While under Baath Party rule, from 1968 to 2003, the Iraqi people were barred from examining the issue of Jews living in Iraq, their forced emigration and their influence on Iraqi life. Everything about the Jewish community's contribution to Iraqi society was suppressed. Since 2003, however, Iraqis have begun revisiting their fellow Jews and their imprint on society. They have also begun to expose the methods used to displace them.

Jews had lived in Iraq for more than 2,500 years, mostly in Baghdad, but also in Babil, Mosul and other cities. They were estimated on average to represent 2.6% of the total Iraqi population. In the 1940s and early 1950s, the Jews became victims of looting and killings, which eventually led to their displacement. The first attacks against Jews took place in 1941, under the Nazi-allied government of Prime Minister Rashid Ali al-Gaylani.

In his book “My Beloved Baghdad,” professor Shmuel Moreh references government statistics citing thousands of deaths among Jews and Iraqis at the time. The Iraqi writer and historian Kadhem Habib documented the statistics in a study titled “The February-May 1941 coup and Farhud against Jews.” He cites June 1941 government statistics estimating that 110 people were killed and 204 others injured. Habib also included estimates from observers, among them the leader of the Jews in Iraq, whom he quoted as saying, “The number of Jews who were killed is 179, while 2,118 were wounded. The number of houses that were looted during Farhud reached 1,000, while 2,500 shops were robbed. And 40,000 Jews suffered a little or a lot of losses.”

Anger toward Jews, who were viewed as pro-British and pro-Zionist, grew and attacks escalated in Baghdad through the partition of Palestine in 1948. The Iraqi government issued a resolution in 1950 declaring the need for the Jews of Iraq to relinquish their nationality and depart for Israel, leaving their possessions behind. The historian Rashid al-Khayoun claims that some Arab religious figures had a role in developing the plan for the Jews' forced displacement of some 150,000 Iraqis.