CUBA
NEWS The
Miami Herald
Smuggling of Cuban migrants investigated
Some have accused Mexican
officials of protecting a smuggling ring
that brings Cubans to the shores and islands
near Cancún.
By Jorge Dominguez, Associated
Press. Posted on Fri, Apr. 14, 2006.
CANCUN, Mexico - Mexico has launched an
investigation into what some officials say
is a people-smuggling ring on the country's
resortstudded Caribbean coast that specializes
in helping Cubans flee the island.
As unusually wellprovisioned Cubans arrive
on the shores and islands near Cancún,
some accuse Mexican officials of protecting
the trade, which for decades ran largely
north from Cuba to Miami.
''There is now an investigation . . . based
on a complaint filed in cases where there
is a supposition of human trafficking,''
said an official of Mexico's National Immigration
Institute who was not authorized to be quoted
by name.
The official said ''there very probably
could be'' smuggling of Cuban refugees.
Sixty-one Cubans were detained in Mexico
in the first quarter of 2006. In 2005, 280
were detained.
But some allege that the smuggled Cubans
might not be reflected in official figures
because, Mexican officials may be protecting
the lucrative smuggling operations -- a
charge officials deny.
''Immigration Institute agents and officials
control the smuggling of Cuban rafters through
Cancún,'' said Laura Martínez
Cárdenas, an inspector in the region
for Mexico's National Human Rights Commission.
Martínez Cárdenas said officials
participated in "a complex web of complicity
with traffickers, in which they receive
large sums of money for supplying traffickers
with help, transportation and protection.''
Egdar Orozco, the head of the immigration
office for the Caribbean coast, said his
agents were doing their jobs well, and noted
his office does not have the authority to
investigate possible people smuggling.
It refers those cases to the Attorney General's
Office, which is carrying out the current
probe.
In past decades, Cubans would only occasionally
drift ashore on Mexico's coast -- usually
driven off-course by winds or currents.
''We are concerned and watching this, because
it's becoming almost a constant thing,''
the head federal prosecutor in the region,
Pedro Ramírez Violante, said of the
arrival of Cuban rafters.
''There are things that stand out,'' Ramírez
Violante told local media. "These appear
to be boats that are adrift, but people
who are left adrift arrive with dehydration,
in bad physical shape. These people aren't
arriving that way.''
He said that might imply the Cubans had
help from smugglers paid to get them close
to the coast. Setting them adrift off the
Mexican coast would presumably be less dangerous
for the traffickers.
Sales of U.S. food up 20%
By Frances Robles. frobles@MiamiHerald.com.
Posted on Fri, Apr. 14, 2006.
ORLANDO - Cuba spent $172 million on U.S.
food imports so far this year, a spike in
sales over last year, the island's top agriculture
import official said Thursday.
Cuba bought mostly wheat, corn, rice and
chicken, despite a rule enacted last year
by the Bush administration that requires
Havana to pay cash for American products
before the goods leave U.S. ports, instead
of when they arrive in Cuban ports, said
Pedro Alvarez, chairman of Alimport, the
island's food import company.
He spoke by teleconference from Havana
at the ''Doing Business in Cuba'' conference
in Orlando.
Cuba spent 20 percent more in the first
two months of 2006 over the same period
last year, experts said.
''That is huge,'' said Kirby Jones, president
of the U.S.-Cuba Trade Association, which
organized the conference for Florida companies.
"That's way up from last year. It doesn't
mean it will continue that high, but it
is substantial.''
The conference, attended by about 50 business
representatives, sought to increase sales
to Cuba. Although the United States has
a trade embargo against Cuba, cash food
sales have been legal since 2000.
Since then, Cuba has spent some $1.8 billion
on American food products. Last year, Alvarez
said, Cuba spent $540 million on U.S. food
products, up from $474 million in 2004.
Experts caution that Cuba's import statistics
are inflated, because they include costs
for shipping and other factors. Other agencies
show sales declined from 2004 to 2005, in
part due to the U.S. change in payment requirements.
