These documents contain correspondence, mostly on a personal level, of the President of the Jewish Community in Baghdad. Included are requests for a telephone to be installed in a school, teacher labor issues, student transfers, receipts and invoices, thank you notes and condolences to members of the Jewish Diaspora in Europe, America, and the Middle East. The documents include an excerpt from the 1945 edition of the Biographical Encyclopedia of the World, featuring the president of the Jewish community of Baghdad, Sassoon Khedouri; a license to import one Chevrolet car from the U.S.; a wedding invitation; and several business cards of foreign dignitaries.

These are archival documents from the Baghdadi Jewish Community. They include correspondence from the President of the Jewish Community in Baghdad to Jewish community presidents in Sulaymaniyah, Irbil, Mosul, Basrah, Kirkuk, Fallujah, regarding condolences, regulations, hospitals, permits, religious dietary laws, smallpox, distributions to the poor, employment and unemployment, financial settlements, legal settlements, charitable donations and requests for documentation. There is also correspondence with various government and community organizations including the Office of Information – Mosul; National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of Iraq; The British Bank of Iran; Office of the Haham of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews of Great Britain; Chevrolet; Iraqi Red Crescent Society; The Society for Improving the Conditions of the Blind in Iraq; French Ambassador in Iraq; The Chartered Bank of India, Australia and China; The Great Synagogue of Baghdad; and the President of the Catholic Diaspora. The item also includes the newspapers: الزمان (Al-Zamān), Issue #4764 from May 1, 1953; and الحوادث (Al-Ḥawādth), Issue #3096 from 1953.

This archival material includes most correspondence with Rabbi Sasson Khedouri. Topics include: correspondence from Midrash Talmud Torah regarding educational and financial matters; election of members to a Management Committee for the Baghdad Brigade; letter to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs regarding Rabbi Khedouri’s testimony before a British-American Commission of Inquiry on the state of Israel; document of questions and Rabbi Khedouri’s answers on the following issues: Jewish status in Iraq, the state of Israel, equality of Jews on paying taxes, education, obtaining jobs, business, religion freedom, travelling, teaching Hebrew, and the number of Jews in Iraq; a form to collect factual information on the Jewish community to be published in the al-Rafidain Directory; a letter from Iraq Red Crescent Society to the head of Jewish community regarding the death of three Iraqis in Java, Indonesia prisons; a letter from a researcher; an invitation for a theater play from the Children's Protection Society; Shamash Company asking for help to distribute fabric to the poor; letter of complaint from a Muslim because some Jews entered the al-Kazmia holy place; a complaint regarding the Jewish community's girls behavior; letter asking for help on a forgery matter; letter asking for help from a Russian Jew who moved to Baghdad; letter asking for help to get papers from the Ministry of Supply to print the Jewish annual calendar for 5708; letter from the al-Jafería Schools Association asking for book donations to build a library; letters to the head of the Jewish community regarding obituaries for martyrs; letter to write an introduction for a book about Iraqi Crown Prince Abdullah; letters from the President of the Jewish Community asking for help on some matters.

These are documents from the Baghdadi Jewish Community. They contain correspondence regarding marriages, divorces, civil disputes; the birthday celebrations of the Iraqi king, responses to inquires about the treatment of Iraqi Jews under Iraq’s citizenship laws, the history of Jews in Iraq, and the provision of Jewish artifacts to the Iraqi Museum. There are receipts for furniture stores and other vendors, invoices; budget allocations, deficits, and planning for various community organizations and institutions; ritual slaughtering administration, names of butchers with the numbers of animals slaughtered, names of community organization members, ledgers of payments for goods or fees, building plans, provisions for school children, concerns over hospital food distribution, blanket distribution to the poor, receptions, meetings, shipment orders, import and export of goods, the care of orphans, and a census on the number of synagogues in Baghdad in 1945 (40). There are copies of a printed text titled “Appeal to Save the Children.” Letters include: the President of the Jewish Community to the Controller of Foodstuffs in Baghdad thanking the Controller for the allotment of sugar and tea for the students at the Rahel Shamoon School; addressing complaints at the Meir Elias Hospital in Baghdad; purchasing blankets for the poor via the Poor Welfare Society; sending money rather than clothes from an importer in New York City to the poor in Baghdad since clothing costs have gone up.

These are documents from the Baghdadi Jewish Community committees and associations through which the Jewish community conducted its business; included for each committee are names of chairmen, board of directors, and secretaries. The documents contain correspondence between the President of the Jewish Community and various Jewish schools in Baghdad, including Frank Iny, Tomkhe Tora Society (teaching Torah to poor children), and the Midrash Talmuh Torah Schools. Subjects include classroom assignments, teacher salaries, requests for Hebrew Bibles from the British and Foreign Bible Society in London for schools in Baghdad. There is also correspondence with the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior regarding the laws of establishing organizations, and documents outlining the arrangement of various organizations including the Dorshe Tora Society (teaching Torah to adults) and Ozer Dalim (committee for helping the poor); correspondence between the Jewish Lay Council and the Baghdad Chamber of Commerce, the Ḥevrah Ḳadishah (Burial Society), Meir Elias Hospital and the Jewish Hospitals Committee; correspondence regarding the training of ambulance attendants, the annual report of the Red Crescent Society from 1947, and lists of the heads and structure of Jewish organizations, hospitals and schools. These committees were all vital in the daily life of Baghdadi Jews.