Jews

Varying patterns of immigration, as well as differing degrees of acculturation, adaptation, and assimilation, have characterized the diverse Jewish population in Latin America and the Caribbean. Ashkenazim (Jews of Central and Eastern European ancestry) currently constitute the majority of the approximately half a million Jews in the region, but the first Jews to land in the New World came from Spain and Portugal. Early arrivals have been traced back to the initial voyages of exploration undertaken by Columbus and others sailing on behalf of Spain. These voyages represented Spain's outward expansion and were a direct result of Spanish unification and of the end of the war against the Moors. They were undertaken at the height of the power of the Spanish Catholic Church, during the Inquisition.

The impact of the Inquisition cut a path across the Atlantic, for only those who could document their Catholic ancestry were sanctioned to enter these new lands. Nevertheless, conversos and suspect "New Christians" (Jewish converts to Christianity), along with a handful of Jews who managed to elude state edicts, in fact became the earliest Jewish settlers of the Americas. A tolerant environment and distance from the Inquisition's reach were major factors in the initial establishment of Jewish communities in both Spanish- and Portuguese-controlled territories and, shortly thereafter, in the Dutch-ruled possessions of Pernambuco and Bahia on the mainland and Curaçao and Suriname in the Caribbean. The experience of the descendants of Spanish and Portuguese marranos (converts to Christianity who secretly maintained their Judaism), who saw themselves as "La Nación," constitutes a unique chapter in the history of Jewish settlements in the Caribbean, which began to flourish in the seventeenth century.

It is both ironic and tragic that the best sources for Jewish life in the early colonial period are dossiers that document persecution and autos-da-fé, such as the destruction of Luis de Carvajal and his family in Mexico and the trial of Francisco Maldonado de Silva in Tucumán, then under the aegis of the Viceroyalty of Peru; detailed records of the Inquisition also portray the daily life of New Christians in Brazil. Many of the New Christians were eventually assimilated into the region's mainstream population, and only occasional traces (names and isolated but telling customs) link descendants to their Jewish origins. The modified Jewish traditions still being observed by the inhabitants of Venta Prieta (Mexico), and by some inhabitants of Loja (Ecuador), attest to non-Christian roots.

While a relatively small number of Jews had already settled in Latin America and on several Caribbean islands as the independence movements unfolded (Jews were, for instance, among the supporters of Simón Bolívar), today's Jewish population must be seen in the context of nineteenth-century migration waves linked to World War I and World War II. This holds true for both Ashkenazi and for Sephardic Jews from Northern Africa and the Middle East. Official immigration plans played a role in attracting Europeans, Jews among them, to the nascent republics. Beyond these plans, however, the dominant factor in the migration of Jews to Latin America and the Caribbean, whether in the sixteenth or in the twentieth century, has been the possibility of finding a haven from persecution (oftentimes, since the 1800s, as a second choice to the United States) and access to opportunities that had been foreclosed in European towns and villages.

A notable example of a prompt and coordinated response to persecution—especially pogroms—under czarist Russia was framed by Baron Maurice de Hirsch and, under his guidance, by the Jewish Colonization Association (JCA) by resettling Jews in an agricultural setting in Argentina. The experiment, lauded by Alberto Gerchunoff as an unmitigated success that delivered a new Zion for the Jews, began to falter as the descendants of the colonists opted for urban life. Contrary to patterns elsewhere, a significant segment of the Jewish immigrants to several Latin American nations became an integral part of the urban labor force. Socialist and anarchist tenets among the urban proletariat contributed to anti-Semitic outbursts and pogroms during labor struggles. In 1919, the Semana Trágica (Tragic Week) served as a powerful reminder of Argentina's painful readjustment to the changing economic order and to the reweaving of its social fabric; it was also a reminder that anti-Jewish feeling had taken root on this side of the Atlantic. Today, most of Argentina's approximately quarter million Jews—the largest Jewish community in Latin America—live in Buenos Aires, where over a third of the country's population resides, and are engaged in occupations that range from retail merchandising (one of the earliest Jewish trademarks in the city) and industry to careers in the liberal professions and scientific fields.

