Brief History of Jews in Cuba

In proportional terms, Cuba offered refugee or migrant status to more Jews than any other Latin American country; more, in fact, than was offered by the United States. In addition, despite occasional periods of hostility by certain sectors of the Cuban elite, these Jews were afforded a good reception. Robert Levine offers three reasons for this unusual circumstance. First, Cuba had an open economy with a "worldly" elite, long accustomed to dealing with strangers. This explains the relative absence of the class-based ethnocentrism and anti-semitism often found among Latin American elites. To be sure, prejudice and discrimination existed but, according to the author, tended to be of the "petty" rather than the institutional sort.

Second, because the Jews settled all over Cuba rather than concentrating in one city (much less one neighborhood), their presence never engendered the "ghetto" syndrome so common in other countries.

Finally, accomodation was facilitated by the fact that Jewish migration occurred in widely spaced historical sequences, each with different settlement patterns. The two earliest groups were very successful economically and incorporated themselves smoothly into Cuban society. First came the Spanish and Portuguese Sephardim, who arrived either with the conquering Spaniards or from the island of Curacao, the center of Sephardim culture in the Caribbean. Although not mentioned by the author, Cuba's most powerful "sugar baron," Julio Lobo, was a descendant of this group. This group is not to be confused with later Sephardim migrants from North Africa and the Otoman Empire. Religiously orthodox, poorly educated and non-Spanish speaking, these Jews were always disdainfully referred to as "Turcos." The second earliest migration was that of American Jews. They arrived with the United States occupation troops and held important technical and commercial positions from the start.

In some way, therefore, attitudes had been mellowed for later migrations. These tended to be Ashkenazim (generally referred to as "Polacos") and while they were not as easily incorporated as the earlier migrants, it is evident that things could have been much worse. Those who arrived in the 1920s and early 1930s included a good number of Marxists, who played a key role in the founding of Cuba's Communist party. In the 1930s, especially around the years of the Spanish Civil War, these Jews became targets of a small but influential sector of the elite that had Falangist leanings. These elites also opposed the entry of the next wave of Jews, the refugees from Nazism. Desperate to enter the United States they settled for Cuba as a safe-haven but tended to see the islands as an "immigration hotel" (p. 285). The unintended consequence was that their aloofness minimized possible confrontations with local anti-Semites. It is to this group that the author gives the bulk of his attention, and it is their often-tragic story which provides him with his most dramatic material.

This book provides a powerful sense of hemispheric history repeating itself: refugees attempting to reach the United States by any means including expensive smugglers, the United States attempting to get alternate settlements for them in small Caribbean countries, and corrupt local officials and politicians enriching themselves from this sordid game of avoidance and callousness. As such, this book is about more than just a Jewish diaspora; it is about the many Diasporas which have made the Caribbean Basin what it is.

Vast Majority of Latin Americans Support Criminal Penalties for Abortion

By Mathew Cullinan Hoffman, Latin America Correspondent

MEXICO CITY, May 28, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The vast majority of Latin Americans are in favor of maintaining criminal penalties for abortion, according to a new study.

The study, which polled residents of several Latin American countries, indicates that 60.4 percent of Mexicans favor criminal penalties for illegal abortions.

Mexico, however, is on the low end of the scale. In Brazil, 67.3 percent favor such penalties, and in Chile, 71.7 percent. In Nicaragua, where abortion is completely illegal, the majority reaches 82.2 percent.

In Mexico, women were even more likely to support the criminalization of abortion than men. Of those who support criminal penalties for killing the unborn, 32 percent are women, and 28.4 percent are men, according to the study.

The poll also reflects the fact that the pro-abortion drumbeat insisting that "women have the right to decide" to kill their unborn child has been heard by the people of Mexico -- and rejected.

While 57 percent said they had heard the slogan, 56 percent were in agreement with the statement that "the life of the fetus is above all things."

Claudia Dides Castillo, director of the Gender and Equity Program for the pro-abortion Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLASCO), which conducted the study, admitted to the press that Latin Americans are "conservative" on the issue of abortion. She added that the study's result reflects the fact that the prevailing image in Latin America is "the woman as the giver of life."

The survey was reportedly conducted through face-to-face interviews with an average of 1,200 respondents in each country. It has a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.

Mexico City, Mexico, Jun 1, 2010 / 02:02 pm (CNA).- Mexican journalist Enrique Sanchez published an article in the magazine, Impacto, this week pointing out that a recent forum in Baja California demonstrates that the pro-life movement in Mexico is growing.

The “Citizens' Forum” was held last weekend in the city of Los Cabos in the Mexican state of Baja California.

In his article, Sanchez noted that during the forum, “Southern Baja California became the center of opposition to abortion, demonstrated by 21,000 notarized signatures” on a petition filed in court calling on the state's Congress to respond to a proposal which would guarantee the right to life.

Speakers at the forum included Mexican actor Eduardo Verastegui; Lianna Rebolledo, a 33-year-old woman whose 13-year-old son was conceived through rape; and representatives from numerous organizations. They all called on the state's Congress to recognize the demand from society for protection for human life.

During her remarks, constitutional lawyer Ingrid Tapia questioned the recent ruling by the Mexican Supreme Court allowing the use of the morning-after pill in cases of rape.

The anti-life norms upheld by the court have led “nearly one thousand hospitals and private clinics to request protection against implementing the directives, as the distribution of the morning-after pill in cases of rape was made obligatory, but the distribution free-of-charge of the drug was not established,” she said.

In addition, “Conscientious objection was not taken in to account, and since the pill is abortifacient when taken 72 hours after sexual relations, there will be medical personnel who will refuse to administer it,” Sanchez said.

“The state says, if you kill it, we’ll support you. If not, you’ll be left alone,” he added.