Minority of One with Hussein Aboubakr

Join the Temple Beth Sholom community for a special presentation by Hussein Aboubakr, a former political refugee from Cairo, Egypt. Hussein will be sharing the inspiring story of how he grew up in Egypt in a society suffused with anti-Semitism, and how he refused to let negative beliefs about Jews cloud his belief in peace between the Arab world and Israel.

Hussein Aboubakr Mansour was born in 1989 in Cairo, Egypt. He was a self-described reclusive Internet nerd, obsessed with comic books and the like. The ultimate villains in the local lore he was steeped in during his youth were the “bloodthirsty Zionists,” so Hussein began to study the supposed enemies of his people.

Hussein studied Hebrew at Cairo University, but did not adapt to the curriculum which was the official anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rhetoric of the regime. Hussein was persecuted by the Egyptian State Police for being

the first visitor to check out books and watch films at the Israeli Academic Center of Cairo. In 2010 he was surveilled, harassed, and jailed for his studies of Israel. Later the same year, he was suspected of being a “Zionist agent” and was held in a military detention facility where he was tortured.

When the Egyptian Revolution swept in 2011, Hussein became an organizer in Tahrir Square. By 2012 the secret police of the Muslim Brotherhood regime again began harassing and persecuting Hussein for his contacts with Israelis and writings expressing hopes for coexistence and peace between the two peoples.

He received asylum in the United States in 2014 and worked as an Assistant Professor of Hebrew Studies in the Defense Language Institute. In 2019, Hussein joined StandWithUs, an organization that supports Israel and fights anti-Semitism.

Click here to view the documentary Minority of One. Password: SWUFEB23

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