In addition to various official plans aimed at attracting European immigrants—plans that varied greatly among the countries that possessed them—conditions that propitiated the establishment of Jewish institutions and allowed for the development of a Jewish way of life were a significant inducement for this minority culture. Following traditional ethnic patterns of immigration, local aid societies were established along trade lines, and by city or area of origin. Religious tolerance and economic incentives, particularly in the form of industrial growth and of an accommodating climate, determined the initial inflow as well as the sustained growth of Jewish communities. In wartime, the availability of visas (or of quasi-legal permits) sufficed to direct passage into one or another country. In this regard, Bolivia and the Dominican Republic (where an agricultural experiment by German-Jewish colonists took place in Sosua), constitute paradigmatic responses to World War II refugees. Other countries soon opened their doors, albeit under quotas, to fleeing Jews.

With few exceptions, the largest Jewish centers in Latin America are in the region's major cities. Buenos Aires, São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Montevideo, Santiago, Mexico City, and Caracas are hubs of Jewish life, possessing established communal, religious, and educational networks that reflect the ideological and religious plurality of the community. From strictly Orthodox to secular Zionist to "lay Yiddishist" and, in recent years, to Conservative and Reform trends that replicate those of the United States, Jews have been provided in most Latin American nations with a suitable environment for all aspects of Jewish life.

As elsewhere, Ashkenazic and Sephardic communities have developed independently of each other, with the added splintering that corresponds to points of origin. In some cases, however, they have come together under representative umbrella organizations, such as Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA) and other mutual aid societies. Even before the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, Zionism had been a mainstay of educational and communal associations. This tends to explain the rapid integration into Israeli life of first- and second-generation Latin American Jews. It is important to note, however, that economic fluctuations, political repression, and anti-Semitic outbursts and sentiments also enter into the equation that motivates immigration to Israel and, particularly since the 1970s, to other countries. Besides Tragic Week, anti-Semitism has included the "Golden Shirts" pro-Nazi elements in Mexico, the July 1994 bombing of the AMIA Building in Buenos Aires, and the ongoing circulation of anti-Semitic publications. It is also important to note that since 1948, relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors have had a direct impact on the Jewish communities (which disagreed on Middle Eastern politics) in Latin America. The 1970s United Nations statement equating Zionism with racism, for instance, generated lost tourist revenue in Mexico and its Jewish community, due to a Jewish-American boycott.

Early life in the major Latin American centers had a distinctly Yiddish flavor: newspapers and magazines—such as Die Yiddishe Zeitung and Die Presse in Argentina and Havaner Leben in Cuba—and theater and radio programs echoed the dominant presence of Ashkenazi Jews. The growth of a vibrant Spanish and Portuguese language journalism in these communities indicate the degree of integration that has occurred in the countries that are home to Latin American Jews. This sentiment is manifested in first-rate literary and cultural expressions that continue to earn critical acclaim. In the political arena, integration is also evident—except for periods of heightened anti-Semitism or of official and unofficial proscription—in the number of Jews who have joined their respective governments, as well as in the relatively high proportion of Jewish youth who in the 1970s and early 1980s actively opposed the dictatorial regimes of the Southern Cone, notably in Argentina. Radical political transformations have also produced a different mass reaction, as witnessed by the emigration of most Cuban Jews at the beginning of the revolution and a similar move by the Nicaraguan Jews at the triumph of the Sandinista revolution. These demographic shifts in turn affected several Caribbean locations as well as South Florida.

Today, most Latin American Jews belong to the middle sectors of the socioeconomic spectrum. Beyond their measurable financial security, however, and contrary to widespread popular notions, a significant number of urban Jewish families remain indigent and require communal support for their sustenance. Entry into the Latin American mainstream can also be gauged by the high rate of intermarriage and assimilation, and constitutes a reason for communal concern over the lasting presence of Jewish life in a number of smaller centers. Other indicators are equally significant to an understanding of the current status of Jews in Latin America. These include ongoing Christian-Jewish dialogues that build on the conclusions of the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), a shift in ethnic politics, the growing participation of Jews in longtime and reestablished democracies, the high profile of Jewish scientists and artists, the open recognition of minority contributions to the mosaic of national cultures, the expansion of moderate religious and cultural practices among younger segments of the population, and the unintended solidarity among persecuted minorities created in response to anti-Jewish terrorism and anti-Semitic acts.

