(JTA) — The oldest Jewish cemetery in Cuba is undergoing rehabilitation. The Havana burial ground is being restored as part of an initiative by the city historian’s office ahead of the 500th anniversary of the Cuban capital’s founding, which will be marked in November, The Associated Press reported. In addition to the cemetery, located in the…
You may have heard that the Yiddish-Cuban opera “Hatuey: Memory of Fire,” made its way to Havana in early March. Despite issues with a finicky old sound system, the premiere was a huge success and the opera has received extensive coverage in the Cuban press. It may seem like a miracle that this opera, based…
Just by coincidence, forty-eight hours after President Barack Obama announced a coming détente with Cuba, I was in Havana. And talking to a kosher butcher, of all people. Yes, Havana has a kosher butcher, which sounds like the punch-line of a joke. There are, after all, only 1,500 Jews left in all of Cuba, the…
Nothing in Brooklyn could rival the formal dances in Havana at the Patronato de la Communidad Hebreo de Cuba. And nothing in the world could rival the exquisite Purim Ball of 1954 at the Patronato. Although my nineteen-year old mother was not selected as the Queen Esther of the ball that night, she was one…
(JTA) — On a recent Friday night inside this city’s Beth Shalom synagogue, Aliet Ashkenazi, 25, stood draped in a blue-and-white prayer shawl leading prayers in a mix of Spanish and near-perfect Hebrew. It was the first time she had ever led services – a feat considering she converted to Judaism seven years ago after…
Cuban officials are poised to make an important “announcement” this morning about the plight of Alan Gross, a Jewish contractor held in a Cuban jail for almost three years. Media have been told to expect an announcement around 9 a.m., the officials said. The alert came hours after a New York rabbi visited Gross at…
A few weeks ago, more than 500 rabbis signed their names to a letter urging the Cuban government to release Alan Gross. He’s the 63-year-old Jew who has served three years of a 15-year term in a Cuban jail for “crimes against the state” — that is, spying for the United States. He has lost…
Daniel Libeskind’s ‘Wheel of Conscience’ in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Courtesy Canadian Jewish Congress. The ill-fated voyage of the MS St. Louis, the Hamburg-based ocean liner intended to transport 907 mostly German Jewish refugees to Cuba in May 1939, has always played a central role in early Holocaust history, and not only because it unraveled, tragically,…
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