The Jewish revival of Porto, Portugal

“The community was strongly rebuilt from 2012, with consistent secular and religious leaders and donations from the Jewish world that were used to promote Jewish religion and culture,” notes its vice president, Isabel Barros, granddaughter of its founder Captain Barros Basto [see box].

In 2013, the synagogue was completely refurbished and became a magnet for newcomers. The following year, a kosher restaurant and kosher hotel opened, kick-starting a wave of Jewish tourism that has increased exponentially. The community now boasts a museum documenting its history, and an innovative Holocaust museum that recounts how the city served as a safe haven for Jewish refugees during WWII, with regular Portuguese school visits aimed at allying antisemitic prejudices. They have also produced three moving full-length movies about the community’s history that have won awards at international film festivals. The film 1618, about the Inquisition’s effect on Porto, is Portugal’s most internationally awarded movie, and has even been purchased by airlines from Arab countries to screen on their flights.

The community’s greatest boost came in 2015, when the Portuguese parliament approved the Nationality Law for Sephardi Jews – commonly known as the “Sephardi Law” – that promoted the arrival of many Jewish families (especially Israelis, French and Brazilians). Close to 57,000 descendants of Sephardi Jews have been granted citizenship since the law was implemented in 2015, according to official data. Young foreign Jews studying at Porto’s universities were warmly welcomed, and as more families chose Porto as their destination, community membership grew and with it came new ideas, greater religious practice, more Jewish culture and more Jewish life.

The Kadoorie synagogue building actually houses two synagogues: in the main chamber, about 350 men and 150 women (sitting and standing) prayed on Yom Kippur according to Sephardi ritual under Rabbi Yoel Zekri, while in the basement, about 60 men and 60 women (sitting and standing) led by Chief Rabbi Daniel Litvak followed Ashkenazi rituals.

Late arrivals stood in awe at the sight of hundreds of men draped in white tallitot (prayer shawls) deep in prayer. Most appeared familiar with the texts, while others nervously leafed through their prayer books to find the place. At times, five cantors sang the heartfelt prayers in perfect unison and harmony – sounds not heard in the Iberian Peninsula for many years.

Catia Silva, a local Catholic woman who was invited to the Kol Nidre service, looked astonished. “The thousands of churches in this country today are attended by an aging population and have a far more restrained religiosity,” she said. “In this synagogue, we can see a participatory congregation both in prayers and songs, as if it were a single collective body.”

To put the Porto Jewish community’s growth in proportion: there were 9.5 million Jews in Europe before World War II, and slightly more than one million today. Large Jewish centers are siphoning off the young generation from smaller communities – and a not inconsiderable number are leaving Europe altogether. Porto (Oporto in Portuguese), Portugal’s second-largest city, has a metropolitan population of 1.7 million.

On September 4, the European Association for the Preservation and Promotion of Jewish Culture held its European Day of Jewish Culture across the continent, and Porto stood out with 5,000 visitors to its museums, cinema, art museums, restaurants and more.

The community and its rabbinate constantly upgrade their efforts to attract new members, introducing congregant-friendly prayer services; Achdut centers for absorbing foreign Jewish students enrolled at Porto’s universities; kashrut services, kosher stores and restaurants; the Portuguese Jewish School – an online school providing basic courses in Jewish religion, culture and history; a new cemetery; a modern mikveh; charitable projects to help the needy, poor, elderly, children and sick; the city’s Holocaust Museum and Jewish Museum; and the largest Jewish library in the Iberian Peninsula. It has also produced historical films that won international awards, opened a historical research center, organized large concerts, and even created online Jewish newspapers.

Meanwhile, the Porto Jewish community is combating antisemitism through positive action. In the past decade, 130,000 school students have visited the Kadoorie Synagogue, Jewish Museum and Holocaust Museum, and training courses are regularly held for teachers. Community leaders have also signed cooperation protocols with the local Catholic Diocese and Muslim Community.

The European Union actively promotes the return of the Jewish people, their culture and religion. However, board member David Garrett offers “a note of warning. As soon as Jewish communities start making their mark in European territory, the influential antisemites in society will attempt to destroy Jewish life bit by bit, attacking the strong synagogues and sparing the weak ones (to avoid being accused of antisemitism), using the same methods once employed in the Soviet Union.”

He outlines these methods citing the “use of the press and slanderers to associate synagogues with businesses, describing such businesses as amoral or illegal, negative reactions from some public opinion and straw Jews, and total destruction of the synagogues’ respectability and the Jewish organizations as promoters of Jewish life and Jewish culture.”

Ten years ago there was almost no antisemitism in Portugal, but as the Jewish community grows in visibility, Jew-hatred has returned, complete with conspiracy theories and anonymous tip-offs. The Portuguese press has claimed that the Porto Jewish Community made “various millions” of euros by processing nationality requests from Jews throughout the world, and berated the new kosher restaurants, Achdut centers, museums and movies as “opulence.”

“Those who were scandalized by the 250-euro fee are ridiculous, especially since the Sephardim from our community have already invested more than one billion euros in the Porto area,” Vice President Isabel Barros retorts.

It appears that the days when Portuguese passports were accessible to about a million Jews have passed. The parliament in Lisbon amended the Nationality Law beginning September 1, with tightened validity requirements effectively castrating the initiative.

In March, Rabbi Litvak was detained by Portuguese police at Porto airport before boarding a flight to Munich en route to Israel, on suspicion of fraudulently certifying the Sephardi origins of applicants, including Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich (whose Sephardic origins were also attested to by the Moscow rabbinate and international Jewish organizations). Community-linked offices were also raided. Six months later, the charges were dropped after an Appeals Court ruled that the prosecutors had no evidence.

“We will never forgive the antisemites who mounted this shameful police operation to destroy the Sephardi Law,” says the Community’s president, Gabriel Senderowicz. “The chief rabbi was arrested without any evidence, and the synagogue was trampled underfoot as if it were a brothel. No religious temple has been treated this way in Portugal in the last 500 years.” ■

The Portuguese Dreyfus

In 1926, he embarked on a bold project (with the help of the Sephardi Jewish community in London) to convert back to Judaism several hundred Marranos – Jews who were forced during the Spanish Inquisition to choose between conversion and expulsion or even death. They established a Jewish school, a local Jewish newspaper, and the Kadoorie Mekor Haim Synagogue, but the descendants of the Marranos preferred to remain a separate stream from Judaism.

Three of them – Adriano Lopes, Rebordao and Horta, instigated by Miguel Vaz and Cassutos – allegedly launched the false accusation against the captain: homosexuality, which was then outlawed in Portugal and much of the world. But this malicious accusation was sufficient to disperse the new Jewish community – the Marranos school closed its doors, and its students were sent home.

“The Portuguese army exploited these anonymous accusations to file a lawsuit against my grandfather, and in the absence of proof, sentenced him to expulsion from military service,” says his granddaughter, Isabel Barros Basto, who worked for many years to clear his name.

Captain Barros Basto spent the rest of his days bitterly, sadly and in poverty. He died in 1961, and in accordance with his last request, was buried in his old military uniform. He never gave up hope that his name would be cleared.

Over the years, increasing voices were raised against the injustice of the man who came to be known as “the Portuguese Dreyfus,” but Portugal tarried until its parliament recommended in 2012 to “return him to military service.” The following year the Portuguese army decided to posthumously promote him to the rank of colonel beginning from 1945.

“For my grandfather, this is the justice he wished for throughout the years after his expulsion from the army until his sad death,” says Isabel Barros Basto.

The community funded the filming and production of a full-length feature film, called SEFARD, which tells the story of the captain available for viewing on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/sefarad