Peruvian Jews
Judíos del Perú

The location ofPeru inSouth America
Total population
1,900[a][5]
Regions with significant populations
Lima metropolitan area,Cuzco,Iquitos
Languages
Spanish,Hebrew,Yiddish,Ladino,Quechua
Religion
Judaism
Related ethnic groups
Chilean Jews,Bolivian Jews,Quechua people

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Thehistory of the Jews in Peru dates back to the country'sSpanish period with the arrival of migration flows ofSephardic Jews fromEurope, theNear East andNorthern Africa. This small community virtually disappeared as a result of theInquisition, and was only revived by two migratory waves that took place during the late 19th-century and the early to mid-20th century, with a number of Sephardic andAshkenazi Jews arriving to northeasternIquitos due to theAmazon rubber boom, as well as the country's capital,Lima, through neighbouringCallao, where they also settled due toWorld War II.

The small community in and around Iquitos is now known as theAmazonian Jews, most of which have sinceestablished themselves in Israel since the late 20th century. In Lima, the community is based in the upper-class districts ofSan Isidro andMiraflores, where a number of synagogues are also located. A synagogue also services a small community in the southern city ofCuzco.

Some Jewishconversos arrived at the time of theSpanish conquest of the Inca Empire. Then, onlyChristians were allowed to take part in expeditions to theNew World. At first, they had lived without restrictions because theInquisition was not active in Peru at the beginning of theViceroyalty. According to theJewish Virtual Library, the original attraction for Jews to come to Peru was the mineral potential. Many Jews had come to Portugal disregarding the immigration restrictions placed at the time.^[6] This action would then be used in trials against some of thesecrypto-Jews who faced thetribunal of Lima, further adding on a penalty to their actions.^[7]

TheHoly Office of the Inquisition establishedan office inLima January 9, 1570, to control the Christian population of the Viceroyalty and to identify non-Catholics, such asJews,Lutherans, andMuslims.^[b][7][8] Consequently, 'New Christians' began to be persecuted, and, in some cases, executed. Descendants of Jews were sometimes called "marranos" ("pigs"), converts ("conversos"), and "Cristianos nuevos" (New Christians) even if they had been reared as Catholics from birth.Crypto-Jews, self-proclaimed Catholics who would secretly adhere toJudaism, were the initial targets of the tribunal and punished, tortured or killed if caught.^[9] Some avoided the tribunals by immigrating out of Spanish territories, such as Peru.^[7]

To escape persecution, the conversos settled mainly in the northern highlands and northernhigh jungle. They intermarried with natives and non-Jewish Europeans (mainly Spanish and Portuguese people) in some areas, assimilating to the local people: inCajamarca, the northern highlands of Piura (Ayabaca andHuancabamba), among others, due to cultural and ethnic contact with people of the southern highlands of Ecuador. Their mixed-race descendants, known today as theAmazonian Jews, were reared withsyncretic Catholic, Jewish, European, andAndean rituals and beliefs.^[10]

According to historian Ana Schaposchnik, the stages of the trial followed "a sequence of: denunciation, deposition, imprisonment, hearings, accusation, torture, confession, defense, publication, sentence, and the Auto."^[7] TheAuto de Fe were occasional public ceremony of punishments made through the inquisition. The punishments included being burnt to a stake, whipping, and being exiled. The trial had started with the accused being convicted of a crime.^[9][11]

The tribunal had often used their connections of viceroyalty to gain information about theNew Christians, about their past actions in other Spanish colonies.^[7] This was the case of Joan Vincente, who was a Portuguese New Christian who had previously been renounced but was put into trial in 1603. His previous actions inBrazil,Potosi, andTucumán had all been shared by the viceroyalties in those regions.^[7] Thegenealogies of the crypto-Jews were accessible through this connection, making it possible to accurately see who were New Christians.^[7] Since the actions of the accused was often not documented, the accused New Christians in court could not prove their statements, while the viceroyalty could obtain all the documentation needed in the trial.^[7]

