COVER STORY:
It’s a sad song for South America’s Jewish communities

buenos aires | In economically ravaged Argentina, thousands of once-prosperous Jews now depend on charity for their basic needs, despite optimism sparked by a new political era and a slight improvement in the economy.

Across the Rio de la Plata in Uruguay, the storefronts of Jewish-owned shops in downtown Montevideo remain shuttered as the country continues to implode.

To the north in Brazil, the economic outlook is better, though soup kitchens still are the main source of nourishment for hundreds of elderly Jews in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.

"The situation is very difficult," said Bernardo Kliksberg, a senior economist at the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington. "In Argentina, we estimate that 60,000 of the country's 220,000 Jews are below the poverty level. Of these 60,000, approximately 25,000 live in extreme poverty. That means they cannot meet the most basic needs.

"The situation is also very bad in Uruguay, where the trends are similar, and in Brazil and Venezuela," added Kliksberg, an Argentine Jew who has written 33 books on social justice and the root causes of poverty in Latin America.

Poverty's Jewish victims include professionals who have been laid off as a result of recent privatizations, as well as tailors, shopkeepers and other small merchants who have been forced to close their businesses in the wake of government austerity measures that have sapped consumers' purchasing power.

Challenges also include preserving dwindling communities in the face of immigration to the United States and Israel, as well as combating the anti-Semitism that has sporadically cropped up in Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Mexico in response to domestic economic difficulties and events in the Middle East.

By far, the region's largest Jewish community is in Argentina. Home to nearly half the region's Jews, Argentina — once the richest country in Latin America — finally is beginning to pull itself out of its worst depression in more than a century.

The 2003 inauguration of President Nestor Kirchner ensured that former President Carlos Menem, who many say bankrupted the country during 10 years in office that ended in 1999, would never return to political life.

Yet things may finally be starting to brighten in Argentina, a mood encouraged by Kirchner's stewardship of the country.

"There are some signs of recovery," said Avi Beker, secretary-general of the World Jewish Congress in New York. "For example, I hear fewer people talking about aliyah [to Israel]. From a Zionist point of view, that's bad, but it's a fact that people in Argentina do feel more comfortable, and they're hopeful that things will get better."

Things already have gotten somewhat better in Portuguese-speaking Brazil, home to 120,000 Jews and about 6 million Arabs. Brazil has Latin America's largest economy, but in January 1999, President Fernando Henrique Cardoso was forced to devalue the Brazilian real by 50 percent. The move may have saved the Brazilian economy in the long run, but in the short run it wiped out the savings of millions of Brazilians.

"Unlike the case in Argentina and Uruguay, there was no sudden exodus to Israel," said Jayme Blay, president of the influential Federacao Israelita do Estado de Sao Paulo. "In Argentina, they went straight to extreme poverty. Here in Brazil, our welfare net could still manage and try to help people survive."

Jack Terpins, president of the Confederacao Israelita do Brasil and a leader of the World Jewish Congress, agreed.

"Brazilians are more accustomed to poverty than Argentines," he said. "Argentina always had the highest quality of life in Latin America, and Brazil has always had lots of poverty. But the Jews have adapted to the situation in Brazil."

Meanwhile, in poor, isolated countries such as Bolivia, Ecuador and Paraguay, the relatively tiny but well-off Jewish communities are in danger of disappearing. In Peru, the country's 3,000 Jews are reeling from an internal banking scandal that turned millionaires into paupers overnight.

Thousands of Jews also have left Colombia, a country of 41 million that has been wracked by kidnappings, drug wars, political violence and assassinations for decades.

The exodus of Venezuelans as well as Colombians has brought many Spanish-speaking Jews to the United States — specifically the Miami area — where the newcomers have joined Cuban Jewish exiles living in South Florida for the last 40 years.

The following brief profiles of Jewish communities around South America show a people struggling to get by while trying to find strength in their common heritage and values.




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