After Israel was founded in 1948, the Knesset passed the Law of Return, which declares that every Jew has a place in the Jewish homeland. As part of fulfilling that pledge, the Israeli government, in partnership with the Federation-funded Jewish Agency and others, secretly transported 49,000 Jews from Yemen to Israel from June 1949-September 1950. The effort was called Operation Magic Carpet. In 2016, 19 of the last Jews remaining in Yemen were transported to Israel.