Arabs Making Their Mark in Latin America: Generations of Immigrants in Colombia, Venezuela and Mexico
By Habeeb Salloum.
“
Nashara al-Islam bi-khawafiq al-alam” [“Islam spread under waving banners”]. I could not believe my eyes as I read these words etched in Arabic on a church bell preserved in the Palacio de la Inquisición in Cartagena, Colombia’s foremost resort. It was dated 1317 A.D. and presumably brought to this former Spanish colony by early settlers from the Iberian Peninsula who thought the inscription was only a decoration. Little did they realize that this remnant of the Spanish Moors, who had been forcibly converted to Christianity then shipped to the Spanish colonies in South America, was a statement of pride by a defeated people.
Thinking of this bell as I walked down Avenue Saint Martin, the main street of Bocagrande, Cartagena’s tourist section, the sign
“Heladeria y Repositeria Arabe” caught my eye. Excited, I entered the tidy-looking ice cream parlor. “Are you an Arab? Do you have Arab ice cream?” I asked, first in Arabic then in English. The girl behind the cash register shrugged her shoulders, not understanding a word.
In the ensuing days of travel through a number of Colombian coastal cities I found that the bell with its Arabic inscription and the sign “Heladeria Arabe” truly reflected the remains of the converted Moors, exiled to the colonies, and the Arab immigrants who had come in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Both groups passed on but left their traces behind.
During the first years after the Spaniards landed in South America, a fair number of the settlers were former Muslims of Spain who had been required to convert to Christianity. A hundred years after their conversion, they were still not fully accepted as true Christians, and many of them were sent to the new Spanish colonies. Still yearning for the life of their ancestors, they preserved a good number of traditions inherited from their Arab forefathers. Hence, when the first immigrants from the Greater Syria area came, they found a people with which they had much in common.
At the turn of the century, the Syrian newcomers, mostly from a peasant or working class background, landed on the shores of a land still living in the medieval world. With hardly any roads or the other amenities of our modern age, these first immigrants used the coastal rivers as roads to trade with the inhabitants of the primitive and isolated villages. With great determination, hard work, and the mercantile traits which they had inherited from their forefathers, they prospered and eventually opened their own businesses in Colombia’s Caribbean coastal towns. Due to their resourcefulness, those who settled in the villages of the countryside were admired and respected by the local inhabitants. However, in the cities, the locals derogatorily called the Syrian newcomers “Turcos,” looking down on them while envying their success.
When the Syrians made some money, most brought brides from their homeland. Only a minority wed Colombian women, including a few from the Guajira Indian tribe. Trying to improve their lives in a land beset by feuding, revolutions and poverty, they had little time to teach their offspring about their Arab culture. In the subsequent years, due to their work-filled lives, the Arabic tongue was almost lost to the Colombian born generations.
The society to which the Arabs came in the late 19th and early 20th centuries reinforced the almost total loss of the language. The church was all-powerful and every inhabitant had to fit into the narrow view of the Spanish-Catholic world of that time.
I asked George Baladi, a longtime immigrant living in Cartagena, if there were any Muslims among the early Arabs in Colombia. He replied, “I am told that five Muslim families from Tripoli, in present day Lebanon, had come with the early immigrants, but they all had to become Christian.”
Baladi, one of the few who has preserved his heritage, and is the representative of the Federacion des Entidades Arabes en Las Americas in Colombia, went on to say that in earlier times one had to be baptized to work and to become a Colombian. Hence, Muslims had to hide their identity. Only much later laws gave freedom and equality to all creeds. Today, there is no problem for people wishing to live under the religion of their choice.
The earliest known Syrian immigrant to Colombia is believed to be the Damascene Salim Abu Chaar who arrived by ship in 1885; a good number of others soon followed. The second wave came in the 1920s. The descendants of these first two waves of Syrian immigrants are now involved in every facet of Colombian life. Many are well-educated and they can be found in all professions. A few hold high positions in the armed forces, while others are pillars in the business community.
In the political arena, the Arab immigrants have also left an impressive mark. Gabriel Turbay ran for president in 1946, and Julio César Turbay Ayallah, born to an Arab father and Colombian mother, served as president of the country from 1978 to 1982. When first elected he is reported to have stood up in Parliament and declared that he was proud to be of Arab descent.
