JEWS IN EGYPT
FROM the time of the Exodus the Jews were warned not to return to Egypt, but so little did they heed these warnings that when the great city which bore his name was founded in 332 by Alexander the Great, they were already present there; and under his successors formed so large a portion of the population that a distinct section of the city was assigned to them. This diaspora spread from Alexandria throughout Egypt, and synagogues there were dedicated to the Ptolomys of which we have records in some of the fragments of papyri which have been unearthed in that country. It was especially in the Fayyum, a little below Cairo but on the other side of the Nile, that an important Jewish community existed in those days; and it is sufficient to think of the Gaon Saadia, the man from the Fayyum, to remember this, his birthplace with gratitude.
No mean share in the renaissance of Egypt which resulted from the influence exercised by the Arab Bedouins and by the prophet of Mecca, falls to the Jews.
Unfortunately,the history of our people in Egypt during this period is not written in books nor chronicled in the writings of historians. As in nearly all other places the vicissitudes through which they passed have destroyed nearly every monument of their existence and it is from torn and tattered bits of papyrus, of parchment and of paper, from occasional references in Arabic authors, and in scattered writings of the Jews, that we gain a faint glimpse into the life that they led during that period. Mohammed, the Arabian prophet, had died in the year 632 and it
was not until 639 that the Arab forces under Amr ibn al-Asi invaded Egypt. The caliph Omar in Damascus was not enthusiastic in regard to this expedition; but Amr is said to have been in Alexandria during his youth and to have remembered the wealth which he saw there and which impressed his Arab mind, unused to such things. How the Jews looked upon the coming of the Arabs, it is impossible to tell. But they had little reason to feel kindly towards the masters of Egypt who immediately preceded the sons of the desert. They had suffered a general massacre early in the 7th century, after the Emperor Heraclius had driven the Jews from Jerusalem. The Byzantine power had been aided by the Copts, who had old scores to wipe out against the Jews for having assisted the Persians in 617 against the Christians in Egypt.
The stipulations made with the Jews by Mohammed and his successors, though in some respects harsh, were more acceptable than the unstipulated restrictions which existed under other rulers. How numerous the Jews were at that time may be seen from the fact that when the city of Alexandria was captured 40,000 of them were found there. The treaty of surrender which was signed in November, 641, expressly stipulates that the Jews were to be suffered to remain at Alexandria. What other Jews therewere in Egypt at this time we do not know; but the center of importance was already passing from Alexandria further South to the Roman camp "al-Fostat," a little northeast of the present Cairo. Fostat remained the social capital for three centuries and