In most trials, the accused New Christians would not give up names of others who were also known to beJudaizing, until they were tortured. After days or weeks of torture, most crypto-Jews gave up other crypto-Jews up to the tribunal.^[8] For example, Mencia de Luna, had said during the trial, "tell notaries of the tribunal to write whatever they wanted in her declaration, so that her suffering would come to an end".^[7] Schaposchnik also states that from recorded accounts from 1635 to 1639 of new Christian Portuguese, 110 people were arrested due to their alleged connection to the Great Jewish Conspiracy, with many having to reconcile their faith to Christianity along with being exiled and facing confiscation of property.^[7][8] He states, "As a result of the Auto General de Fe, the community of Portuguese New Christians in Lima were decimated."^[7] It is said that up 11 people were burned at a stake as they did not confess to committing any Judaic practices.^[7][9]

According to anthropologistIrene Silverblatt, though it is not clear that those who were persecuted under the inquisition were practicing Judaism, most of the New Christians in Lima were considered "tainted" even after being baptised. Many New Christians during this time were seen to be inferior to Old Christians being banned from certain professions, entering universities and public offices.^[9] The inquisition had those who had been called, to confess to their sins and share information on others who had practiced Judaism in Lima.

A notable figure of those prosecuted in Lima includedManuel Bautista Pérez, an individual who was considered as "one of the world’s most powerful men in international commerce".^[8] Perez had been arrested once in 1620, when a broad sheet had been found which claimed that Perez was one of the premier teachers of Judaism in Lima. The witnesses and inquisitors considered Perez to be an 'oracle' due to his vast knowledge and wealth.^[8] Though Peru fought to the best of his abilities during the hearings, the overwhelming evidence against had mounted up. The inquisitors had faced some difficulty in going through with the trial, as Perez was a part of the viceroyalty's high society, with many clergy and high figures testifying for his innocence.^[8] Some of the evidence submitted in the trial included many New Christians appearing as witnesses calling him the Great Captain of Jews in Peru, along with his brother-in-law denouncing him.^[8]

Another notable crypto-Jew that had been in the tribunal was Antonio Cordero, who was a clerk fromSeville. He had been originally denounced in 1634 with weak evidence, such as abstaining from work on Saturdays and not eating pork.^[12] The tribunal decided to conduct a secret arrest on Cordero, so there would be no one suspecting the tribunal's involvement. They gave him no sequestration, and he confessed that he was a crypto-Jew.^[12] After they had tortured Cordero, he gave up the name of his employer and two others, which then gave up the name of more crypto-Jews in Lima. This eventually led to seventeen arrests being made, with many notable merchants being brought to the Tribunal as crypto-jews.^[12] According toHenry Charles Lea, this then led to many frightened Portuguese to try to flee Lima.^[12]

During the last decades of the 19th century, many Sephardi Jews from Morocco emigrated toLoreto as traders and trappers, working with the natives. The first was Alfredo Coblentz, aGerman Jew who arrived in 1880 at the port ofYurimaguas.^[13] Starting in 1885, theAmazon rubber boom attracted even greater numbers of Sephardi Jews from North Africa as well as Europeans.^[c] Many settled inIquitos, which was the Peruvian centre for the export of rubber along theAmazon River. They created the second organised Jewish community in Peru after Lima, founding aJewish cemetery andsynagogue. After the boom fizzled due to competition from Southeast Asia, many European and North African Jews left Iquitos. Those who remained over generations have eventually married native women; their mixed-race ormestizo descendants grew up in the local culture, a mixture of Jewish and Amazonian influences and faiths, and are now known as theAmazonian Jews.^[13]

In 1870, theSociedad Hebrea de Beneficencia was formally founded by Jews wishing to organise the proper burial rituals and financial compensation for the families of ten Jews who died ofyellow fever in 1868, who were buried in the British Cemetery ofCallao.^[14] A provisional directory had been established in Abril 1869 under the leadership of Jacobo Herzberg and Miguel Badt, but the society—under the presidency of Natazzius Hurwitz, who was accompanied by Paul Ascher and Jacobo Brillman—was only officially recognised on July 1, 1873. On March 1875, the first stone of theCampo Santo Israelita de Baquíjano was placed in a terrain acquired from U.S. businessmanHenry Meiggs in what was then Baquíjano farm, located atLa Legua Valley.^[14]

In Lima, a small number of Ashkenazi Jews left Europe and theUnited States for Peru, working in banking, commerce and infrastructure, among other lines of work. In 1875, the number of Jews in Lima was 300, of which 55% were from Germany, 15% from France, 10% from England, 10% from Russia and 20% from other backgrounds.^[6] A notable resident at the time wasAuguste Dreyfus,^[6] who had signed a contract with the Peruvian government to acquire 2 million tons ofguano. TheWar of the Pacific, which took place from 1879 until 1883, also interrupted any immigration during this period.^[14] By 1890, it was estimated that around 200 Jews lived in the country.^[15]

