09 February 2007
The Spanish government has inaugurated a culture institute honoring the Sephardic Jews and said it was settling a debt dating back to their expulsion during the Spanish Inquisition. "Today is a historic day for the Jewish communities, Israel and Spain. With this act, we settle a very old debt with Sepharad," Spain's foreign minister Miguel Angel Moratinos, who was the host of the event, said. "We are moving on from our own history to confront the present and the future," he pointed out. The ceremony was attended by ambassadors from around the world, Israel's foreign minister Tzipi Livni, and Israel Singer, chairman of the Policy Council of the World Jewish Congress.
Livni thanked the Spanish authorities for opening the cultural center "Casa Sefarad-Israel" in Madrid. She noted the Sephardic Jews expulsion, saying that Spain and the Jewish people shared "a long history accompanied by light and shadow." Responding to Moratinos and Livni, Israel Singer said, “This opening brings with it not just the promise of closer cooperation. It is a challenge as well, to the government and the people of Spain, to create understanding of Israel and the Jewish people, and between Jews, Christians, and Muslims. This is the work we need to do together, and this is the significance of today’s event.”
Sephardic Jews trace their origins back to Spain before the expulsion. After the Catholic Inquisition and the edict by Queen Isabella of Castile and King Ferdinand of Aragon in 1492 ordering the expulsion of all Jews, attitudes in Spain toward Jews and Judaism were characterized by official religious and political hostility. Most Jews either fled Spain after the royal edict or converted to Catholicism.