''Those changes have created uncertainty,''
Alvarez said, adding that sometimes perishable
goods spoiled because of payment snafus.
"Cuba was forced to divert hundreds
of million of dollars to alternative markets.''
Bahamas on tightrope between U.S. and
Cuba
Close to both the United
States and Cuba, the Bahamas wants to be
a good neighbor to both, but its policy
on migrants has Cuban exiles crying foul.
By Jacqueline Charles. jcharles@MiamiHerald.com.
Posted on Thu, Apr. 13, 2006.
NASSAU, Bahamas - The earthy smell of Cuban-grown
tobacco wafts through the crowded downtown
nightspot as cigar-smoking locals and Cuban
officials exchange pleasantries -- and try
to cut trade deals.
This is not a scene that Cuban Americans
in South Florida would appreciate as an
exercise in Caribbean solidarity, although
that is how many Bahamians, and others around
the world, see it.
For years, the Bahamas has walked a diplomatic
tightrope between its indispensable economic
relationship with the United States and
a budding alliance with communist Cuba.
The recent detention of two Cuban dentists
at its notorious Carmichael Road detention
center tripped up the relationship and stirred
calls by Cuban exiles for a tourism boycott
of the Bahamian destination.
For many exiles, it brought into question
why the Bahamas -- which generates $1.7
billion in trade with the United States,
most of it with Florida -- would cozy up
to Fidel Castro.
The Cuban president has courted his mostly
English-speaking Caribbean neighbors with
doctors, teachers and free trade in rum,
coffee and cement.
''Why shouldn't we trade with Cuba?'' said
Arthur Foulkes, a founding member of the
Bahamas' opposition Free National Movement
political party.
DENTISTS INCIDENT
The saga involving the detained dentists
strained relations with the United States
and Cuba. The dentists had visas allowing
them to enter the United States, but they
were denied exit permits by Cuba. They then
attempted to leave by boat -- only to wash
up in the Bahamas.
Under a treaty, the Cuban government has
15 days after the Bahamas notifies Cuban
officials about migrants to decide whether
to demand their return. The dentists were
detained for almost a year at Carmichael
Road, drawing the attention of Cuban exiles
in Miami. A South Florida Spanish-language
TV reporter who went to investigate the
matter was then allegedly beaten by a detention-center
guard, further angering exiles, some of
whom urged a boycott.
The dentists, Marialys Darias Mesa and
David González, were freed last month
after members of Congress, particularly
South Florida's Cuban-American members and
Rep. Connie Mack of Fort Myers, intervened.
They now live with their families in Florida.
To refugee advocates, the dentists' ordeal
was yet another example of how shabbily
Cubans, Haitians and others are treated
in the Bahamian island chain, where Cuban
cigars and Havana Club rum are as ubiquitous
as native spicy conch.
To Bahamians like Foulkes, and members
of the governing Progressive Liberal Party,
the matter was an unfortunate incident in
a geopolitical drama that the tiny nation
of 301,790 people has long tried to avoid.
Many here saw the exiles' calls for a boycott
as a failed tactic to force the Bahamas
to fall in step with U.S. policies toward
Cuba.
'As a Bahamian, I deeply resented when
people in Florida threatened the Bahamas
with sanctions, threatened the Bahamas that
they will have the American government remove
the preclearance at the airport, threatened
the Bahamas that 'we'll stop the cruise
ships,' '' said Foulkes, who served as a
nonresident ambassador to China and Cuba
from 1999 to 2002. "That's counterproductive.
That only makes you angry.''
NEAREST NEIGHBOR
With 50 miles separating Bimini from the
South Florida coast and only eight miles
separating Cay Lobos from Cuba's northern
coast, the Bahamas is by far the closest
neighbor to both countries. Bahamians argue
that their country needs to have good relations
with both.
About 20,000 Bahamians a year travel to
Cuba for vacation and medical care, said
Bahamian Foreign Minister Fred Mitchell.
