History of The Jews in Portugal - Present

Present

As of the present time, Jews enjoy a peaceful life in Portugal, even if isolated attacks on the community occur, such as the vandalism perpetrated in Lisbon's Jewish Cemetery in 2007 (painting of swastikas). This attack was promptly denounced by public authorities, that committed themselves to aid in the cleaning up in an official visit to the cemetery by the President of Portugal, Aníbal Cavaco Silva, the Leader of Lisbon's Muslim community and the Mayor of Lisbon António Costa.

In 1987 the then President Mário Soares, for the first time in the History of Portugal, asked forgiveness to the Jewish communities of Portuguese origin for Portugal's responsibility in the Inquisition and all the past persecutions of Jews.

At present there are numerous Jewish cultural heritage sites in Portugal, including five synagogues in the country, in Lisbon (Sha'aré Tikvá – Orthodox/ Ohel Yaakov – Conservative), Oporto (Mekor Haim), Ponta Delgada in the Azores islands (Porta do Céu – Shaar ha-Shamain) and Belmonte (Bet Eliahu), and several private places where the Jewish community meets. There are a series of kosher products being produced in Portugal including wine.

It is hard to say how many Jews live in Portugal as of 2006. The Portuguese census estimates a Jewish population of 5000 individuals as of 2001, with a between-census estimate (as of 2006) of 8000. CIA's World Fact Book refers a smaller number of a thousand Jews, mainly central European Holocaust survivors. But the Marranos (Crypto-Jews) and returned Sephardim represent the remainder.

According to a 2008 study by the American Journal of Human Genetics, 19.8% of the Portuguese population has Jewish ancestry. The genetic signatures of people in the Iberian Peninsula provide new evidence that the number of Jews forced to convert to Christianity during Catholic rule in the 15th and 16th centuries was much greater than historians believed.

Some Portuguese personalities are known Jews or descendants of Jews, most notably Esther Mucznik (leader of the Israelite Community of Lisbon), the award-winning photographer Daniel Blaufuks, screen actress Daniela Ruah, former Lisbon Mayor Nuno Krus Abecassis, and the former President of the Republic Jorge Sampaio, whose grandmother was a Moroccan Jew of Portuguese-Jewish origin. Sampaio does not consider himself Jewish, stating that he is agnostic.