Mizoram has recently found itself in international headlines for reasons that are unusual and largely unfamiliar to many outside the region. In late November 2025, Israel approved a proposal to bring back the remaining 5,800 members of the Bnei Menashe Jewish community from Mizoram and Manipur over the next five years.
The move has renewed global attention on a small community in India’s Northeast whose story spans faith, migration, colonial history, and identity.
The Israeli government plans to resettle the Bnei Menashe primarily in Nof HaGalil and other towns in northern Galilee, a region bordering Lebanon. Israel has said the move is aimed at strengthening the Jewish population in underdeveloped and conflict-affected areas, many of which have seen residents flee due to security concerns.
While the final list of those approved has not yet been released, many are hopeful of leaving by February. But who are the Bnei Menashe, and how did a community in Mizoram come to be recognised by the Israeli government as having Jewish roots?
The idea of a “lost tribe”
A study by a professor from Mizoram University’s Department of History helps trace this complex story. According to his study, this idea is not new. The Chin-Kuki-Mizo tribes came under British colonial control in the 1890s.
The British restricted outside entry into the region and encouraged Christian missionary activity in Mizoram, Manipur, and Chin State in present-day Myanmar. Missionaries introduced the Roman script and translated the Bible into local dialects, transforming religious life in the region.
As communities engaged deeply with biblical texts, many began noticing parallels between their pre-Christian traditions and ancient Israelite practices, particularly sacrificial customs and moral codes.
Visions, prophecy, and early belief
According to the study, the first explicit claim of Israelite ancestry emerged during a religious revival in 1936, when two men, Pu Kapa and Pu Saichhuma, claimed to have received prophecies identifying the Mizo as descendants of Israelites.
In 1951, Challianthanga, a church leader in Buallawn village in Mizoram, reported having a vision in which God revealed that the Mizo were Israelites and must return to their original homeland to survive an impending Armageddon.
News of these beliefs spread rapidly. In the mid-1950s, some families sold property, stopped farming, and withdrew children from school in preparation for a return to Israel. When no such return materialised, most resumed normal life, but a small group continued to hold on to these beliefs.
Conflict, migration, and consolidation of identity
The story took another turn in 1966 when Mizoram erupted in an armed uprising against Indian rule. Amid military operations and village regrouping, many people fled to neighbouring Manipur, especially Churachandpur, where interest in Israelite origins was also growing.
The study says, in Manipur, several communities began adopting practices they believed were biblically ordained. In 1972, the Manipur Jews Organisation was formed. While outward practices such as wearing skullcaps and headscarves were adopted, beliefs initially remained largely Christian.
During the 1970s and 1980s, booklets circulated tracing the supposed journey of the lost tribes from ancient Israel through Central Asia, China, Myanmar, and finally Northeast India. Leaders sought contact with Jewish communities in cities like Bombay and Calcutta.
Recognition and migration to Israel
From the 1980s onwards, Israeli researchers and religious figures began visiting Northeast India to investigate these claims.
Over time, evidence was gathered pointing to similarities between Mizo customs and Jewish traditions, including songs, chants, festivals, and rituals. Some scholars have documented more than sixty cultural practices said to resemble Jewish customs.
In 2005, the story drew international attention when around 1,700 Chin-Kuki-Mizo people, after formally converting to Judaism, were allowed to migrate to Israel. By 2019, about 3,500 had relocated.
Do Mizo rituals and songs point to an Israelite past?
According to the Mizoram University study, one of the strongest cultural arguments cited by those claiming Israelite descent lies in ritual practices, songs, and oral traditions passed down over generations.
The research highlights the Hmar Sikpui Festival, celebrated since ancient times, whose songs are interpreted by adherents as referencing the Israelites’ escape from Egyptian bondage under Moses and their crossing of the Red Sea.
Alongside this, repeated invocations of “Manmasi” in traditional chants and ceremonies are associated with Manasseh, one of the lost tribes of Israel.
During festivals such as Kawngpuisiam, village priests would invoke Manmasi while performing sacrifices, asserting descent from him and seeking forgiveness for the “children of Manasseh,” while similar invocations were made during the founding of new villages.
The study further notes that before the advent of Christianity, sacrificial rites were common among the Mizo, with priests constructing four-cornered altars and sprinkling animal blood, practices researchers compare to ancient Israelite rituals.
Oral traditions also speak of a lost written script, believed by claimants to have been a Torah scroll, allegedly destroyed when eaten by a dog.
How did Jewish identity spread in Mizoram?
According to the Mizoram University study, Jewish identity narratives in Mizoram gained momentum through organised movements and influential local figures.
A key catalyst was the Chhinlung Israel People Convention (CIPC), founded in 1994 by Lalchhanhima Sailo, which formalised claims of Israelite descent.
While drawing heavily on Jewish identity, the organisation’s stated goal was not migration to Israel but the pursuit of an independent homeland for Mizo-inhabited areas through international recognition.
At its peak, CIPC claimed around 200,000 members, with its headquarters in Aizawl and branches across Myanmar and Bangladesh, and it even submitted a memorandum to the United Nations in 1998 asserting descent from the tribes of Manasseh and Ephraim.
The study also highlights the pivotal role of Zaithanchhungi, a former teacher and insurance worker, in spreading these ideas. After being encouraged by Rabbi Avichail to research possible links between Mizo traditions and ancient Judaism, she conducted comparative studies that were later presented in Israel and published as Mizo-Israel Identity.
Although she never converted to Judaism, her work, social influence, and active engagement with visiting Jewish delegations helped embed Israelite identity narratives into public discourse in Mizoram.
What do DNA studies say?
The study also examines genetic research conducted to test claims of Middle Eastern ancestry. In 2003, genetic samples from 350 Chin-Kuki-Mizo individuals were tested at the Technion–Israel Institute of Technology.
The results were never formally published, and researchers involved later stated that no clear evidence of Middle Eastern origin was found.
A subsequent study conducted in 2004 by Kolkata’s Central Forensic Science Laboratory tested 414 individuals.
While no evidence of Middle Eastern ancestry was found among the men, some genetic markers were detected among a small number of women, possibly indicating historical intermarriage during migration. The study cautions that this research did not undergo peer review.
Despite the lack of definitive genetic proof, the Mizoram University research notes that in 2005, Sephardi Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar formally recognised the Bnei Menashe as descendants of a lost tribe of Israel after years of reviewing historical, cultural, and religious evidence.
This recognition allowed community members to immigrate to Israel under the Law of Return.
The Mizoram University study situates these developments in the socio-economic realities of mid-20th-century Mizoram, where poverty and limited opportunities made biblical narratives of a “chosen people” and a “promised land” deeply appealing.
Songs, prayers, and sermons increasingly invoked Israel as a spiritual homeland.
At the same time, it highlights the complexity of identity among the Chin-Kuki-Mizo, who lack a single written historical record, unified leadership, or common dialect, leading many contemporary identity labels to be imposed by colonial administrators and outsiders.
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