Ancient Jewish communities in the Middle East formed a distinct civilization

Researchers describe a two-millennium-old Jewish civilization in the Mediterranean and Middle East that functioned under Islamic rule.

This civilization included communities in Babylonia, Persia, Yemen, Egypt, and the Maghreb. These groups developed unique cultural identities, including Judeo-Arabic, Judeo-Persian, and Judeo-Berber traditions, which were deeply integrated into the wider Arab-Islamic world. The Islamic dhimma system provided these Jewish communities with a legal framework that granted them physical security and internal autonomy.

In exchange for a poll tax and a subordinate social status, these groups maintained their own courts, religious laws, and communal institutions. This structure allowed for a period of commercial mobility and intellectual synthesis. Records from the Cairo Geniza show that these communities traded grain, spices, textiles, and metals across the Mediterranean and as far as India. The modern term Mizrahi is an Israeli administrative category created in the twentieth century to group these diverse communities together.

This label emerged after the mass exodus of these populations during the mid-twentieth century due to decolonization and regional conflicts. While the communities were distinct from one another before this period, they shared a common history of settlement and coexistence within the Islamicate political order.