400 Miles to Freedom

"That night I just remember running. No time to catch your breath, just running, because you want to be gone from the village before the sun comes up." -Avishai Mekonen, 400 MILES TO FREEDOM

In 1984, the Beta Israel, a secluded 2,500-year-old community of observant Jews in the northern Ethiopian mountains, fled a dictatorship and began a secret and dangerous journey of escape. Co-director Avishai Mekonen, then 10 years old, was among them. In this film, he breaks his 20-year silence about the brutal kidnapping he endured as a child in Sudan during his community's exodus out of Africa. This life-defining event launches an inquiry into identity, leading him to African, Asian and Latino Jews in Israel and the U.S.

Accolades

*World Premiere New York Jewish Film Festival

*Official Selection San Francisco Jewish Film Festival

*Official Selection Toronto Jewish Film Festival

*Platinum Remi Award World-Fest Houston

*Official Selection Africa World Documentary Festival

"Shari Rothfarb and Avishai Mekonen explore the exodus of Jews from Ethiopia to Israel through the story of Mekonen's personal experience. Recommended." - Video Librarian