Jewish in South America. Part III

                           Mexico

New Christians arrived in Mexico as early as 1521. Many of these conversos had fled Spain to escape the Inquisition, but no infrastructure was left by them in what is the modern day Mexican Jewish community. Due to the strong Catholic Church presence in Mexico, few conversos and even fewer Jews migrated there after the Spanish Conquest of Mexico.

Then, in the late 19th century, a number of German Jews settled in Mexico as a result of invitations from Maximilian I of Mexico, followed by a huge wave of Ashkenazic Jews fleeing Pogroms in Russia and Eastern Europe. A second large wave of immigration occurred as the Ottoman Empire collapsed, leading many Sephardic Jews from Turkey, Morroco, and parts of France to flee. Finally, a wave of immigrants fled the increasing Nazi persecutions in Europe during World War II. Today, there are more than 50,000 Jews in Mexico, the third largest Jewish community in Latin America.

In the state of Quintana Roo, Mexico, there is a thriving Jewish community that has been growing over the past decade. In 2007, Chabad Headquarters in New York decided to send their first representatives to Quintana Roo, in order to spread Judaism and to teach people Torah. They appointed Rabbi Mendel Druk as the regional representative, he arrived with his wife Rachel and their young baby girl. They quickly got to know all the local Jews and started serving them, along with tourist for all their Jewish needs.

Based in Cancún, they reached out to the whole Quintana Roo and Mexican Caribbean including Playa del Carmen, Cozumel, Isla Mujeres and Mérida. In 2010 they opened a Chabad branch in Playa del Carmen to expanded their activities. Rabbi Mendel Goldberg along with his wife Chaya and two daughters where assigned to direct the activities there and open a new center.

The State of Baja California has also had a Jewish presence for the last few hundred years. La Paz, Mexico was home to many Jewish traders who would dock at the port and do business. Many locals in La Paz descend from the prominent Schcolnik, Tuschman and Habiff families, although most are assimilated into Mexican life. In recent years, the tourist industry has picked up in Baja California Sur, which saw many American retirees purchase and live in properties around the Baja. 

In 2009, with a grassroots Jewish Community formulating and with the help of Tijuana based businessman Jose Galicot, Chabad sent out Rabbi Benny Hershcovich and his family to run the operations of the Cabo Jewish Center, located in Los Cabos, Mexico, but providing Jewish services and assistance to Jews scattered throughout the Baja Sur region, including La Paz, Todos Santos and the East Cape.

                     Nicaragua

The first Jewish immigrants to arrive in Nicaragua came from Eastern Europe after 1929. The Jews in Nicaragua were a relatively small community, the majority lived in Managua. The Jews made significant contributions to Nicaragua's economic development while dedicating themselves to farming, manufacturing and retail sales. The Jewish community encountered antisemitism by individuals, the majority who claimed that Nicaraguan Jews were responsible for Israeli arms sales to the Somoza regime.

Many of these individuals were part of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). There was much hostility between the Sandinista government, which came into power in 1979, and the Jews. This was mostly due to the Sandinista government's close relationship with the  Palestine Liberation Organization.

It was approximated that the highest number of Jews in Nicaragua reached a peak of 250 in 1972. However, in fear of persecution and imprisonment by the Sandinista National Liberation Front, all the remaining Jews fled Nicaragua, they went into exile mainly in the United States, Israel, and other countries in Central America.

After Daniel Ortega ran and lost the presidential elections in 1990, a small number of Jews returned to Nicaragua. The current Jewish population is estimated at around 50 persons. Prior to 1979 the Jewish community had no Rabbi or mohel (circumcision practitioner). The Jewish community now includes 3 mohalim; however, as of 2005, the community does not have an ordained rabbi or synagogue.

                        Panama

For nearly five hundred years Panama has been a transit station. Long before the construction of the Panama Canal in the early twentieth century, merchants and missionaries, adventurers and bandits crossed the swamps of Panama ports and to go from the Atlantic to Pacific or vice versa.

Although descendants of the "anusim" or crypto from the Iberian Peninsula, have lived in Panama since the early sixteenth century, there was there a Jewish community that has openly practiced their religion until it took centuries. Jews, both Sephardic (mostly Spanish & Portuguese Jewish  from nearby islands such a Curacao, St. Thomas and Jamaica) and Ashkenazi, began arriving in Panama in large quantities until the mid-nineteenth century, attracted by economic incentives such as bi-oceanic railway construction and the California gold rush.

They were followed by other waves of immigration: during the First World War the Ottoman Empire from disintegrating, before and after the Second World War from Europe, from Arab countries because of the exodus caused in 1948 and more recently from South American countries suffered economic crises. They all contributed to the diversity of the Jewish population in Panama today.

The center of Jewish life in Panama is Panama City, although historically small groups of Jews settled in other cities, like Columbus, David, Chitre, La Chorrera, Santiago de Veraguas and Bocas del Toro, Those communities were disappearing As families were moved to the capital in search of education for their children and for economic reasons. With some 20,000 souls, the Jewish community is a strong presence in the country despite its relatively small demography in relation to the total population (three million).

Panamanian Jews have their peculiar history of participation in government and in civic and diplomatic functions. Panama is the only country in the world except for Israel which has had two Jewish presidents in the twentieth century. In the sixties Max Delvalle was first vice president and then president. Delvalle is famous for its inaugural presidential address in which he said: "Today there are two Jewish presidents in the world who are the president of the State of Israel and myself." His nephew, Eric Arturo Delvalle, was president between 1985 and 1988. The two were members of Kol Shearith Israel synagogue and were involved in Jewish life.                                        

                            Peru

In Peru, conversos arrived at the time of the Spanish Conquest. At first, they had lived without restrictions because the Inquisition was not active in Peru at the beginning of the Vice royalty Then, with the advent of the Inquisition, New Christians began to be persecuted, and, in some cases, executed. In this period, these people were sometimes called "marranos", converts ("conversos"), and "cristianos nuevos" (New Christians) even if they had not been among the original converts from Judaism and had been reared as Catholics. 

The descendants of these Colonial Sephardic Jewish descent converts to Christianity settled mainly in the northern highlands and northern high jungle, and they were assimilated to local people: Amazonas, Cajamarca, the northern highlands of Piura as Ayabaca and Huancabamba, among others, due to cultural and ethnic contact with the southern highlands of Ecuador. In modern times, before and after the Second World War, some Ashkenazi,  Western and Eastern Slavic and Hungarians mainly, migrated to Peru, mostly to Lima. Today, Peruvian Jews represent an important part of the economics and politics of Peru; the majority of them are from Ashkenazi Community.