Saudações/Greetings friends of CVJHP!



Over the summer, CVJHP deepened linkages between the Jews of Morocco and Cabo Verde. In late June, the Mimouna Association held a conference in Essaouira (formerly Mogador) on Sephardim in Latin America, and invited me to to moderate the panel on Moroccan Jewish Diaspora in the continent, especially in Brazil, Mexico and Venezuela. The above-group photo was taken at the beautiful conference venue, Bayt Dakira, or House of Memory, a 19th-century home that was converted into a place for preserving Moroccan Jewish heritage. It is built around one of 37 synagogues that used to adorn the city in the 1950's. Moroccan-born Jews David Jacob Cohen, Fortunato Levy and Abraham Brigham (Ohayon) emigrated from Mogador to Cabo Verde in the 19th century as our recent book recounts. Os Judeus Marroquinos de Cabo Verde: Século XIX is also available at bookstores in Cabo Verde and Portugal! At the conference, I forged relations with many terrific Moroccan, Gibraltarian, Latin American and Israeli scholars of Moroccan Jewish history, all of whom were delighted to learn about the "Cabo Verdean branch." Their scholarship will greatly enrich our research too.

Morocco Museum Collaboration

In addition to participating in the Conference, I visited the Jewish quarters of Tangier and Tétouan. Most of the Jews who went to Cabo Verde came from those northern cities where Spanish influence was significant. I met with the dynamic president of the Tangier Jewish community, Sonia Cohen, who is dedicating a wall in the Assayag Museum to showcase the Moroccan Jewish diaspora in Cabo Verde! CVJHP will contribute photos and text for the forthcoming permanent display. Likewise, for Bayt Dakira in Essaouira (which had already created a space for the Cabo Verde Jewish story), CVJHP will contribute more photos and documentation about "os nossos."

Aviad Moreno, (l), El Mehdi Boudra (ctr), and Adriana Brodsky (rt) who interviewed Moreno, an Israeli whose Moroccan Jewish ancestors immigrated to Venezuela, about his new book "Entwined Homelands, Empowered Diasporas: Hispanic Moroccan Jews and Their Globalizing Community." I offered Moreno a copy of Os Judeus Marroquinos de Cabo Verde to enhance his research. He promised to add Cabo Verde to his map of Moroccan Jewish Diaspora!

Alberto Hayon (l), Castiel (ctr), Elias Benchimol (r) in Tétouan. Tétouan and nearby Tangier, had one of the largest concentration of Jews whose ancestors had sought refuge from the Spanish and Portuguese Inquisitions after 1492.

Kudos to Alberto Hayon, who has almost single-handedly restored the enormous Jewish cemetery in Tétouan. A big "gracias" to Elias Benchimol, the local expert on Tétouan's rich Jewish history.

New CVJHP Web Pages

We are delighted to share our new web pages which document the milestone events of March 6, 2024, that commemorate the 10th anniversary of the restoration of the Sephardic Jewish burial plot in the municipal cemetery of Várzea. Please click on these links: Ceremony in Várzea and Symposium on Cabo Verde's Precious Moroccan Jewish Heritage at the Biblioteca Nacional. See our previous newsletter for details.

April and May 2024 Events

I traveled to São Vicente and Santo Antão to promote our new book, "Os Judeus Marroquinos de Cabo Verde: Século XIX," and to participate in events surrounding the "Festa do Municipio" in Ribeira Grande, including a panel about the Jewish presence in Ribeira Grande. Our book on the Moroccan Jews of Cabo Verde is on sale online and in bookstores in Lisbon and Cabo Verde. Students from the José Lopes da Silva School in Ponta do Sol visited me at Tiduca Hotel to obtain a copy of the book. Much more to come! Obrigada/Mantenhas, Carol Castiel, President