The Iraqi Communist Party (ICP), established in 1934, was once the largest communist organization in all of the modern Middle East. Although not sanctioned officially by the Iraqi government, the Party amassed a large cohort of passionate, committed, and active proponents. The apex of ICP membership happened to coincide in part with a period of Jewish participation. Jewish life in Iraq dated back more than 2500 years, and the community, having produced the Babylonian Talmud, was once a premier spiritual example for Jews the world over. Jews’ participation in the Communist Party took place between 1941 and their mass exodus from their homeland, primarily to Israel, in 1951.

These Jews had both a deep ideological, political, and material commitment to the ICP and an impact that exceeded their participation numbers, which were likely never more than 300. Similarly, although few women ranked among the more notable Party members, their commitment and activities were equally as meaningful as those of more prominent men.

Among the three main religions represented in the ICP in mid-twentieth century Iraq, by percentage Jewish women participated less than Muslim women but more than Christian women. Due to the clandestine nature of the Party, membership for specific women is known primarily through the records of outside (Iraqi or British government) sources. Police interrogation records mention Ellen Yaakov Darwish, Doris and Anisa Shaul, Najia Kujman, Saida Sasson Mishal, Amuma Meir Mistri, and Marilyn Meir Ezer. Other outside recordings identify Sa’ida Salman, Albertine Menashe, and Rachel Zilkha, among others.

Throughout their tenure in the Party, Jewish women undertook a multitude of roles: creating and participating in women’s cells for recruitment and teaching; organizing demonstrations; functioning as go-betweens to pass along letters, funds, and communist literature; drafting communist protocols and assisting in the printing of literature; and participating in women-focused committees. Although the vast majority of Iraqi Jewish communists hailed from Iraq’s capital, Baghdad, some were from southern and northern Iraq as well.

Organized communism as a political path and solution flourished in Iraq, channeling disenchantment among workers and the poor into revolutionary hope. Yusuf Salman Yusuf, also known as Comrade Fahd, was inspired by his own impoverished upbringing in a Christian family from Basra to transform revolutionary spirit into action. Jews then found themselves within Comrade Fahd’s streamlined Communist Party. As communists participated in the protests against the continued British presence in Iraq during the Wathba (Leap) demonstrations of 1948, they extended reach and established themselves as archetypical Iraqi leftists. Leftist commitments appealed to many Iraqi Jews.

Besides wanting to rebuff the British colonial powers that had plagued the country since 1918, when the British formed Iraq from the three Ottoman provinces of Baghdad, Basra, and Mosul, Communist Jews were proud Iraqis who wanted to confirm their commitment to the state through their Communist actions. Antifascism was also a significant catalyst. The Soviet Union’s assistance in stamping out Nazism spoke to Jews as well. Whether recruited from coffeehouses, colleges, high schools, working-class and poor Jewish neighborhoods, or within family structures, these Jews wanted their future as Jews to be safeguarded in Iraq. They also understood resisting capitalist exploitation as a way to combat other social ills, such as colonial oppression and gender inequality.

To be sure, Jewish women likely held all of the above sentiments. They also were often attracted to Communism through family ties. Many had brothers, extended family members such as aunts and cousins, and eventually husbands, in the Party, who sparked their enthusiasm. Marilyn Meir Ezer began her political career as a Young Pioneer in the Zionist Youth Movement in her hometown, only to later follow her brother, Tzviach Meir Ezer, to Baghdad and become a committed Communist. Women family members were some of the most potent transmitters of the communist message for their sisters, cousins, and nieces. Some Jewish women met their future husbands through the ICP, and not all of these men were Jewish. Saida Sasson Mishal (who married the popular Communist official Zaki Khairy) and Marilyn Meir Ezer (who married Baha al-Din Nuri) eventually converted to Islam after meeting their husbands through Party activity. Saida even changed her name to Sa’ad.

Many Jewish ICP women were well educated, although some reportedly cut their education short in order to more fully commit to advancing the Communist mission. Still others were skilled in trades such as sewing. Their explicitly Communist education usually lasted two to three months and often included foundations of Marxism and Leninism, as well as the history and conditions of exploitation suffered by workers in Iraq.        

