Iraqi Jewish Books
Galei Tzahal (Israel Army Radio) is reporting that the Iraqi Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities is accusing Israel of stealing hundreds of Jewish books from Iraq. According to the report, a few years ago around three hundred Jewish books which were in the possession of the Iraqi Jewish community were smuggled out of Iraq to Israel. See here, here, and here for discussions about these books. They are currently on display at the Babylonian Jewry Heritage Center in Or Yehudah, Israel. This collection includes twenty books of Rabbi Yosef Hayyim of Baghdad, the Ben Ish Hai. The two rarest books on display are an edition of Gersonides’s commentary on the book of Job, published in Napoli in 1487, and a book of responsa by Rabbi Moshe Alshich, published in Venice in 1605.
There is an additional collections of books numbering in the thousands which were shipped out of Iraq by the American Army and are currently being stored in America. The Iraqis are also demanding the return of these books.