Bahamian business people are looking for
additional opportunities, as evidenced by
a recent two-day Cuba trade conference at
a Paradise Island hotel.
At the same time, the Bahamas does about
$1.1 billion in two-way trade with Florida.
The Bahamas isn't the only small nation
in the region with increasing ties to the
United States' nemesis. Others have signed
agreements with Cuba as well as with oil-rich
Venezuela, where President Hugo Chávez
has been blasting U.S. policy in the region.
According to reports by the Caribbean Community,
an estimated 2,606 students from the region
are studying in Cuba, and trade between
Cuba and its Caribbean neighbors amounts
to $26.5 million.
After a recent meeting in Nassau with Mitchell
and Caribbean foreign ministers, U.S. Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice said she had not
come to dictate diplomatic relations. But
Rice made the U.S. position on Cuba trade
and travel very clear.
Highlighting its warmer relations, Cuba
last year upgraded its consul general to
an ambassador, and the Bahamas -- which
recently named a resident ambassador to
Cuba -- plans to open an embassy in Havana
in coming weeks. Also, about 300 Bahamians
recently received free eye surgery, courtesy
of the Cuban government.
Trade between Cuba and the Bahamas remains
on a small scale, mostly isolated to a few
niche products that account for $1.6 million
in goods that Bahamians bring from Cuba.
Many of those products can be found at Flamingo
Cigar & Gourmet Cafe, an upscale cigar
bar in the downtown tourist district.
Lined with made-in-Cuba mahogany furnishings,
it offers a variety of products, including
$995 Cuban paintings, $5 Cristal and Buccanero
beer, and $10 packages of Cubita coffee.
It is a favorite stop for tourists, as well
as locals and Cuban diplomats who recently
kicked off a trade conference with an informal
Friday night gathering featuring Sol Caribe,
a band from Havana.
Owner Garth Bethel said the Cuban products,
acquired during his monthly trips to Cuba,
are by far his most popular items.
''I see unlimited potential to do so many
things there,'' Bethel said, sitting upstairs
in the Havana Club VIP lounge.
Yet some Cubans -- the population in the
Bahamas numbers about 300 -- who come to
Bethel's weekend parties to sip mojitos
admit privately that they are torn. They
see the trade benefits for the Bahamas,
but not for the millions of Cubans who live
in a state-run economy.
COMPARISON MADE
Bahamian business leaders point to Americans'
own trade dealings and ask: Is doing business
with Cuba any less reprehensible than doing
business with communist China?
''It's the same for the Bahamas as it is
for the United States. It's difficult to
really criticize,'' said Philip Simon, executive
director of the Bahamas Chamber of Commerce.
Doing business with Cuba isn't easy, and
many Bahamian business people are reluctant
to advertise their Cuba dealings.
''Doing business there is so difficult,
from banking, payments, shipping, to the
language barrier,'' said Tennyson Wells,
an independent member of the Bahamian Parliament
who has been at the forefront of trading
with Cuba.
''If [the Cubans] were to change their
system of doing business to bring it in
line with what the Chinese are doing, then
I believe Cuba would have tremendous potential,''
said Wells, a lawyer and developer. "Unless
the Cubans make it easier to buy and sell,
I don't think much will happen.''
Patriot Act bars Cuban rebels from asylum
Supporters of an old
anti-Castro rebellion are having difficulties
getting asylum in the United States because
the Patriot Act labels them terrorists.
By Pablo Bachelet, pbachelet@MiamiHerald.com.
Posted on Wed, Apr. 12, 2006.
WASHINGTON - Four decades ago, thousands
of Cubans took to the Escambray mountains
in a CIA-backed guerrilla war against Fidel
Castro. Today, U.S. law brands them as terrorists.
In a twist of fate, 320 Cubans on the island
with links to that armed revolt are now
having problems winning U.S. political asylum
because the Patriot Act bars asylum for
terrorists and people who help them.
