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3 Cheshvan 5760 - October 13, 1999 | Mordecai Plaut, director Published Weekly
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News
Publicizing the Aliya from Cuba is Liable to Stop It

by Arye Zisman and Mordecai Plaut

Prominent Israeli government officials have expressed the fear that the publicity given the aliya from Cuba is liable to limit its continuation. Until now, approximately 400 Cubans have immigrated to Israel, and apparently 300 more hope to arrive. The immigrants are currently residing in absorption centers in Beersheva, Chadera and Ashkelon. Torah figures note that some of them are not Jewish.

The release of this information by the British Daily Telegraph, which publicly disclosed the aliya from Cuba to Israel, occupied the Israeli media early this week. Until now the story was kept quiet, even though the Cuban immigrants had already arrived in Israel in small groups as early as two years ago. Government officials worried that the publicity may negatively affect the immigration of 300 more Cuban immigrants.

The earliest exit from Cuba was actually some five years ago. Visas were given via the Canadian embassy in Israel, since Cuba does not have diplomatic relations with Israel, and the immigrants were transferred to France, from where they reached Israel. All along, the Jewish community of Cuba had not suffered from antisemitism, and was making aliya to Israel just due to the difficult financial situation in Cuba and the better opportunities in Israel. The immigrants arrive in Israel empty-handed, and until today they are living in absorption centers. When interviewed last week, they sounded very bitter, and claimed that the Israeli authorities are not helping them to leave the absorption centers or to find work, though several have regular jobs.

Torah figures in Ashkelon who are working with the immigrants noted widespread activities among the immigrants are being conducted. They stressed, though, that some of the immigrants are not Jews.

Rabbi Yisroel Marin of Lev L'Achim's Ashkelon branch gives shiurim as the absorption center in Spanish on a regular basis. He says that a family recently asked him to arrange for a bris mila for the males, but when he checked out the family's background it became clear that they were not Jewish. Another family, however, recently had brissim in Yerushalayim. Rabbi Marin believes that the Jewish identity of the Cuban immigrants is a social time bomb.

According to the report in the London Sunday Telegraph, the move on Cuba's part is linked to the country's dire economic situation and the regime's attempt to improve its image in Washington.

In the past President Castro was one of the most anti-Israel leaders in the world. Cuba has no formal ties with the Jewish state, having broken off diplomatic relations after the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Cuba has also supported Arab terrorists and Castro praised Yasser Arafat.

Many Cuban Jews are descendants of Polish and Russian Jews who fled Czarist pogroms at the turn of the century. About 60% are Sephardim originally from Turkey. There are four shuls currently in operation, 2 Ashkenazic and 2 Sephardic. Three of these are in Havana. There is only one school with 40 students. The Mexican community sent siddurim with Spanish translations several years ago, to help those who were rediscovering their Judaism.

A rabbi from Guadalajara, Mexico visits the community every few months, and a mohel from Panama also comes from time to time.

Thousands managed to escape the country after the Communists came to power about 40 years ago, most going to the United States. Before Castro came to power, there were said to be about 15,000 Jews in Cuba.

About 1,500 remained in Cuba before this wave of immigration, most of them concentrated in Havana and Santiago. Several hundred of these are said to want to leave the country for Israel.

A leading Israeli expert on Cuba, Margalit Bejarano, of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, said: "There has been much less antisemitism in Cuba compared with the Communist regimes in east Europe. Castro has never denied Jews kosher food or the right to organize cultural activities, although any expressions of religion by Jews or Christians prevented their entry to university and to a range of professions in Cuba."

On Yom Kippur every Jew is allowed to take off from work with pay. One of the synagogues has a kosher kitchen.

Official relations with the Jewish community have become more friendly in recent months. Last Chanukah, President Castro attended an Israel cultural evening at the Patronato synagogue in Havana--the largest of the country's four remaining synagogues.

The fourth synagogue was in fact opened just about a year ago, the first synagogue to open since the revolution. It is in Camaguay, Cuba's third largest city. The Jews there were not active as a community until a few years ago, hiding their Jewish identity. A young woman whose father is Jewish discovered her Jewish roots. Her father had never told her. She converted, learned Hebrew, and revived the whole community.

With the fall of the Communist block, President Castro, 73, has been forced to modify his previous anti-Zionist stance. The economic situation in Cuba is now said to be desperate. The regime is billions of dollars in debt and many people's ration books fail to provide enough goods to get them through even half the month.

America further tightened its long-time economic blockade in 1996, and many Cubans regard the lifting of sanctions as the country's most pressing concern.

Cuba and Israel are interested in establishing diplomatic ties but, according to one Israeli diplomat, Israel is holding back for fear of angering the Americans.


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