In Memory of Lena Russo, Aâ€H, one of the last of 35 Holocaust survivors from Kastoria, Greece. The pre-war community had numbered 1,000 Jews. Sent to Auschwitz, Lena recited the Shema to prove her Jewishness to the skeptical Yiddish-speaking inmates. These and other experiences from her remarkable life are immortalized in Trezoros, an exceptional documentary by Larry Confino and her son, Lawrence Russo. She received the praise of Greece’s Consul General at New York, Dr. Konstantinos Koutras, and an appreciative standing ovation from the audience for her inspiring words at the 20th NY Sephardic Jewish Film Festival’s screening of Trezoros.
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Sephardi Ideas Monthly is a continuing series of essays from the rich, multi-dimensional world of Sephardi thought that is traditionally delivered to your inbox on the second Monday of every month.
This month’s featured essay, “The Island within an Island: The Cuban Jewish Story of Survival,†is an original contribution to Sephardi Ideas Monthly, penned by the accomplished art and travel writer, Irene Shaland. In her article, Shaland explores the history of Jewish Cuba from Crypto-Jews who sailed with Columbus, through different waves of Jewish immigration, to today’s small Jewish community.
Irene Shaland
(Photo courtesy of Irene Shaland)
Shaland begins by tracing Crypto-Jewish history back to Christopher Columbus’ maiden exploratory voyages. Columbus, of course, thought he was sailing to Asia and, once there, he hoped to find some Hebrew-speaking Lost Tribes of Israel. Needing a Hebrew-language translator, Columbus hired Yosef ben Levy Ha-Ivri, who, after converting to Christianity in order to get the job, became Louis de Torres. Shaland writes that while de Torres didn’t find any lost tribes in Cuba, “he did find a strange native custom of drying leaves, inserting them in pipes, burning them, and inhaling the smoke.â€
Crypto-Jewish history is necessarily difficult to discern with any clarity, lost as it is amidst various levels of dissimulation and accusation. Nevertheless, its presence was still heavily felt in Cuba through the second half of the 20th century. How so? Well, Fidel Castro, the country’s former Caudillo, apparently found it expedient to spread rumors of a crypto-Jewish ancestry.
After all, such ancestry could provide convenient cover for rabid anti-Zionism, hosting and training of terrorists (Abu Nidal, Carlos the Jackal, Fatah, and PFLP) who murdered Jews, deploying 3,000 Cuban troops to the Syrian front during the Yom Kippur War in 1973, and holding the American Jewish humanitarian worker Alan Gross hostage for helping the Cuban Jewish community use the Internet. However, it is also true that there were some strange incongruities to the socialist dictator’s behavior.
Unlike much the rest of the Soviet bloc, Fidel did not fully embrace Holocaust denial. After seizing power he left standing Latin America’s first Holocaust memorial, and he openly spoke out about his sympathy for Jewish suffering. Still, there were limits: Castro still allowed anti-Semitic Soviet propaganda to proliferate in the Cuban regime-controlled media, and he never missed an opportunity to exploit the Holocaust to make crude analogies and otherwise delegitimize the Jewish State.
Recent issues of
Sephardi Ideas Monthly have explored the 20th-century history of Eastern Mediterranean Jews in America, but not all the Jews escaping forced conscription into the Turkish army fled to the United States. Some arrived, instead, in Cuba, and as Shaland notes, “These Ladino-speaking Sephardim had a relatively easy time assimilating to their new home.†Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe had a more difficult time assimilating. Thanks to their foreignness, they were classified, as a whole, as “Poles.â€
Feature Photo:
(Photo courtesy of Chrystie Sherman). To learn about the synagogue’s last guardian, see: “Cuban Jews dwindle to a precious few,†UPI, 9 August 1987
Shaland’s essay takes us through five hundred years of Cuban-Jewish history and the successive waves of Jewish immigrations, before concluding with Cuban-Jewish life today. Her conclusion? The great irony of Cuban Jewish history, writes Shaland, is that, “ The political and social pressures of 20th century Cuban Jewish life produced a remarkable achievement. A tiny remnant of the tiniest of the tiny minorities on the island has survived, after half a millennium of struggle, with a shared sense of Jewish identity.â€
Sephardi Ideas Monthly is happy to introduce our readers to the fascinating story of Cuban Jewry with Irene Shaland’s colorful and enlightening essay, “The Island within an Island: The Cuban Jewish Story of Survival.â€
 The American Sephardi Music Festival August 24, 27, and 28 Tickets range from $20 to $40 ($20 Tax-Deductible Donation) PROGRAM: August 24: Please click here for additional information |
| SOLD OUT – Hidden in Plain Sight: Forgotten Jewish Architects and their Famous Creations
Wednesday, August 23 This presentation is being made possible by the generous support of The Cahnman Foundation and The David Berg Foundation. Join us for an evening of exploration as we tour these sites and illuminate their little known history. Please click here to be be notified first about future Diarna Geo-Museum presentation dates |
 Nosotros: Strengthening Bonds Between Jewish and Latino Communities Thursday, September 7 Each artist has displayed their works in hundreds of exhibits in both the US and Latin America, having many of them included in some of the most coveted collections in the world. We are very excited to bring them and their works to celebrate the importance of uniting us (or Nosotros), the Jewish and Latino communities, and having this art displayed in a very powerful way at the American Sephardi Federation at the Center for Jewish History. Please click here to reserve tickets |
| Iraqi Jewish Voices Project cordially invites you to a festive event celebrating and honoring its founding supporters: Robert Shasha and Dennis Shasha Monday, September 11
Please click here to reserve tickets |
| Let Our People Go!
Tuesday, September 12 |
 When Baghdadi Jews Baruch and Ellen Bekhor (née Cohen) succumbed to the camera’s gaze for their denaturalization pictures in 1951, they became stateless. Ellen was in her eighth month of pregnancy. Permitted to bring no more than a few kilos of belongings out of Iraq, Ellen carried their wedding picture and ketubah in her pocketbook. Laissez-Passer, Royaume D’Irak by Leslie Starobin (2016). Through September 2017 Center for Jewish History Leslie Starobin is a Boston-area photographer and montage artist. Her work is in the permanent collections of many academic (Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University) and public (Jewish Museum, MoMA) museums. Starobin is the recipient of numerous grants, including from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New England Foundation of the Arts/Massachusetts Cultural Council, and the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture. Most recently, she received two Hadassah-Brandeis Institute Research Grants for this series, The Last Address. Her exhibition in ASF’s Myron Habib Memorial Display is sponsored in part by CELTSS: The Center for Excellence in Learning, Teaching, Scholarship and Service at Framingham State University in Massachusetts, where Starobin is a Professor of Communication Arts.Please click here for additional information and viewing hours |
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