During the early 20th century, Sephardic Jews from theOttoman Empire, as well asGreece,Morocco, andEgypt migrated to Peru. Around 1912, someAshkenazi Jews, mostly from Western and EasternSlavic areas and fromHungary, also made the same voyage, chiefly to the capitalLima.^[14] The Jewish–GermanSociedad de Beneficencia Israelita saw the separation of the SephardicSociedad de Beneficencia Israelita Sefaradí on November 9, 1920, which was officially registered on November 24, 1925, inaugurating its premises inSanta Beatriz on September 17, 1933.^[14] Meanwhile, the AshkenaziUnión Israelita del Perú was founded at theChirimoyo neighbourhood on June 11, 1923, which was officially registered on November 16, 1929.^[14] TheOrganización Sionista del Perú, aZionist organisation that sought to reunite all of Peruvian Jewry, was established in 1925.^[16]

Until the 1930s, there were no synagogues in Peru due to the community only celebrating theHigh Holy Days.^[17] During this decade, theUnión Israelita del Perú—the Ashkenazi congregation of Peru established in 1923—hiredAbraham Moshe Brener, a Polish Rabbi, to perform Jewish rituals in the country.^[d] Brener arrived in Lima in 1934 and oversaw the rituals of all Jewish denominations up until around 1950, when the Sephardic congregation—established in 1928—hired Abraham Shalem. In 1957, another rabbi, Lothar Goldstein, was hired by the German Israelite Society.^[17]

During the 1930s, the community saw itself negatively affected with the establishment of theRevolutionary Union, a fascist political party founded byLuis Miguel Sánchez Cerro, who served as president from 1931 until hisassassination in 1933.Luis A. Flores assumed the party's leadership following his death, leading it towards a more radical shift in ideology.^[18] This anti-Jewish sentiment led to attacks on some Jewish-owned businesses in Lima.^[19]

For logistical reasons, and in response to growing anti-Jewish sentiment, theDirectorio de la Colectividad Israelita del Perú was established on February 4, 1942, presided by Max Heller, Jacobo Franco and Leopoldo Weil. It was registered theAsociación de Sociedades Israelitas del Perú on June 20, 1944, a name that remained until 1975, when it was renamed theAsociación Judía del Perú.^[14] A committee to build a Jewish school was formed in March 1945 and headed by Israel Brodsky, inaugurating the León Pinelo School on April 24, 1946, then located at 1241 General Varela street and whose first honorary director was writerManuel Beltroy [es]. The school later moved to 610 Los Manzanos (then Maimónides) street in 1954.^[14] Another "Pro-Hebrew Palestine" committee was established on June 27, 1945, headed byJosé Gálvez Barrenechea and composed of people such asLuis E. Valcárcel andCésar Miró, among others.^[14]

TheUnión Israelita saw the separation of three Orthodox groups who opposed Brener and opened synagogues of their own.^[20]Knesset Israel separated in 1942, led by Leib Fishman; andAdat Israel did the same in 1953, led by Abraham Shapiro Klein and reuniting to pray at one room of a house inBolivia Avenue that belonged to member Jaime Portnoi. On the High Holidays of the same year (July 29),^[14] they inaugurated a synagogue of their own at 542^[14] Iquique street in Chacra Colorada (a neighbourhood ofBreña, one of the city's districts), commonly known as the Mandel Synagogue after the family of the same name affiliated to the group.^[21] The last group to separate wasSharón.^[22] The congregation eventually unified again,^[17] starting with the dissolution and reincorporation of the members ofKnesset Israel andAdat Israel, followed by a process of integration betweenSharón and theUnión Israelita that started in 1987, when the inventory of the synagogue of theUnión Israelita located atBrasil Avenue was moved to the former's location inSan Isidro.^[22]

DuringWorld War II, the Consul-General of Peru inGeneva,José Maria Barreto, secretly issued passports to a group of Jews which included prisoners at theconcentration camp in the (German-occupied) French city ofVittel. The Peruvian government at the time had forbidden its diplomatic missions to issue visas to Jewish refugees,^[23] an order that Barreto ignored. In 2014, he was posthumously recognised asRighteous Among the Nations.^[24] According to theWorld Jewish Congress, 650 Jews fled to Peru during this period.^[24]

