunion on campus. But
when the visit of his father - who was wanted by the Ethiopian government for
his Zionist activities - became known, he was
prohibited from taking his belongings and books out of the dormitory building;
and finally, with the authorities on his heels, he ran to the Israel Embassy
for assistance.
Although medicine now fascinates him, Yitzhak was actually
dared by friends to apply to the English-speaking medical school of Addis
Ababa University. "I took the tests and did well. After getting into
medicine, I fell in love with it, and I studied there for three-and-a-half
years," he recalls.
However, what he learned in Addis was purely theoretical.
"We didn't have the medicines or equipment to apply what we
learned." Accepted by both the medical schools of Tel Aviv University and
BGU, Yitzhak decided to settle down in the south. He also insisted on going
back to the beginning of his studies, rather than continuing with the
third-year curriculum.
When asked about the difficulties he faced as a medical
student at BGU, he says quietly, "There is always some racism, but it
comes from people who don't know you. At first, I felt hurt; I took it
personally. But I was determined not to let it bother me."
Sources: Israeli
Foreign Ministry; Israel Magazine-On-Web, April 2000,:Jerusalem Post, (November 11, 1999) |