The Department of Homeland Security says
the holdups affect 160 asylum applications
involving 320 individuals who joined or
helped the anti-Castro guerrillas, as well
as some of the close relatives of the asylum
seekers.
Bill Strassberger, a spokesman for U.S.
Citizenship and Immigration Services, said
lawyers from Homeland Security and the departments
of State and Justice are trying to resolve
the legal tangle of who's a terrorist and
whether civilians who provide willing or
unwilling support to terrorists should be
denied asylum.
''We're trying to develop a policy that
could be used across the board for any types
of cases . . . to develop a process that
will allow us to exercise discretion,''
Strassberger said. "Until that time,
we're not denying cases, but we're not approving
cases either.''
The Escambray guerrillas and many other
anti-Castro movements were supported by
the CIA in the early 1960s with food, weapons
and even explosives meant for sabotage.
All the groups were wiped out by the late
1960s by Castro troops in what the government
called a "struggle against bandits.''
Cuban exile groups are stung by the plight
of the asylum seekers.
''This really hurts because these are the
people that have been forgotten by history
and the world,'' said Cuban exile activist
Ramón Saúl Sánchez
of the Miami-based Democracy Movement. Most
of the guerrillas got no CIA help, he said.
''They fought with dignity . . . and practically
naked, starved and with their bare hands,
they resisted the dictatorship that is today
the despair of the Cuban people,'' he added.
Citing privacy concerns, U.S. Citizenship
and Immigration Services won't identify
the Cuban asylum applicants and would say
only that all the applications were made
after the Patriot Act was passed in October
2001. It's not clear why the asylum seekers
did not apply before the act was approved.
The Patriot Act defines terrorism as ''any
activity which is unlawful under the laws
of the place where it is committed.'' The
definition, Strassberger said, also includes
any use of explosives, firearms or other
weapons "with the intent to endanger
individuals or cause substantial damage
to property.''
Strassberger said that ''in broad terms''
there are no exceptions for people who were
''forced to provide a meal or an animal''
to rebel groups but that government lawyers
are working on drafting a waiver to benefit
those who supported terrorists because they
had no other choice.
The International Rescue Committee (IRC),
a New York-based organization that helps
victims of political violence, has described
the Patriot Act's impact on some migrants
as "Kafkaesque.''
About 2,000 Colombians who were forced
to make payoffs to leftist guerrillas have
been denied asylum so far because of the
act, according to the IRC, as has a Liberian
woman who was forced to house rebels after
they killed her father and raped her.
But the Cuban case is especially difficult,
the IRC pointed out, because the asylum
applicants will find it hard to convince
asylum officers they were coerced into backing
the anti-Castro guerrillas.
Abigail Price, the national immigration
director for the IRC, said most of the rebels
themselves are already dead and the 320
are probably friends or families who provided
assistance to the fighters.
''They supported an anti-Castro movement,''
she said. "The exception of duress
isn't going to work for them.''
Asylum applicants are routinely asked in
their interviews with U.S. government officials
if they were involved in an armed movement
or provided material support to one.
Strassberger said the majority of the Cuban
cases had a ''basic fact pattern:'' Individuals
provided support that varied from food,
shelter, medicine to arms, "sometimes
willingly, sometimes under duress.''
''That's a distinction that's going to
be made, to see who is going to qualify,''
he noted.
But Price said the Citizenship and Immigration
Services -- which is headed by Emilio Gonzalez,
a Cuban American -- isn't being "given
the flexibility to look at the totality
of the circumstances in dealing with the
cases.''
Officials recognize the Cubans' issue is
a thorny one involving delicate national
security concerns and a lengthy history
of U.S.-backed attacks on the Castro government.
''We can't run the risk of developing a
process that would allow potential terrorists
to get through the system,'' Strassberger
said. "That's the challenge of the
law, the way it's written into immigration
laws is very broad in its interpretation
of terrorist activities.''
Hurricanes forge a Cuban connection
Eddy Rodriguez and Yonder
Alonso, two of UM's best hitters, fled Cuba
as children and have since bonded as baseball
brothers.