At any one time, there are from 20 to 30 members of Parliament and the Senate who are of Arab origin. It is estimated that there are over a quarter of a million Colombians of Arab descent — almost all tracing their origins to Syria, Lebanon and Palestine. The vast majority live along the Caribbean coastline; Barranquilla has the largest number of Arabs in the country. Since it is a large commercial center, it drew many Arab immigrants who have built a huge community center which is the envy of the other communities.
One of the oldest of the other communities is in Cartagena, 136 km to the west of Barranquilla. In this city, once known as the “Gateway to El Dorado,” there are only about 2,000 Arab Colombians, but they are very influential. Even though they are a small minority in a city of 900,000, a good number of the these emigrés and their descendants are prominent in all its avenues of life.
In this city, the Arabs have built a center, called Club Union, reflecting the unity of the Syrians and Lebanese in Cartagena. With restaurants and numerous recreation facilities, it offers a home away from home for the residents of Arab origin. The Arabs are the only organized ethnic community in the city and, according to Elias Daffach, owner of the restaurant La Olla Cartagena, they are well respected by the other Colombians.
In spite of their small number and almost total assimilation, the Arabs have left a significant mark on Colombian society. In every city where they reside, restaurants and cafes proudly display the name
Restaurante Arabe or
Comida Arabe. The Arab dishes,
kubbah,
shish kabab, taboula, tahini, and all types of pies stuffed with cheese, meat, sweets, and vegetables are well-known among the Colombians. Many Colombians have come to think of these delicacies as their own foods, and a good number of these dishes are sold frozen in almost all markets.
Strangely enough, even though the Arab immigrants’ descendants have lost their tongue and most of their traditions, they still form social clubs, and about 25 percent marry within the Arab community.
ARABS IN VENEZUELA
I feasted in the restaurant of the Centro Sirio Venezolano (Syrian Venezuelan Center) on the tastiest kababs which I had ever eaten. The cook, hailing from Aleppo, had done a superb job. No meal, even in his home town, could have been more satisfying than this dinner in one of Venezuela’s top resorts.
All around me in the outdoor restaurant and by the swimming pool, about 1,000 out of the 8,000 Arabs who reside in the town of Puerto La Cruz and the adjoining city of Barcelona were eating and playing backgammon, bingo, cards or dominos. Others were watching Arabic videos or chatting while all around, masses of children played and shouted.
Above this din, I could barely hear the taped voice of Umm Khalthum, singing of a lost love. This vibrant community had built the most magnificent of all the clubs in Santa Cruz. Unlike in many other urban centers where Arabs have immigrated, in this town the Syrian community had founded a home where they could meet, socialize, and at the same time keep their heritage alive.
Credit for the effort and success of establishing the top ethnic center in Venezuela—some say in all of South America—is due, in a large part, to a few dedicated men, mostly from Aleppo, Syria. They were mainly part of the huge Syrian migration to Venezuela which took place during the oil boom of the 1950s. These newcomers scattered throughout the country and are the core of today’s 400,000 Syrians living in Venezuela.
Almost every town and village which had missed having Arab settlers from the earlier immigrations, which began in the late 1880s, now has at least one Arab family. They have joined the approximately 500,000 prior immigrants and their descendants, reinforcing Arab culture amongst the older Arab community which had been almost totally assimilated.
The center, even though it was almost entirely built by the Syrian community, accepts membership from all Arabs, regardless of their country of origin or religious affiliation. Arab students, not only from Puerto La Cruz, but from other parts of the country, are given free membership.
LEBANESE IN MEXICO
Arabs who emigrated in the early 1900s from the Ottoman province of Syria, part of which is now Lebanon, to the Yucatán, then a poor area of Mexico, had primarily come from poor villages themselves, and, like their compatriots in the other parts of the Americas, began their lives in the New World as peddlers. Remarkably, soon after reaching Mexico’s shores, they did well.
Today, about 30 percent of Mérida’s commercial life is controlled by the descendants of these early Arab immigrants. However, the vast majority have totally assimilated into Mexican society and retain virtually no connection with their Arab past.
