Chapter Six
Epilogue: Brazilian Jews, Jewish Brazilians

Between 1942 and 1945 a total of 235 Jews legally entered Brazil as immigrants.^[1] Yet Brazil's Jewish Question did not disappear. As general immigration levels dropped to their lowest levels in years, industrialists and large landowners in Rio de Janeiro and Silo Paulo began pushing for more labor and claimed that "Brazil will need an increase of twenty million [people in order to alleviate] the shortage of hands."^[2] Even so, nativists continued to express concern about the mass entry of Jewish refugees and displaced persons. Indeed, the specter of waves of Jews entering Brazil hovered around most immigration policy decisions in the 1940s.

In 1943 the Conselho de Imigraão e Colonização began to debate a future national immigration policy. The aim was to examine all existing immigration legislation and consolidate it into a single decree law. CIC members advanced four main options. Proposals for an open-door policy were based on the idea that the Brazilian melting-pot society would easily assimilate all immigrants. No member of the CIC openly supported this position. The other extreme was most vociferously represented by Ernani Reis, the secretary of the Ministry of Justice. Reis advocated closing Brazil to all but the Portuguese and "Mediterranean Latin" peoples, arguing that the existing population would have a large natural rate of increase and did not need many immigrants.^[3] This position was a logical extension of existing Brazilian immigration policy. What made it different from the third position, which focused on tinkering with the immigration quotas set out in the 1934 constitution,

was that it defined who was desirable, and thus eligible for immigration rights; all others would simply be banned from entering Brazil.

While no CIC member actively supported the status quo, most supported a fourth position—a preferential open-door policy. Under this scheme Brazil would be open to those from the Americas and Portugal while banning Africans, Asians, and all who descended from them. Numerical quotas were unworkable, so went the argument, because they were indiscriminate and "restrict the entry of desirable races and favor races not wanted."^[4] Who were the undesirable races? Africans and those of African descent topped the list, while the Japanese, accused of creating "pre-war headaches arising from haphazard immigration," were often mentioned by those not tied to the large landowners.^[5] The CIC still focused on whitening Brazil racially, with some members even arguing that it was already "the only great white country in the tropical area."^[6]

Not surprisingly, the other troubling "non-white race" was Jews. A U.S. State Department official in Brazil noted that the "sentiment for the exclusion of Jews is stronger than is generally thought."^[7] CIC members complained that Jews did not assimilate and displaced Brazilian businesspeople. Although two members of the military on the CIC, Navy Captain Atila Monteiro Aché and Army Major Miguel Lage Saião, did not openly oppose Jewish immigration, they were most committed to the General Staff position that European refugees not be allowed into Brazil for security reasons. Only Arthur Hehl Neiva, a member of the CIC whose 1938 defense of a liberal Jewish immigration policy was censored and remained unpublished until 1944, spoke openly in favor of Jewish entry.^[8]

Academic "research" continued to support restrictions on Jewish immigration by portraying Jews in stereotypical ways. An unsigned article titled "The Assimilation of the Foreign Element in São Paulo: Ethnological Notes on Israelites" made a clear distinction between "nationals, [that is,] legitimate Brazilians[,]" and Jews, who could presumably never be "legitimate."^[9] Manuel Diégues, Jr., whose Etnias e cultura no Brasil was published in the 1950s and is still considered a standard work on the subject, claimed that "the great [Jewish] activity was, and is, commerce. It can be said that international commerce is in their hands."^[10] Professor Everardo Backheuser, a technical consultant to the National Geographic Council associated with the movement to institute Catholic religious training in public classrooms, broached both the assimilation and occupational issues. He insisted, in the respected Revista

Brasileira de Geografia , that "the only desirable immigration is that of farmers" and that "the Jew, of all nationalities, is a peddler. [He is] squirmy, unctuous, a monopolizer, and invincible. He constitutes, from the social and political point of view, a real danger, because he is inscrutable, not only by robbing his customers but by disseminating subversive ideas. He has been named one of the best agents of Bolshevism."^[11] The widely published and respected Osório Lopes's ideas were equally pedestrian: he suggested in 1942 that the solution to "The Jewish Problem" (the title of his book) was to convert all Jews to Catholicism.^[12]