See alsoArab-Latin American Relations; Israeli-Latin American Relations.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Boleslao Lewin, Los judíos bajo la inquisición en Hispanoamérica (1960).

Anita Novinsky, Cristãos novos na Bahia (1972).

Seymour B. Liebman, The Inquisitors and the Jews in the New World: Summaries of 'Procesos,' 1500–1810, and Bibliographic Guide (1975).

Comité Judío Americano, Instituto De Relaciones Humanas, Comunidades judías de Latinoamérica, 1973; 1974; 1975 (1977) [similar reports exist for other years].

Henrique Rattner, Tradicão e mudanca: a comunidade judaica em São Paulo (1977).

Martin H. Sable, Latin American Jewry: A Research Guide (1978).

Jacobo Schifter Sikora, Lowell Gudmundson, and Mario Solera Castro, El judío en Costa Rica (1979).

Robert Weisbrot, The Jews of Argentina: From the Inquisition to Perón (1979).

Judith Laikin Elkin, Jews of the Latin American Republics (1980).

Seymour B. Liebman, New World Jewry, 1493–1825: Requiem for the Forgotten (1982).

Judith Laikin Elkin and Gilbert W. Merkx, eds., The Jewish Presence in Latin America (1987).

Leonardo Senkman, comp., El antisemitismo en Argentina, 2d ed. (1989).

Haim Avni, Argentina and the Jews: A History of Jewish Immigration, translated by Gila Brand (1991).

Gunter Bohm, Los sefardíes en los dominios holandeses de América del Sur y del Caribe, 1630–1750 (1992).

Judit Bokser De Liwerant, Imágenes de un encuentro: la prescencia judía en México durante la primera mitad del siglo XX (1992).

Robert Di Antonio and Nora Glickman, eds., Tradition and Innovation: Reflections on Latin American Jewish Writing (1993).

Robert M. Levine, Tropical Diaspora: The Jewish Experience in Cuba (1993).

Additional Bibliography

Agosín, Marjorie. Memory, Oblivion, and Jewish Culture in Latin America. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2005.

Bodian, Miriam. Dying in the Law of Moses: Crypto-Jewish Martyrdom in the Iberian World. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007.

Bokser de Liwerant, Judit, and Alicia G. de Backal, eds. Encuentro y alteridad: Vida y cultura judía en América Latina. México, D.F.: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México; Jerusalem: Universidad Hebrea de Jerusalén; México, D.F.: Asociación Mexicana de Amigos de la Universidad de Tel Aviv: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1999.

Cohen, Mario E. América colonial judía. Buenos Aires: Centro de Investigación y Difusión de Cultura Sefardí, 2000.

Cortina, Guadalupe. Invenciones multitudinarias escritoras judíomexicanas contemporáneas. Newark: Juan de la Cuesta, 2000.

Elkin, Judith Laikin. The Jews of Latin America. Rev. ed. New York: Holmes & Meier, 1998.

Grinberg, Keila, ed. Os judeus no Brasil: Inquisição, imigração, e identidade. Rio de Janeiro: Civlização Brasileira, 2005.

Klich, Ignacio, and Jeff Lesser. Arab and Jewish Immigrants in Latin America: Images and Realities. Portland: F. Cass, 1998.

Lesser, Jeff. Welcoming the Undesirables: Brazil and the Jewish Question. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.

Papiernik, Charles. Unbroken: From Auschwitz to Buenos Aires. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2004.

Ruggiero, Kristin. The Jewish Diaspora in Latin America and the Caribbean: Fragments of Memory. Portland: Sussex Academic Press, 2005.

                                         SaÚl Sosnowski