By Susan Miller Degnan,
sdegnan@MiamiHerald.com. Posted on Thu,
Apr. 13, 2006.
When Eddy Rodriguez and Yonder Alonso were
little guys growing up in Cuba -- Eddy the
son of a farmer in the province of Las Villas
and Yonder the son of a well-known baseball
coach in Havana -- they had no idea the
other existed.
They had no idea their lives would intertwine,
brought together by baseball, first at Coral
Gables High and then at the University of
Miami.
''We both left Cuba for a better world,
so we both appreciate our great friendship
and the opportunities we were given,'' said
Rodriguez, 20, UM's junior catcher and top
hitter with a .354 average and .625 slugging
percentage. "We always joke how I came
here on an old wooden boat when I was 7
and he came on an airplane when he was 7.
But it's not really funny. Those were huge
events in our lives.''
Alonso is a freshman first baseman whose
father, Luis, was head coach of the minor-league
affiliate of Industriales, often called
the New York Yankees of Cuba. He has at
least twice as many RBI (46) as any other
Hurricane and leads all Atlantic Coast Conference
freshmen. He is hitting .331, with a team-high
43 hits and six home runs.
''The last guy who did that for us as a
freshman with any consistency was Pat Burrell,''
said UM coach Jim Morris, whose Hurricanes
(24-12, 9-6 ACC) travel to Tallahassee on
Friday to play fourth-ranked Florida State
(31-4, 12-3) in a three-game series. "You
normally don't have freshmen batting third
or fourth. Yonder is a clutch hitter, and
Eddy is more of a defensive guy.
"They basically had to start here
from scratch with their families, so there's
a strong bond. We have a lot of Cuban-Americans
on this team. It's an ideal place for them
to play.''
COMING TO AMERICA
Rodriguez's saga began on August 29, 1993,
when he and mother Ylya, father Edilio,
older sister Yanisbet and cousin Carlos
packed into a small wooden fishing boat
off the Cuban coast, said Ylya. They had
hidden containers of fuel over several months.
The kids thought they were going to a great
place to fish, but realized by the next
day, when they hit a storm, their father
had lied to protect them.
''I was scared,'' Rodriguez said, "and
hardly understood how close we were to dying.
The waves were huge swells, 20 feet high,
and the water was navy blue.
'I cried that I wanted to go back home
to be with my grandparents. That's when
my dad told me, 'We're not going back. We're
going to the United States.' ''
Ylya, who works at Publix, cried when she
relived the story in Spanish, saying they
got lost for five days, the last three only
with sugar water. "When we hit the
storm, I thought I was going to lose my
children. I had a little statue of Regla,
the virgin of the ocean, and prayed. Suddenly
there was a space for us to go through.
You wouldn't believe it, but ask Eddy.''
An American ship en route to Chile found
the Rodriguezes and delivered them to a
Puerto Rican Coast Guard boat on its way
to Miami.
''I thank God every day,'' Ylya said. "We
had food in Cuba, but no freedom.''
ALONSO'S JOURNEY
Alonso's family got permission to leave
from the Cuban government, but kept it a
secret until they left on Feb. 6, 1995.
Luis Alonso and his wife, Damaris, received
their degrees at the University of Havana,
he in sports management and she in accounting
administration. Her father came to Miami
in 1980 as part of the Mariel boat lift,
started a company and saved enough money
to help his daughter's family emigrate from
Cuba.
Yonder Alonso has a 3.2 grade-point average,
loves English and is majoring in criminal
justice. He turned down a contract by the
Twins after being drafted last June in the
15th round.
''The money wasn't there,'' he said. "I
felt very young. I knew the opportunity
for me to get older, bigger and stronger
was at UM.''
Today, Damaris works as an accountant by
day and cleans offices at night with Luis,
who also works in a paint factory.