In April 1943, the New York Times quoted a Brazilian diplomat as saying that "[we are] not eager to receive refugees in our cities as traders," and in August the CIC drafted a plan that would abolish the old quota system and would limit entry to Europeans, with an emphasis on farmers and technical specialists.^[13] The draft, however, was never formalized into policy, and few immigrants or refugees entered Brazil between 1943 and 1945. In early 1944, the War Refugee Board approached the Brazilian ambassador in London, who doubled as the representative on the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees, with a plan to send a group of Jewish children from France to Brazil.^[14] Fifteen months later, when the Brazilian government finally agreed to accept the children after much debate, the situation had already been resolved. The debates on immigration policy continued through 1945. A new decree law that ostensibly "facilitate[d] European immigration" was in fact concerned with limiting it.^[15]

In 1946, a total of 1,486 Jews entered Brazil, a number that doubled the following year.^[16] This figure represents more than 10 percent of all immigrants to the country. Complaints about "the ghettos of the city" again began to appear, even in the prestigious Jornal do Brasil .^[17] In 1947, a Jewish federal deputy from Rio de Janeiro, Maurício Grabois (Communist Party of Brazil, PC do B), spoke against the "illegal prohibition of the entry of Jews in the country," and, according to Elias Lipiner, Secret Circular 1,249 was not officially canceled until February 1951, even though it had not been enforced in years.^[18] The renewal of Jewish immigration testifies to the ways that refugees and displaced persons managed to manipulate Brazil's immigration system. For example, the Brazilian government insisted that all ships list their passengers by religion, and it appears that the category labeled "Orthodox," and meant to include Greek and Russian Orthodox immigrants, often "included many 'Orthodox' and not-so-Orthodox Jews."^[19]

Negative images of Jews did not disappear after the war. A 1950

survey of two thousand São Paulo university students found that most would not want Jews in "close kinship by marriage."^[20] In 1957 Arthur Hehl Neiva and Manuel Diégues, Jr., completed a UNESCO study titled "The Cultural Assimilation of Immigrants in Brazil."^[21] In spite of the claim that immigrants easily assimilated in Brazil, Jews and Hindus were referred to as members not of religions but of nationalities, placing a question of dual loyalties on the two groups. In spite of such notions, Jews continued to find Brazil a nation of social, political, and economic mobility.

The character of Brazil's Jewish community changed markedly after Israel was established in 1948. Yet Zionism, although important in postwar Brazilian Jewish life, never played the same role that it did in other communities in Latin America. A preparatory kibbutz (agricultural community) was founded in 1948 for those thinking of making aliyah (a "returning" to Israel). This late date, and the general lack of participation of the Brazilian Jewish community in the agricultural Zionist movement, led one Jewish leader to complain that because "the economic situation of Brazilian Jewry is fantastic . . . one finds [the group] in the process of complete assimilation."^[22] Between 1948 and 1977, 6,268 Brazilian Jews made aliyah .^[23] A small group committed to agriculture emigrated in 1950, and among Israelis, the kibbutz begun by that group, Kibbutz Bror Chail, is called "the Brazilian kibbutz."

Following the Suez crisis and the rise of Arab nationalism in the 1950s, about five thousand Jews from Egypt and other Arab countries immigrated to Brazil. The established Syrian and Lebanese community "facilitated their penetration into channels of trade and even into politics of the small towns, many of which had Arab mayors."^[24] The Sephardic newcomers initially had little contact with the established Ashkenazic community, but this has changed. Intermarriage between the groups is high, and it is significant that the former German congregations in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo have recently elected Sephardic presidents.

The establishment of a military regime in Brazil in 1964 brought new challenges to the Jewish community. Although many Jews were prominent members of the opposition, others supported the twenty-one-year military regime (1964-85) and "as allies and supporters of the ruling oligarchies . . . tend[ed] to remain aloof from the incipient movements aimed at renovating Brazil's social and political system."^[25] State suppression of all political movements ensured that the level of anti-Semitism would remain low, an additional motive for Jewish sup-

port. With the suppression of the left, many Jews believed the new military government had made a commitment to the continuation of Brazilian Jewry. This was not the case. Brazil's authoritarian regime never provided the expected protection for minority groups, and political violence against dissenters led many Jews to relocate to Israel, where the Brazilian-born population doubled between 1977 and 1982 to about 11 percent of Israel's 109,865 Jews of Latin American origin.^[26] The Brazilian military's foreign policy also made many Jews uncomfortable. In 1975 Brazil voted in favor of the United Nations resolution equating Zionism with racism, and soon afterward the military decided to base its foreign policy on a "responsible pragmatism" that included a heavy dose of pro-Arab rhetoric.^[27]

