Sephardic Jews invited back to Spain after 500 years

BBC News ^ | 6th March 2013 | Gerry Hadden

[the scotsman]

'More than 500 years ago, tens of thousands of Jews fled Spain because of persecution. Now their descendants are being invited to return.

Before the infamous Spanish Inquisition of the 15th Century, some 300,000 Jews lived in Spain. It was one of the largest communities of Jews in the world.

Today, there are about 40,000 or 50,000 - but that number could be about to swell dramatically.

In November, Spain's justice minister Alberto Ruiz-Gallardon announced a plan to give descendants of Spain's original Jewish community - known as Sephardic Jews - a fast-track to a Spanish passport and Spanish citizenship.

"In the long journey Spain has undertaken to rediscover a part of itself, few occasions are as moving as today," he said.

Anyone who could prove their Spanish Jewish origins, he said, would be given Spanish nationality.'

[quadrant]

y be mistaken, but didn't a lot of Sephardic Jews come to the US, esp. NY City?

[wideawake]

didn't a lot of Sephardic Jews come to the US, esp. NY City

What defines "a lot" is the question. A few thousand, maybe.

But their descendants began the Reform movement and were more or less absorbed into the general population, or into the larger Ashkenazi communities that arrived in the 1800s.

The original Sephardic synagogues in the US are now either museums or have Ashkenazi congregations.

[Texan5]

Spain has been in a serious decline for a long time-I’m pretty sure they just want individuals with a real work ethic to immigrate to Spain to work and pay taxes to support their socialist welfare state. I hope no one buys into it.

My ancestors weren’t Jewish, but they had sense enough to leave Spain for the Spanish territory in the New World in the 1600’s...

[dfwgator]

" 'Cause the Inquisition's here and it's here to stay!"

[miss marmelstein]

My only problem with the Sephardics (we have tons of them at the Jersey Shore) is that their healthy diet is becoming really popular and pushing out the Ashkenazim food culture of pastrami and matzo ball soup. You can't find an old-fashioned Jewish cookbook these days - it's all “middle eastern” stuff.

[GJones2]

> “I’ve never heard of a country trying to make amends in this way. More power to them for trying to do something to set things right.”<

I disagree. I find absurd the whole concept of trying to remedy wrongs that took place in the distant past. It’s too late to help those who really suffered, and the descendents of neither the perpetrators nor the wronged are closely related to their ancestors.

At four generations a century — with the genetic connection being halved at each generation — even a descendant from someone in 1800 is only 1/256 connected. For 1500, a few years after the 1492 expulsion, the connection would be 1/1048576 (if I’ve calculated correctly). Less than one millionth. Of course, I’d expect a Sephardic descendent to have many Sephardic ancestors, but still there would be dilution across the centuries.

In any case the moral debt or entitlement is simply not there. The advantage of automatic Spanish citizenship may be a minor one (and I doubt that many persons of Sephardic origin would want to take advantage of it). Still, I think giving it is unfair to others.

[miss marmelstein]

My only problem with the Sephardics (we have tons of them at the Jersey Shore) is that their healthy diet is becoming really popular and pushing out the Ashkenazim food culture of pastrami and matzo ball soup. You can't find an old-fashioned Jewish cookbook these days - it's all “middle eastern” stuff.

[GJones2]

If countries or regions must return to their ethnic makeup of 1492, then Americans of European ancestry, start packing your bags! I’m supposedly about 1/16 Indian and the rest European (culturally entirely European). Where do I go — 15/16 of the way back across the Atlantic?

Even injustices of mere decades ago are difficult to redress. To use ethnic origin to try to do that with events that happened centuries ago serves only to create new injustices. It’s a form of racism. It judges people by their ethnic background rather than as individuals.

[count-your-change]

Sure some Jews were burned at the stake but it was done in the spirit of Christian love and the fires weren’t really all that hot.

[Publius]

Some went to North Africa, but most settled in the economic powerhouse of the day, the Ottoman Empire...

Those with serious money settled in Naples. My maternal line was of Spanish Jewish lineage, and they found a home in Naples. where they did well enough to come to America in 1909.

Funny, I even look Jewish.

[TheThirdRuffian]

“Jews were allies of the Muslims during the conquest of Spain. They along with Muslims were given an amnesty of a kind after the Spanish recounquered their land.”

Wow, talk about a half-truth.

There were just as many Jews on the side of Spain as against the muslims, especially in the Spanish Navy where they proved to be excellent seamen.

The reason for the Expulsion and Inquision (according the official Roman Catholic Church apology) was greed. The Jews had done well in Spain and had lent money to the royals and the Church who jointly concocted bullshit excuses to force conversions and/or kick them out of the country.

I am 100% proud Roman Catholic, and I am sick and tired of schismatics like you who sully the work we have done to recocile with the very un-Christlike things we stupid humans did in the name of His Church.

[TheThirdRuffian]

There are a bunch of old Sephardic families in West Texas, Mexico, and New Mexico.

The old Mexican presidente — Vincente Fox, among them.

[Publius]

Ping.

Luis Carvahal.

[jjotto]

The Jewish ‘Golden Age’ in Spain was ended not by Christians, but by fanatical Muslims in the 12th century. That was the first wave of Sefardic Jews that spread far and wide, though it was soon followed by the Crusades.

http://www.aish.com/jl/h/cc/48950501.html

[Verginius Rufus]

The reference may be to the original Muslim conquest in the 700s--the Jews were not happy with how they had been treated by the Visigoths, if I remember correctly.

Ivo Andric was a Nobel-Prize-winning writer from Bosnia. In one of his novels, Bosnian Chronicle, set in Travnik in the Napoleonic era, he has a Sephardic Jewish man thinking about what a wonderful life his ancestors had had in Spain until they were forced to leave.

[married21]

I guess I had put it in the same category as the Catholic Church apologizing about Galileo 400 years after the fact. It doesn’t change much, but it’s important to apologize, for the character development of the apologizer, as much as anything.

Of course,I didn’t think about the resulting law suits and such.

[wideawake]

That's really just Israeli cuisine, which is largely Arabic cuisine.

Traditional Sephardic fare was closer to Turkish food, which is heavier - there is such a thing as Turkish pastrami (pastirma) and also savory kugels (budinca) and cholents (chamin).

[Varda]

It's called simple history. Generalizations are the norm when talking about historical groups. It says nothing about what some individuals may have done. I doubt this Jewish author considers his work a "half-truth" when he says,
"According to surviving records, Jews helped the Arabs in many places. From Syria to Spain, they opened city gates to the besieging armies; and in Spain, they often garrisoned the captured cities to enable the Muslims to sweep on to further conquests. " (Lucien Gubbay -The Jews of Arabia)

"The reason for the Expulsion and Inquision (according the official Roman Catholic Church apology) was greed."

Do you have a link for this?

[miss marmelstein]

Thanks for the info! You make me want to go out to Katz’s for a pastrami sandwich, a knish,and a celery soda!

[SJackson]

Middle East and terrorism, occasional political and Jewish issues Ping List. High Volume

If you’d like to be on or off, please FR mail me.

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This article doesn't mention it, but North African Muslims are going bat sh*t, claiming this is a racist act and that the millions of "Sephardic Muslims" must be offered citizenship as well. They'll find tens of millions if they're successful getting citizenship. Then they'll work on France and Italy, parts of which also belong to the Ummah.