''It was very hard for my dad to leave,
but he did it for us,'' said Alonso, 19,
who has a 16-year-old sister, Yainee, and
returned to Cuba in 2000 when their grandmother
died. "It was rough, because everyone
was poor. I gave them everything I brought
except the clothes I wore. You can only
imagine. That's why I appreciate everything
I get.''
At the airport to bid farewell to the Alonsos
in 1995 was Orlando ''El Duque'' Hernandez,
a close family friend and one of Luis' former
players who eventually defected to the States
and now pitches for the Diamondbacks.
Among Luis' other former players: former
Marlins pitcher Miguel Tejera, in March
reassigned to a Giants minor-league camp;
and outfielder Alex Sanchez, who signed
a minor-league contract with the Reds in
March.
''I was a bit sad to leave Cuba,'' said
Luis, who gave his wife a baseball and bat
when he found out she was pregnant with
Yonder -- ''I would have preferred flowers
or chocolates,'' she mused.
''But I'm very happy it happened,'' Luis
said. "I left behind a family, but
it gave an opportunity for my kids to lead
a better life.''
The mothers of Rodriguez and Alonso have
since become close friends.
''We feel so grateful our sons are in America
and found each other,'' Ylya said.
Cuban Jews' rituals aim to preserve
a unique heritage
Members of Temple Moses,
Miami's only Cuban Sephardic congregation,
are passing their unique Passover traditions
on to the next generation.
By Alexandra Alter, aalter@MiamiHerald.com.
Posted on Wed, Apr. 12, 2006.
Back in Havana, they prayed in a cramped
sanctuary above a downtown warehouse where
grocers sold rice and onions. They sang
songs from the old country in Ladino --
a blend of Spanish and Hebrew -- and chanted
ancient prayers superimposed onto Turkish
melodies.
On Passover, they fried leeks with cheese
and matzo meal, a traditional Turkish Sephardic
dish, and told the story of the Israelites'
flight from slavery in Egypt 3,300 years
ago.
The story reminded them of their ancestors'
exodus more than five centuries ago, when
they fled from Spain to Turkey to escape
the Inquisition in 1492. Later, they were
uprooted again, leaving Turkey for Cuba
to escape the ruins of World War I.
Today, when members of Temple Moses, a
Miami Beach Sephardic congregation made
up mostly of Cuban Jews of Turkish ancestry,
celebrate the start of Passover, they also
will be nurturing hopes of keeping their
traditions alive.
With no new members coming from Cuba, the
25-year-old synagogue on Normandy Isle has
shrunk from close to 700 families in the
1980s to around 400 today. The younger generation
has assimilated, moved away, and, in some
cases, joined other Sephardic synagogues.
The old guard can still be found Saturday
mornings in the cavernous sanctuary on Normandy
Drive -- the women sitting to the left,
wearing traditional white lace head coverings,
the men to the right, wearing white yarmulkes
and prayer shawls. For four hours, they
chant in Ladino and pray in the old style.
''We keep the traditions of our ancestors.
We pray the same way they did,'' said Solomon
Garazi, 80, whose parents fled Turkey for
Cuba in the 1920s and left Havana for Miami
after Castro came to power. "We have
a responsibility to get the younger generations
involved. That's the way it's been done
for 500 years.''
As members of Temple Moses join Jews around
the world in marking the start of Passover
tonight, many will celebrate with rituals
their ancestors guarded through generations
of exile. Sephardic Jews, descendants of
Jews who lived in Spain until the Inquisition
in 1492, have Passover rituals that are
distinct from the Ashkenazim -- Jews of
European ancestry -- said Zion Zohar, who
heads the program for Sephardic studies
at Florida International University.
Moroccan Sephardic Jews, for example, march
around the table to symbolize the Jews'
march out of Egypt and wave plates over
one another's heads while reciting an Aramaic
blessing, Zohar said.
FLAVORS
Nelly Egozi, 75, who is regarded by members
of Temple Moses as a master of Turkish Sephardic
cuisine, will cook buñuelos -- fried
pastries made of matzo flour, eggs, cheese
and drizzled honey traditionally eaten at
the start of the meal to savor the sweetness
of freedom.