While it is unclear exactly how many Jews live in Brazil today, in part because there is no exact definition of who is a Jew, the figure is between 100,000 and 150,000.^[28] The Jewish Congregation of São Paulo is the largest synagogue in South America, boasting a membership of over two thousand families. Conservative and Orthodox synagogues are found in all of Brazil's major cities, and the Reform movement has recently established itself in São Paulo.^[29] Jewish parents continue to have the option of sending their children to Jewish or secular schools, and about one-third of the community is educated in Jewish schools.^[30] Brazilian Jews are widely integrated into the political system at its highest levels. The 1988 presidential elections saw Brazil's most famous television personality, Senor Abravanel (known to all by his stage name, Silvio Santos), the son of Sephardic Jews from Greece, briefly enter the race. His public acknowledgement, but nonpractice, of Judaism appears not to have hurt his base of support among the poor and urban working classes, who generally seem unaware that Brazil has a Jewish population. Jews have also been promoted to the higher ranks of the Brazilian armed forces, and in 1988 a Jew became military commander of one of Brazil's largest states. Even so, a 1977 confidential report by the army's Division of Security and Information, written at the height of the controversy over Brazil's proposed nuclear agreement with West Germany, claimed that Jews opposed to the agreement were Zionists.^[31] While the Jewish Question may no longer be asked, questions about "Jewish issues" still exist.

The integration of Jews into Brazil's political and economic system has not diminished the fear of anti-Semitism. Many Jews believe that Brazilian Jewish life is precarious and that only unity will allow the community to maintain its status. Such notions, of course, are rein-

forced by concerns about losing wealth and power in a society in which the overwhelming majority have little. With recent and growing criticism of the State of Israel, this position has hardened, most notably as the Jewish community has taken divergent paths on appropriate responses to criticism of Israeli policy. Such concerns about the future are understandable as the Brazilian press and some political leaders continue to question Jewish loyalty.

In the economic sphere, Brazil's large arms-manufacturing export firms Engesa and Avibras, both competitors with Israel's armament industries for a share of the Third World market, have boomed because of contracts with many Arab nations. A weapons manufacturer that sells armored cars to Libya, Engenheiros Especializados, is reported to refuse "to employ Brazilians of Jewish origin to avoid offending Arab customers."^[32] The report went on to claim that "although such discrimination is illegal, it is also practiced to a much lesser extent by Petrobrás [the government-owned petroleum corporation] in dealings with its Arab suppliers."

In 1989 the Brazilian people chose Fernando Collot de Mello as president in a free election. The return to democracy, however, has also led to a limited rise in anti-Semitism among some members of the urban middle class. During the campaign, the publication in Rio Grande do Sul of literature denying the existence of the Holocaust became a "Jewish issue" of sorts. Politicians, however, did not actively support requests by the Rio Grande do Sul Jewish Federation that such books be outlawed in accordance with the 1988 Brazilian constitution, which makes the public expression of religious or racial prejudice a crime.^[33] A skinhead movement began in the late 1980s and a revived Integralist Party has gained notoriety and national fame even though the levels of actual participation remain extremely low.^[34]

How do we judge Brazil, a country that appears to have simultaneously restricted and promoted Jewish immigration? Clearly, it was a nation whose intellectuals and political leaders were beset by stereotypes to such an extent that they were unconcerned with the essence of individuals and groups. They cared only about labels. Yet the stereotypes were often fluid and could be interpreted in both positive and negative ways. This challenged the status quo and upset the system even while conventional clichés about Jews remained remarkably consistent in Brazil throughout the first half of the twentieth century. What changed over the course of the 1930s was that stereotypes that had been previously

interpreted in a negative way were viewed positively by some influential Brazilian policymakers. The result was that positions on Jewish immigration were always in flux. Jews were deemed nonwhite and antithetical to Brazil's racial whitening policy while simultaneously being viewed as crucial to Brazil's economic development. In 1939, in spite of secret orders restricting Jewish entry, more Jews entered Brazil than had done so at any time in the previous ten years.

