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Fazal Ahmad, London, UK
Location: Tahiti, South Pacific
Belief: Judaism
Era: 1993 CE
The island of Tahiti in the heart of the South Pacific might be the last place you’d expect to find evidence of Judaism. However, in Papeete, there is a Jewish synagogue in French Polynesia, located hundreds of miles east of Australia.
Tahiti is a remote island with rare natural beauty and limited access to Australia and the rest of the world.
The synagogue was established by the Sephardic Jewish community in 1993. It is called Ahava v’Achva, meaning love and friendship. Jews first arrived in Papeete in 1796, primarily from North African countries, including Morocco. An English merchant, Alexander Salmon, settled in French Polynesia in 1791 and married into the Tahitian royal family. Some of the early Jewish settlers converted to Catholicism.
Over the past century, groups of Jews emigrated to Tahiti from Algeria, Morocco, and other parts of North Africa.
There are three copies of the Torah in Tahiti, one of which was donated by the Egyptian Jewish community in Paris with links to French Polynesia. Services for the 30 Jewish families on the island are held periodically by a visiting rabbi from Australia, with Kosher food and dishes for Jewish festivals being shipped from France.
References:
B. Kingstone, “Papeete, Tahiti: A Surprise Synagogue in the South Pacific,” Indulged Traveller, 2011. Accessed: September 5, 2025.