For haroset, a traditional Passover dish
that symbolizes the mortar used by the Jewish
slaves, she'll use dates, walnuts, raisins,
apples and red wine.
''It says in the Hagaddah, we should celebrate
as if we were getting out of Egypt,'' said
Garazi, referring to the traditional Passover
text.
Garazi acknowledged some differences between
the Israelites' exodus and the flight of
his ancestors: ''We didn't divide the sea
in two to come from Cuba to here, and when
we were expelled from Spain we left in ships,''
he said.
South Florida's first Turkish-Cuban Sephardic
synagogue started with just 10 members in
1968, when a group of newly settled Cuban
exiles decided to form a synagogue in South
Beach. For years, they met to worship in
a cramped space they called ''The Cave''
at the back of a grocery store on Washington
Avenue.
Their home now is an imposing, two-story
beige structure that takes up a full block.
Inaugurated during the high holidays in
1980, the temple then served as a communal
hub, giving the exile community a sense
of place.
''When Cuban Jews first came to Miami,
they needed to stick together, they had
no choice,'' said Ricky Behar, 33, who comes
from a family of longtime Temple Moses members
and recently joined the synagogue board
to help lead revival efforts. "Now
that everyone is integrated into the community,
there's no longer that need. We need to
redefine ourselves.''
Redefining has a price: the synagogue may
have to compromise its unique cultural identity
to broaden its appeal.
To attract new congregants the synagogue
board plans to reach out to newly arrived
Sephardic Jews from Latin America, Europe
and North Africa, said Didier Choukroun,
Temple Moses' new president. Choukroun,
who is of Algerian and Italian Sephardic
ancestry, became the temple's first non-Cuban
president last January.
''We're trying to be true to our roots
and true to the Torah, but we're trying
to be very open to Jews who are not very
observant,'' Choukroun said. "What
is more important is the Sephardic culture.''
COMPETITION
The growth of Miami's Sephardic population
may have contributed to decline in the synagogue's
membership. While Temple Moses still stands
as Miami's only Cuban Sephardic congregation,
other Sephardic synagogues have sprouted
up in recent years.
As recently as 1994, Miami had just three
Sephardic congregations; today there are
seven throughout Miami-Dade County, according
to a 2004 Jewish population survey. Sephardic
Jews have doubled their ranks in the last
decade, growing from 6 percent to 13 percent
of Miami's roughly 100,000 Jewish adults.
In Broward, there are now around 10 Sephardic
congregations, said FIU's Zohar.
''More people came from South America and
Morocco and they founded other [Sephardic]
synagogues,'' Garazi said. "We didn't
grow because no more Sephardic Jews came
from Cuba.''
Synagogue members are determined to see
the temple flourish again.
NEW DIRECTION
Six months ago, they hired a charismatic
new rabbi, Iosef Benchimol, an Argentine
who worked as a rabbi in Colombia for the
last 11 years. He's already attracting some
Colombians, Venezuelans, Argentines and
Mexicans, members say.
Benchimol also plans to revive the synagogue's
youth programs, Hebrew classes, and Torah
study to draw younger members, he said.
And he aims to recover some of the synagogue's
lost membership. Of six new families that
have joined the synagogue since January,
three have historic ties to Temple Moses.
Jack Ojalvo, 38, a textile exporter who
lives in Fort Lauderdale, formally joined
Temple Moses at the end of last year, just
as his father, Jose Ojalvo, was ending his
tenure as temple president.
Now he hopes to bring back some of the
other young members of the community who
grew up in the synagogue and later moved
north.
''I decided to become a member to make
things correct,'' said Ojalvo, whose grandfather
left Turkey and became a rabbi in Cuba.
"I became involved in a youth movement
trying to call back our community.''
He's passing traditions on to his own daughters,
ages 6 and 9. ''When we're at home singing
any kind of religious song, they've basically
learned it with a Sephardic chant,'' he
said.
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