In the early 1890s, the more enlightened elements of Yemeni Jewry began pleading with Jewish organizations and leaders abroad to help them open a modern Jewish school in Sanʿa. In 1908, encouraged by the Ottoman government, some of them enrolled their children in the state modern school (maktab rushdiyya), but this soon came to an end because of Muslim protests against Jewish children attending school with Muslim children. In 1910, at the request of the Jewish community’s leaders, the Ottoman government opened a maktab for Jews alone, the only such school in the entire empire. 

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