Iraqi Jewish women Communists also advocated for women’s suffrage and fairer laws for women, working within Iraq’s women’s movement with Jews and non-Jews alike. The ICP platform explicitly mentioned the need to address the plight of women. Iraqi Jewish Communist women followed in the footsteps of non-Jewish women who pioneered the fight for women’s rights in Iraq. As the preeminent historian of Iraqi Jews Orit Bashkin, has suggested, because the Communist Party and particularly its women members were some of the first and staunchest advocates for Iraqi women’s rights, Jewish women might have been enticed to join the ICP for this very reason. However, the ICP itself did not ensure gender equity within its own ranks. Jewish women, like all women in the Party, faced the twin burdens of Party organizing and activity and taking part in the Women’s Committee. It seems that some were encouraged to perform gendered tasks like cooking and laundering clothing. Many were called upon to act as couriers, perhaps because they would be more inconspicuous than men. In fact, although they promoted gender stereotyping, such roles might have helped women escape the worst forms of persecution (usually execution) under the Iraqi judicial system.

Many Iraqi Jewish women were enticed by Zionism because, like Communism, the movement also championed women’s rights and offered a certain amount of liberation from gendered role expectations. Their numbers were estimated at a little over 600 before the exodus to Israel in 1951. Still others were drawn to Pan-Arab or nationalist movements to fight for modernization and independence in Iraq. Jews of all political affiliations are said to have lived side by side in Iraq’s Jewish quarters. However, Communists saw Zionism as an extension of capitalist and imperialist oppression, and Zionists thought Communists suffered from a false consciousness about politics and were not fully committed to a Jewish future.

 According to Orit Bashkin, the establishment in September 1945 of the League for Combatting Zionism was one of Jewish Communists’ most significant undertakings. They were opposed to Zionism’s desire to speak for all Jews no matter their country of origin, and wary of the dangers inherent in Iraqis and others conflating Zionism and Judaism. In addition to publishing literature with their stated beliefs, the League denounced Zionism by supporting Palestine through organized protests.

Since Communism was illegal in Iraq, women sometimes faced punitive consequences along with their male counterparts. According to Bashkin, Jewish women could usually operate with less oversight by police. Yet this did not entirely free them from Iraq’s legal system. Often, women Communists visited other Party members in prison, usually to secretly transport mail as couriers. They also had to stand by as some of their male counterparts (such as noted Jewish Communist Sasson Dalal, who was once betrothed to Sa’ad Khairy) were executed for their Communist activities. When entrapped by police, these women were interrogated about letters they supposedly transported, what Communist headquarters were like, and what they knew about high-level Communist men. The women proved skilled at answering police questions, while avoiding questions that could be incriminating for them and their comrades. For instance, when Amida Mistri was asked after having been arrested in a Communist apartment whether she was in fact a Communist, she replied, “Anyone arrested in such an apartment is obviously a Communist” (271), which freed her from confessing directly. Other evasive tactics were to offer one-word, yes or no answers, never answer more than the stated question, and never provide names of other Communists. Interrogators within the judicial system often threatened the women with long prison sentences to encourage their cooperation. Amuma Meir Mistri changed her name to Amida and converted to Islam after narrowly avoiding a twenty-year prison sentence. 

Even after emigrating to Israel, Iraqi Jewish women Communists did not receive the same level of recognition as their male counterparts, such as the Iraqi Jews Sami Michael and Shimon Ballas, who gained prominence through their literary efforts as well as their activism. In literature written by Communists, women were much more likely to be acknowledged as mothers and wives rather than as comrades. Furthermore, some of the aforementioned women did not leave for Israel in 1951. For example, Sa’ad Khairy remained in Iraq after 1951, obtained a Doctor of Psychology, and wrote works about revolutionary movements like Communism. More well-known Iraqi Jewish women politicians who did make names for themselves in Israel, such as Nuzhat Katzab and Shoshana Almoslino, were not Communists. Facing capitalist, state, and gender oppression simultaneously, Iraqi Jewish women Communists deserve to be acknowledged for their bravery and dedication to fighting for just causes, even if historical records have not favored them.