Jews Return From Exile

On April 30, 2014, The Christian Century carried a story about an event that occurred earlier this year. I had previously read about it in The New York Times on March 18, but did not pay much attention to it. The article in the Century suddenly struck me as intriguing. On February 7, 2014, Alberto Ruiz-Gallardon, Spain’s minister of justice announced that a new law would allow Sephardic Jews anywhere in the world, descendants of the Jews expelled from Spain in 1492, to apply for Spanish citizenship without having to give up their present citizenship. A previous law had offered such a possibility before, but the application process was very complicated and dual citizenship was not an option; there were very few applications. Now the process would be simpler and speedier, in addition to not requiring the surrender of previous passports.  The law still has to be approved by parliament, but this is deemed to be very likely. There has been huge interest in this new law; Spanish consulates in many countries (including Israel) have been inundated with inquiries about eligibility and procedures. (A curious fact: A grandfather of Ruiz-Gallardon had been Spanish ambassador in Romania during World War II and helped Sephardic Jews to escape from the Holocaust. What stories did little Alberto hear from his grandfather?)

The article in the Times was based on an interview with Ruiz-Gallardon, who was visiting New York at the invitation of Jewish groups wanting to be informed about the new law. He described the law as “a real historic reparation of, I dare say, the biggest mistake in Spanish history.” “Mistake” hardly seems the right word to describe the horrendous event of 1492 and its aftermath. Be this as it may, I don’t know what motivated the Spanish government to take this step at this moment in time, some 500 years after the event.  I assume that it was not simply caused by (shall we say) slightly delayed pangs of conscience, but that there were also some political considerations involved.