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Jews In Barcelona
Are Still Active
Barcelona, Spain (JTA) — With
the arrival of 94-year-old Alber-
to Arditti, the oldest Jew in
Barcelona, a minyan is present
and Rabbi Gabriel Alfasi, a
Sephardic Jew from Morocco
dressed like a Lubavitcher
Chasid, opens the Sabbath ser-
vice.
The sanctuary of the Mai-
monides Synagogue, with a cen-
tral bimah and lighted by nine
handsome brass and crystal
chandeliers, is for Sephardic wor-
shipers. Upstairs is the much
smaller Ashkenazic chapel, in use
only during the High Holy Days.
Housed in the same building
are the offices of the Comunidad
Israelita de Barcelona (Jewish
Community of Barcelona), a mik-
vah, library, kosher snack bar
and auditorium for concerts and
lectures.
The community supports or
supervises a Sephardic day school
attended by 110 boys and girls,
an impressive sports complex and
a kosher butcher store.
When the building was dedi-
cated on Rosh Hashanah in 1954,
it marked a major milestone in
the 2,000-year history of Spanish
Jewry as the first synagogue
erected on Iberian soil since the
expulsion of the Jews in 1492.
Before 1954, the regime of dic-
tator Francisco Franco allowed
Jewish services in private homes,
but worshipers had to obtain a
separate government permit for
each Sabbath service, recalls
Leon Sorenssen, the communi-
ty's present executive director.
Today, official registration fig-
ures list 485 heads of Jewish
households in Barcelona, which
Sorenssen multiplies by an av-
erage of 4.5 family members to
arrive at close to 2,200 Jewish
souls.
With a slightly larger figure for
Madrid, and smaller concentra-
tions in a dozen cities, the Jew-
ish population count in Spain
stands at about 12,000.
Of the present Barcelona Jew-
ish community, 75 percent is
Sephardic and the remaining 25
percent Ashkenazic. The Ashke-
nazic community consists main-
ly of descendants of Central
European refugees, who arrived
during and after World War II.
An uncertain number of J - ews,
estimated at between 500 and
700, have never affiliated with
the community. They are main-
ly Jews from Argentina and oth-
er Latin American countries who
fled upheavals in their native
countries in the 1980s.
Although the initial Sephardic
immigrants have now produced
two or more generations of Span-
ish-born descendants, they are
still divided between the "Thrks"
and the "Moroccans."
Intermarriage between
Sephardim and Ashkenazim is a
rarity, and between Jews and
Gentiles practically unknown.
The age distribution of
Barcelona's Jews has not been
calculated, but the number of life-
cycle events points to an aging
but still viable community.
Considerable assistance in
money and training programs
has come from the American
Jewish Joint Distribution Corn-
mittee, which maintains an ac-
tive presence in the city.
The community's young rabbi,
only three months at the post,
comes from a Moroccan family,
but studied at a Chabad yeshiva
in Brooklyn. His all-black dress
code reflects this experience and
his congregants have jocularly
lengthened his name from Alfasi
to Alfasinsky.
Police Recover
Stolen Artifacts
Budapest (JTA) — Hungarian
police have recovered most of a
collection of Jewish artifacts
stolen from the Jewish museum
in Budapest last December.
Nearly 90 percent of the col-
lection, valued at $200 million,
was recovered two weeks ago
near the Romanian capital of
Bucharest, according to Hun-
garian police chief Gen. Ion Pit-
ulescu.
Speaking at a news conference
last week, Gen. Pitulescu said the
Mossad, the Israeli secret service,
had helped Hungarian and Ro-
manian police in tracking down
the collection.
Two suspects in the case, Ro-
manian citizens identified as
Emilian Stefan and Nicolae
Chirita, have been arrested in Vi-
enna and Frankfurt, respective-
ly, and Hungarian authorities are
currently seeking their extradi-
Local reports indicate there
may have been additional people
involved in the robbery.
The collection, stolen last Dec.
12, consisted of more than 180
pieces collected since 1916, in-
cluding gold and silver religious
objects, paintings and carpets.
After being closed for several
months, the Jewish museum,
housed in the building of Bu-
dapest's main synagogue, was re-
cently re-opened to the public.
Gen. Pitulescu said the collec-
tion would be returned to the mu-
seum within a month.