Despite the prevalent assimilation, a good number of these former Syrian-Lebanese have preserved a pride in their heritage, and today form a close-knit community. Even though a fair number only retain the food of their forefathers and a faint recollection of their ancestors’ origins, they are the driving force behind the Lebanese community and its impressive club.
The Lebanese in Mérida organized in the latter part of this century. Their first community center was a rented hall on 63rd Street, in the heart of town. Later, a number of the affluent members donated money to build a clubhouse on the outskirts of the city; the center is now the attractive and prestigious Lebanese Club, drawing the admiration of all Méridans.
I spoke with Michel Jacabo Eljure, whose father emigrated from the district of Qura, located in present-day Lebanon. He is a retired businessman who owned a ranch in the Yucatán. He spoke Arabic well and was familiar with the history of the Arabs in Mérida. According to him, even though the Lebanese were only 1 percent of the city’s 1.5 million population, they controlled 30 percent of the commercial and industrial establishments. As for religion, he explained that the Lebanese were originally evenly divided between Maronite and Orthodox Christians. Today, they are all Roman Catholics with only about 20 families still practicing the Orthodox rites. From time to time, a priest travels from Mexico City to administer to these few families’ needs.
With the tolerance of peoples to others in mind, I asked Michel, “Why is it that in countries like Canada, multicultural societies are encouraged and here in Mexico it’s total assimilation?” He replied, “Our society is montholitic. We want everyone to be Roman Catholic and speak Spanish. In our community only about 20 people still read Arabic.”
He continued, “As for our food, it’s another matter. Even a great number of the non- Lebanese in Mérida cook in their homes our kubbah, grape leaves and other Arabic foods. At least we contributed some of our heritage to Mexico - now our beloved homeland.”
This essay appeared in Al Jadid, Vol. 6, no. 30 (Winter 2000)
Copyright © 2000 by Al Jadid
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Arabs Making Their Mark in Latin America: Generations of Immigrants in Colombia, Venezuela and Mexico | Al Jadid Magazine
Interview: Latin America's dynamic Palestinian communities
NOV. 28, 2013 7:44 P.M. (UPDATED: MAY 20, 2015 6:46 P.M.)
BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- The Palestinian diaspora in Latin America represents an undocumented story of success, with Latin Americans of Palestinian descent holding positions of power and influence in the political and business classes of their respective countries.
Ma'an interviewed Cecilia Baeza, Doctor of Political Science at Sciences Po Paris and co-founder of
RIMAAL, to discuss the history of Palestinian emigration to Latin America, a chapter of the Palestinian narrative often overlooked.
Below is an edited transcript of a conversation between Ma'an and Baeza.
How large is the Palestinian community in Latin America?
Latin Americans of Palestinian descent claim today to be around 700,000, making it the largest Palestinian presence outside the Arab world. There is no single Latin American country where one cannot find Palestinians, but Chile and Honduras are by far the first in terms of numbers, with at least 350,000 and 280,000 people of Palestinian origin, respectively. In those countries, Palestinians are mostly third and fourth-generation immigrants from the region of Bethlehem. In Brazil, by contrast, one can find a majority of first and second generations. The majority arrived from the region of Ramallah in the 1950's or after the Six-Day War. Brazilian-Palestinians are today around 60,000, a small number compared to the 15 million Brazilians of Lebanese and Syrian descent.
What is the current political and economic status of the descendants of Palestinian immigrants?
The integration of Latin Americans of Palestinian descent has not only been successful on a professional and economic level, it is also deeply culturally rooted. Latin Americans of Palestinian descent are seen as fully-fledged citizens by their fellow nationals and fully identify themselves with the countries where they live. The presence of politicians of Palestinian descent at every level of politics in their countries is an evidence of that.
Palestinians have been elected city mayors since the 1920's. Wadi Damas was the mayor of La Romana in the Dominican Republic from 1923 to 1928 before coming back to Beit Jala where he became mayor in 1944. The first Minister of Palestinian descent was Rafael Tarud Siwady, appointed Minister of Economy and Commerce in Chile in 1953. Since the late 1990s, Palestinians in Latin America have even reached the highest levels of political representation, with Carlos Flores Facuss, President of Honduras from 1998 to 2002, Elas Saca Gonzalez, President of El Salvador from 2004 to 2009, Said Wilbert Musa, Prime Minister of Belize from 1998 to 2008, and Yehude Simon Munaro, Prime Minister of Peru from 2008 to 2009.
