The word “refugee” appeared 2 times in this article's opening at its peak in 2005. Today the opening carries none. 6 remain further down the article, where a reader arriving from a search result does not go.
Measured, not asserted. Every count, date and revision on this page was taken from Wikipedia's own history and checked against the live article. The words quoted are theirs.
Machine-checked against the full current article on 2026-08-02. “refugee” appeared 2 times in this article's opening at its peak. Today the opening has none; the body has 6.
We saved snapshots of this article over twenty years; you are reading the 2005 one. Red dashes: removed from Wikipedia since.Pale dots: rewritten; the numbered note shows what it says now.Red text: written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot.1 tap a number or a side note to jump between them
The opening as it read in 2005
Operation Moses , named after the biblical figure Moses , was the covert removal of Ethiopian Jews (known as Beta Israel ) from Sudan during a famine in 1984 . The operation was a cooperative effort between the Israel Defense Forces , the Central Intelligence Agency , the United States embassy in Khartoum , mercenaries and Sudanese state security forces. Begun November 21 , 1984 , it involved the air transport of some 8,000 Ethiopian Jews from Sudan directly to Israel , ending January 5 , 1985 . Thousands of Beta Israel had fled Ethiopia on foot for refugee camps in Sudan. It is estimated as many as 4,000 died during the trek. Sudan secretly allowed Israel to evacuate the refugees. Once the story broke in the media, Arab countries pressured Sudan to stop the airlift. Some 1,000 Ethiopian Jews were left behind. Most of them were evacuated later in the U.S.-led Operation Joshua . More than 1,000 so-called "orphans of circumstance" existed in Israel, children separated from their families still in Africa , until Operation Solomon completed the migration of the Ethiopian Jews.1
This is Wikipedia's own text, saved in our repository. Their copy of it is revision 16458475.
The opening as it stood in 2010
Operation Moses ( , Mivtza Moshe ) refers to the covert removal of Ethiopian Jews (known as the " Beta Israel " community or "Falashas") from Sudan during a famine in 1984. The operation, named after the biblical figure Moses , was a cooperative effort between the Israel Defense Forces , the Central Intelligence Agency , the United States embassy in Khartoum , mercenaries , and Sudanese state security forces. Beginning November 21, 1984, it involved the air transport of some 8,000 Ethiopian Jews from Sudan directly to Israel , ending January 5, 1985. Thousands of Beta Israel had fled Ethiopia on foot for refugee camps in Sudan. It is estimated as many as 4,000 died during the trek. Sudan secretly allowed Israel to evacuate the refugees. Operation Moses stopped on Friday January 5, 1985 after then-PM Shimon Peres held a press conference confirming the airlift while asking people not to talk about it.Sudan killed the airlift moments after Peres stopped speaking. Once the story broke in the media, Arab countries pressured Sudan to stop the airlift. Some 1,000 Ethiopian Jews were left behind. Many were evacuated later in the U.S.-led Operation Joshua . More than 1,000 so-called "orphans of circumstance" existed in Israel, children separated from their families still in Africa, until five years later Operation Solomon took 14,000 more Jews to Israel in 1991.This operation was the subject of an Israeli-French film titled Live and Become , directed by Romanian-born Radu Mihăileanu .The film centers on an Ethiopian child whose Christian mother passes him as a Jew so he can immigrate to Israel along with the Jews in order to escape the famine that is looming in Ethiopia.The film went on to win the 2005 award for Best Film at the Copenhagen International Film Festival .Operation Moses Aliyah through Sudan The History of Ethiopian Jews Va, vis et deviens (2005)
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 366729863.
The opening as it stood in 2015 15 passages from the previous snapshot no longer appear
Operation Moses ( , Mivtza Moshe ) refers to the covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews (known as the " Beta Israel " community or "Falashas") from Sudan during a famine in 1984. Originally called Gur Aryeh Yehuda, “Cub of the Lion of Judah” by Israelis, the United Jewish Appeal changed the name to “Operation Moses.” "Operation Moses" .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 659030109.
The opening as it stood in 2020
1984 Israeli covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews from Sudan during a civil war For other uses, see Operation Moshe (disambiguation) . Operation Moses ( , Mivtza Moshe ) refers to the covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews (known as the " Beta Israel " community or "Falashas") from Sudan during a civil war that caused a famine in 1984. Originally called Gur Aryeh Yehuda (“Cub of the Lion of Judah”) by Israelis, the United Jewish Appeal changed the name to “Operation Moses.” "Operation Moses" .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 963222884.
The opening as it stood on October 6, 2023
1984 Israeli covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews from Sudan during a civil war For other uses, see Operation Moshe (disambiguation) . Operation Moses ( , Mivtza Moshe ) was the covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews (known as the " Beta Israel " community or "Falashas") from Sudan during a civil war that caused a famine in 1984. Originally called Gur Aryeh Yehuda ("Cub of the Lion of Judah") by Israelis, the United Jewish Appeal changed the name to "Operation Moses".
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 1162828152.
The opening as it stood in 2025
1984 Israeli covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews from Sudan during a civil war For other uses, see Operation Moshe (disambiguation) . Operation Moses ( Hebrew : מִבְצָע מֹשֶׁה , Mivtza Moshe ) was the covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews (known as the " Beta Israel " community or the derogatory "Falashas") from Sudan during a civil war that caused a famine in 1984. Originally called Gur Aryeh Yehuda ("Cub of the Lion of Judah") by Israelis, the United Jewish Appeal changed the name to "Operation Moses".
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 1253259458. This is our newest snapshot; the live article may have moved again since.
Today
“refugee” appeared 2 times in this article's opening at its peak. Today the opening has none; the body has 6. Read the current article and compare.
2005
2010
2015
2020
Oct '23
2025
Counts in the opening at each snapshot. Green: the word gained ground. Red: it was cut. Grey: no change.
What Wikipedia says this is
Every article opens by defining its subject. This one was redefined between 2005 and 2025.
Then
covert removal of ethiopian jews
Now
covert evacuation of ethiopian jews
Struck red text is no longer in the article; dotted amber text was rewritten. Every revision id links to Wikipedia's copy; the text shown is our own saved copy. Data: /data. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA; quoted for the record; not affiliated with Wikipedia.
