Operation Magic Carpet

Between June 1949 and September 1950 Israel and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee flew about 49,000 Jews from Yemen, together with Jews of Aden, to the new state in some 380 flights, mostly on planes chartered from Alaska Airlines and other carriers. Many families walked for weeks across the desert to reach the British colony of Aden, where they waited in the Hashed transit camp; many arrived weak or sick, and some died on the way. The operation's Hebrew name is Kanfei Nesharim, "On Wings of Eagles".

The name comes from Exodus 19:4, "I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself", and many Yemenite Jews, who had never seen an airplane, saw the flights as that promise fulfilled. Almost the entire community, which had preserved its own traditions, its precise pronunciation of Hebrew and its manuscripts in Yemen for many centuries, was transferred. Its songs, the poetry of Rabbi Shalom Shabazi and its silver and embroidery crafts became part of Israeli culture.