The existence of a "Jewish policy" in a nation with only a small population of Jews might suggest that the Vargas regime leaned more toward the German model of anti-Semitism than the American one. The close alliance between the regime and the Nazis in the mid-1930s and the existence and encouragement of the Integralists, whose funding partially came from the German embassy, gives further credence to such a view. Even so, inconsistency and selective enforcement of Jewish immigration policy were the rule. As some Jews were turned away, others arrived. In this sense, Vargas's Brazil had a "Jewish policy" much like that of Franco's Spain.^[35]

These contradictions force us to reject the question as to whether the Brazilian government was "for" or "against" Jewish immigration. Indeed, such a query may lead us to focus on the refusal of the Brazilian government to let a group of Vatican-supported Catholics, albeit non-Aryans, enter as somehow part of a different policy from the one that permitted significant numbers of Jewish refugees to enter Brazil legally in the five years after their entry was banned by secret diplomatic circular. Yet neither of these discrete pieces of information signals the pattern. Rather, by taking both together, and understanding that Jews were seen as a race whose characteristics were difficult to judge with any absolute finality, we see that acceptance and denial were both part of the ideology of Brazilian policymakers.

What does this seemingly contradictory policy mean when placed in the context of Brazilian ethnic relations? It shows that race was not, at least in the first half of the twentieth century, simply an issue of skin color. Indeed, my analysis challenges a number of general assumptions about race in Brazil. Most certainly it shows that the "racial" question includes ethnicity, language, nationality, and religion. The study of the Jewish Question in Brazil pulls together several themes that have in the past been considered as separate. In twentieth-century Brazil, race, ethnicity, and nationality were so closely linked that it became virtually impossible to distinguish between them. Brazil's racial democracy, as I have shown, was never about democracy; rather, it was about a concept

of race that easily pointed to "the other." In spite of their "Caucasian" racial background and European nationality, Jews were deemed by many politicians and intellectuals as nonwhite and non-European—a dangerous "other" to whom immigration rights should be denied.

Not only did Jews challenge stereotypes of what "white" and "European" meant; they also challenged stereotypes of themselves. This helps explain why, in spite of the vociferous and effective anti-Jewish movement among intellectuals and politicians, those Jews who did settle in Brazil not only survived, but prospered in the same ways that many other white, European groups did. It appears that the reaction against Jewish immigration was a reaction against an unknown, fearsome image for which little real evaluative information existed. Once Jewish immigrants actually arrived in Brazil they were to a large extent accepted, in part because their ethnic background was not always self-evident. Some Jews discovered ways to keep entering Brazil even after the anti-Jewish immigration movement seemed to have won its battle over policy. Others devised ways to help thousands of refugees in Brazil with expired visas stay on and lead productive lives. Jewish refugees, in spite of the horror from which they had fled, and the lack of concern that they faced, were never simply victims. If there are any heroes in this sad story, they are to be found among the refugees and immigrants themselves.

The nature of Brazil's Jewish Question can also be seen by the powerful (but sporadic) effects of international diplomacy on Brazilian refugee policy. The Jewish refugee issue was one important element of U.S.-Brazilian economic and political relations. Those in Itamaraty, especially the actively pro-Yankee Foreign Minister Aranha, realized that concessions on the refugee issue could improve relations with the United States, improve Brazil's international status, and bring in economically desirable newcomers. Yet whatever influence the United States may have had in encouraging Brazil to accept Jews ended after August 1942 with the Brazilian declaration of war against Germany and Italy and the consequential unwillingness among U.S. diplomats to criticize Brazilian policy.^[36]

Manipulation of immigrants has been a constant in Brazilian history. With judgments about Jewish stereotypes always in flux, however, absolute policies never functioned as well as relative ones. In this sense Jews were tools of the elites, pawns of state and federal regimes that looked upon all immigrants as components in the building of a white, elite-dominated, economically and militarily secure Brazil. Yet the poli-

cies were not made in an ideological vacuum. Ideology was, in fact, a particular concern of the Vargas regime, which sought to create justifications for all positions. The active support that both the press and intellectuals gave to the anti-Jewish immigration regulations is striking. Indeed, few were willing to speak openly in favor of humanitarian policies. The Jewish Question in Brazil had many answers, usually contradictory and generally given at the same time. Yet the question, although asked by a small group of nativists, politicians, journalists, and intellectuals, had an effect on real people trying to save themselves at a particularly tragic moment in the modern era. The story has both triumphant and tragic aspects. In spite of the power of anti-Semitic politicians and intellectuals, Jews did make an exodus to Brazil, the land of the future. There, they were welcomed as undesirables.

A number of different organizations kept statistics on Jewish immigration to Brazil. While there is a general, and occasionally exact, agreement on totals, discrepancies can be attributed to different sources.