Argentine Jews - Early History

Early History

Some Spanish conversos, or secret Jews, settled in Argentina during the Spanish colonial period (16th–19th century), where they generally assimilated into the general population. After Argentina gained independence, the General Assembly of 1813 officially abolished the Inquisition. A second wave of Jewish immigration began in the mid-19th century, during revolutions in Europe that created extensive social disruption. Much of the Great European immigration wave to Argentina came from Western Europe, especially France.

In 1860, the first Jewish wedding was recorded in Buenos Aires. A minyan was organized for High Holiday services a few years later, leading to the establishment of the Congregación Israelita de la República. In the late 19th century, Ashkenazi immigrants fleeing poverty and pogroms in Russia and Eastern Europe settled in Argentina, attracted by its open-door immigration policy. These Jews became known as rusos, "Russians". In 1889, 824 Russian Jews arrived in Argentina on the S.S. Weser and became gauchos (Argentine cowboys). They bought land and established a colony named Moiseville. In dire economic straits, they appealed to the French Jewish philanthropist Baron Maurice de Hirsch, who founded the Jewish Colonization Association. In its heyday, the Association owned more than 600,000 hectares of land, populated by more than 200,000 Jews. Between 1906 and 1912, some 13,000 Jews immigrated to Argentina every year, mostly from Europe, but also from Morocco and the Ottoman Empire. By 1920, more than 150,000 Jews were living in Argentina.