During the early 1950s, the Jewish community in Lima and Callao was distributed as follows:^[20]

Starting in 1950, the Jews in Peru started their involvement in the country's economy and a number of white-collar workspaces. An strong interest inZionism also took over the community, with two youth organisations being formed to prepare young Jews toemigrate to Israel:Betar (located at the synagogue in Iquique street) andHanoar Hatzioní (located at León Pinelo School).^[20] Marcos Roitman, an ardent Jewish-Peruvian Zionist, was nominated ashonorary consul of Israel in 1951, inaugurating the consulate atColmena Avenue in late 1953.^[28][29]Relations between both countries were then elevated to legation level in 1956 and to embassy level in 1958, with Tuvia Arazi serving as Israel'sfirst ambassador.^[6] Massive immigration to Israel began after theSix Day War in 1967, similar to other countries in Latin America.^{[citation needed]}

During a trip to Iquitos in 1948 and 1949, the Argentine-Israeli geologist Alfredo Rosensweig had noted that the Amazonian Jews were "almost a hidden community" due to their geographical separation from Lima and the city's inaccessibility by road. At the time that Rosensweig visited, the community did not have a Jewish school, a rabbi, or a synagogue.^[13] Most Amazonian Jews in Iquitos are of Christian origin, and consider themselves to be a mix between Christians and Jews.^[30] It's believed that was due to the fact that most immigrant Jews who had come to Iquitos in the 19th century were single men, who then married the Christian women of Iquitos.^[13] In the 1950s and 60s, the Jews of Iquitos had almost disappeared due to the mass emigration to Lima.^[13] The community of Iquitos Jews had not been recognised by the rest of Peru until the 1980s, when Rabbi Guillermo Bronstein, who was then the chief rabbi of theAsociación Judía del Perú in Lima, was contacted by the Iquitos Jews and visited the community in 1991, subsequently sending resources such asprayer books and other Jewish texts.^[13] In 1991, theSociedad Israelita de Iquitos was established.

In 1990, 70 people fromCajamarca who claimed descent from theTen Lost Tribes (and thus converted to Judaism) moved to Israel. Another group followed in 1991, composed of 32 people. On the same year, an Indigenous woman married a soon-to-be Israeli rabbi.^[20]

As of 2023^[update], there are about 1,900 Jews in Peru,^[5][1][2] with only three organised communities: Lima, Iquitos andCuzco.^[4][31] The community is in decline,^[1] having been numbered at 3,000 years prior and 5,000 in the 1970s,^{[2][4][32][33]} but has nevertheless contributed to the country's economy and politics. The majority in Lima (and the country) areAshkenazi Jews (whose community was founded in 1934), while others areSephardic Jews (whose community was founded in 1933).^[34] Both communities proclaim themselves to be Orthodox.^[17]

As of 2025^[update], four synagogues represent the Jewish community in Lima:

In addition, the León Pinelo school operates since April 24, 1946,^[6] and serves as the city's only Jewish school, educating 90% of local Jews.^[34] A recreational club,Hebraica, also exists in La Molina Avenue since 1956.^[36][37]

The northeastern city ofIquitos has maintained its small community of Amazonian Jews (also called "Iquitos Jews"), of mixed Moroccan Sephardic,^[10] Ashkenazi, and/or Indigenous Peruvian descent, observing some form of Jewish traditions and customs.^[30] Some^[38] have claimed that there exists a kind of pressure exerted upon this community to adhere to customs that are normative in the broader Jewish community; though these customs have been characterised as specifically Ashkenazi,^[38] they are often in fact matters ofJewish law recognised by non-Ashkenazi Jews throughout the world as binding. Iquitos Jews' unique practices and customs aresyncretic to varying degrees, influenced by Catholicism and local traditional spiritual traditions. Thus, they come from the mix of Peruvian and Jewish cultures.^[10] This community has been rather isolated from the rest of the Peruvian Jewish community, which is concentrated in Lima.

