Here's a recent article from The Atlantic:

“The clock is ticking down on one of the world’s most unusual immigration proposals—Spain’s offer of citizenship to Jews whose families it expelled more than 500 years ago.

In 1492, the year Christopher Columbus set sail, Spain’s Edict of Expulsion gave Jews a stark choice: Convert, depart, or die. At the time, Spain’s Jewish community was one of the largest in the world, though their numbers had diminished due to a series of massacres and mass conversions 100 years earlier. Jews had lived on the Iberian Peninsula for more than 1,700 years, producing philosophers, poets, diplomats, physicians, scholars, translators, and merchants.”

Historians still debate the number of Jews expelled; some estimate 40,000, others 100,000 or more. Those who fled sought exile in places that would have them—Italy, North Africa, the Netherlands, and eventually the Ottoman empire. Many continued to speak Ladino, a variant of 15th-century Spanish, and treasure elements of Spanish culture. Tens of thousands stayed, but converted, and remained vulnerable to the perils of the Inquisition. How many Jews were killed remains unclear, but a widely accepted estimate is 2,000 people during the first two decades of the Inquisition, with thousands more tortured and killed throughout its full course. In 2015, the Spanish Parliament sought to make amends. Without a dissenting vote, it enacted a law inviting the Sephardim—Jews who trace their roots to Spain—to return. (Sepharad is the Hebrew word for the Iberian Peninsula) The law declared that after “centuries of estrangement,” Spain now welcomed “Sephardic communities to reencounter their origins, opening forever the doors of their homeland of old.”

Spain’s offer of citizenship to Sephardic Jews is a powerful gesture of atonement. The country today has one of the smallest Jewish populations in Europe: about 15,000 to 45,000 in a country of more than 46 million people. Yet, like so much of Spain’s complicated history with the Sephardim, the citizenship offer raises a host of questions. How many Sephardim would apply? What would be their reasons? And, if the law’s intent is to open “forever the doors of their homeland,” why does it have an expiration date? The offer ends this October.

When the Second World War broke out, Spain declared neutrality, but supported the Nazis in the early stages. In his Christmas message of 1939, Franco made a thinly veiled reference to the Jews as a “race” that was a “disturbance” and a “danger,” noting that “we, by the grace of God and clear vision of the Catholic Kings, have for centuries been free of this heavy burden.” Spain, however, did not deport Jews—indeed, thousands of Jews fleeing the Nazis crossed safely through Spain en route to other countries. In the post-War period, Franco attempted to rehabilitate his reputation and whitewash the anti-Semitism that was rife among his party and supporters.

Anti-Semitic beliefs in Spain have been especially widespread among the educated. A reportproduced by Spain’s Observatory of Anti-Semitism found that 58 percent of the Spanish public believes that “the Jewish people are powerful because they control the economy and the mass media.” Among university students, this number reaches 62 percent, and among respondents who are “interested in politics,” 70 percent hold this view. Some Spanish anti-Semitism reflects a tendency to conflate Jews with Israelis and to view both through the lens of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Spain did not recognize the state of Israel until 1986, when it did so as a condition of entering the European Union.

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He added in an email, “There are still anti-Semitic expressions in the Spanish language which, unfortunately, are used quite frequently in the media, among the political classes, and of course, in the street—perro judío[Jewish dog], judiada [a dirty trick, cruel act, or extortion], and judío [associated with usurers].”

In the city of León, they drink a lemonade mixed with red wine called matar judíos (“kill Jews”) during Holy Week. Instead of “cheers” or “bottoms up,” the local drinking cheer is “We are going to kill the Jews.” For hundreds of years, a village in northern Spain was named Castrillo Matajudios (“Castrillo Kill the Jews”). The residents finally voted to change the name—in 2014.

By:

KIKU ADATTO teaches at Harvard University and writes about art, popular culture, and civic life. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The New Republic, Time magazine and other national publications.