The Iquitos community's claims of Jewish status have been subjected to some question by the Orthodox Jewish leaders of Lima, as the only people Jewish lawconsiders to be Jews are those who are born to aJewish mother, or who have formallyconverted. Because the community itself says that its founding members were Jewish men and non-Jewish women, their descendants are not always considered Jewish by Jews who adhere to Jewish law. In the late 20th century, some descendants in Iquitos began to study Judaism and eventually made formalconversions in 2002 and 2004 with the aid of a sympathetic American rabbi fromBrooklyn. A few hundred were given permission to makealiyah toIsrael. By 2014, nearly 150 moreIquitos Jews had emigrated to Israel.^[13] These waves comprised an estimated 80% of the community in Peru, which now numbers only 50 individuals.^[3]

In Cuzco, the community was numbered at 200 to 300 people in 2015.^[4]

In 2023, thePeruvian ambassador in Tel Aviv reported that around 100 Peruvian citizens had been recruited asreservists of theIsrael Defense Forces.^[39]

• Abraham Moshe Brener, Chief Rabbi of Lima from 1935 to 1962.
• Salomón Lerner Ghitis, Prime Minister of Peru in 2011.
• Efraín Goldenberg, served as Prime Minister (1994-1995), Foreign Minister (1993-1995), and Finance Minister (1999-2000).
• Elsa Hochhäusler, Viennese-born journalist and writer forEl Comercio andLa Prensa,^[40] as well as mother of politicianFrancisco Sagasti.
• Baruch Ivcher, Israeli-born business tycoon.^[41]
• Segismundo and Fernando Jacobi, founders of the firstbureau de change in Lima (1860), the Baquíjano Cemetery and of theSociedad de Beneficiencia Israelita. The former brought aTorah, the first in the city.
• Eliane Karp, French-born anthropologist andFirst Lady of Peru from 2001 to 2006.
• Wladyslaw Kluger [pl], engineer.
• Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, president of Peru from 2016 to 2018.
• Antonio de León Pinelo, historian, namesake of the country's only Jewish School.
• Salomón Libman, footballer.
• Simón Moses, first spiritual leader of theSociedad de Beneficiencia Israelita.
• Enrique Oppenheimer, who served alongsideAndrés Avelino Cáceres as part of a group called "the musketeers" during theWar of the Pacific.^[42]
• Rodrigo Orgóñez, captain.
• Manuel Bautista Pérez, merchant.
• David Señor de Castro, second spiritual leader of theSociedad de Beneficiencia Israelita.
• Yehude Simon, Prime Minister from 2008 to 2009.
• León Trahtemberg, educator and historian of Jewish history.^[43]
• David Waisman, Second Vice President of Peru from 2001 until 2006.

The Fire Within: Jews in the Amazonian Rainforest (2008) is a documentary about the Jewish descendants in Iquitos and their efforts to revive Judaism and emigrate to Israel in the late 20th century. It is written, directed and produced by Lorry Salcedo Mitrani.^[44][45] Before that Salcedo published the book (Salcedo: photos, Henry Mitrani Reaño: text)The Eternal Return: Homage to the Jewish Community of Peru [El eterno retorno : retrato de la comunidad judío-peruana] (2002) on the subject.^[46]

The 2018 filmUtopía, based on the2002 fire of a nightclub of the same name, features the story of Orly Gomberoff Elon, one of the victims of the fire, as well as her family, all practising Jews.^[47]

• Amazonian Jews
• B'nai Moshe
• Immigration to Peru
• Religion in Peru
• History of the Jews in Latin America and the Caribbean
• Peruvian Jews in Israel

• Frank, Ben G. (2010).A Travel Guide to the Jewish Caribbean and South America (in Spanish).Arcadia Publishing.ISBN 9781455613304.
• Trahtemberg, León (1989).Los judíos de Lima y las provincias del Perú(PDF) (in Spanish) (1st ed.). Lima: Unión Israelita del Perú. Archived fromthe original(PDF) on 2016-06-20.
• Cano Callañaupa, Brian; Donayre Catacora, Evelyn Melisa (2021).Los judíos en el Cusco: cultura, religión y aspectos judaizantes (1620-1650) (Thesis) (in Spanish). Cuzco:Universidad Nacional de San Antonio Abad del Cusco.
• Trahtemberg Siederer, León (1989).Vida judía en Lima y en las provincias del Perú: un recuento histórico documentado sobre la presencia judía en el territorio del Perú en el siglo XX (in Spanish). Unión Israelita del Perú.

• Peru -Jewish Agency for Israel
• Official website of the Jewish Museum of Peru (Museo Judío Perú)

• Jewish Peruvian history

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