The descendants of Palestinian immigrants are part of the middle and upper classes. Some of them are among the top businessmen of their respective countries. Others have won renown in the fields of medicine, journalism, or the arts.
Father Francisco Salvador, a Chilean priest of Palestinian descent,
displays his grandfather's wooden box of Palestinian soil. (CNEWA/Tomas Munita)
How do Palestinian communities in Latin America relate to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
The mobilization of Palestinian emigrants for the Palestinian cause dates as far back as the 1930s, when emigrants in Latin America collected funds to be sent to the families of martyrs in the Arab Revolt. Mobilization for the Palestinian cause has never ceased over generations, even though its intensity has varied according to periods and countries.
In 1984, Latin Americans of Palestinian descent organized themselves by creating the COPLAC, Confederation of Palestinian entities of Latin America and the Caribbean, whose first congress took place in So Paulo, Brazil. Eleven representatives from Latin America were designated to be members of the Palestinian National Congress of the PLO.
After the decline of those movements during the decade of the 1990s - when the Israeli-Palestinian Peace Process gave a sense of hope that a solution was finally within reach - the mobilization started again at the beginning of the 2000s in the aftermath of the Second Intifada.
Palestinian-Chileans lead this movement in Latin America. The Palestinian Federation of Chile, GUPS-Chile and other organizations were revived, and new institutions were created, like the Palestine Bethlehem 2000 Foundation, a charity founded by wealthy businessmen that also does cultural work towards the community.
The club emblem of Club Deportivo Palestino, a Chilean
football team founded by Palestinian immigrants in the 1920's.
How has the sense of Palestinian identity changed over time?
The first change occurred in the 1920s. Until 1920, emigrants from Palestine used to mention alternatively four focuses of identity: their hometown - in this case, Bethlehem, Beit Jala or Beit Sahour; Syria, in the sense of Bilad al-Sham; their religion, mainly Orthodox Christianity; and finally, their Arabness. References to Palestine were rare, while the identification with the Ottoman Empire was almost nonexistent.
In 1920, the Club Deportivo Palestino, a professional football club, was founded in Santiago de Chile: the name of the club - Palestino - and the colors of the football jersey - those of the Palestinian flag - were clearly a nationalist reference. This new identification gained momentum from 1924. Between 1924 and 1939, dozens of organizations with a direct and unique reference to Palestine were founded all across Latin America.
The decade of the 1930s witnessed the development of a very dynamic nationalist ethnic press in Latin America. The best examples are Al Islah in Chile, published from 1930 to 1942 and also distributed in Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador, and Rumbos published in Honduras from 1939.
The result of all of this is that, as the end of the 1930s, we have a population who increasingly claimed its belonging to the "Palestinian nation," while they were more than ever intended to settle in their host countries.
However, in the 1970s, with the arrival of the PLO in Latin America, Palestinian identity was revived through a myriad of cultural activities, including dabkeh. Today, Palestinian identity in Chile is more political than cultural, even if certain practices have survived, like food, a vector maybe less powerful than language and religion, but that produced and embodied feelings of connection with Palestine.
Every Latin American of Palestinian descent will always start speaking about its Palestinian identity with souvenirs of lunches at the grandparents' place, eating maqluba, stuffed marrows and eggplants.
Chile Square in the Palestinian town of Beit Jala. A stone in the center
of the square reads in Spanish:"The Republic of Chile, to her sons of
Palestinian origin, on the occasion of the commemoration of the second
centenary of our national independence. Palestine, September 2010."
How do Palestinian communities in Latin America relate to the major issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
The dominant narrative among Palestinians in Latin America takes up the major themes of official Palestinian nationalism, such as the Nakba, Jerusalem, refugees, the right of return, the dismantlement of settlements, etc. They defend exactly the same positions as the PLO and the Palestinian authority. Some identify more with the historical Palestinian Left, the PFLP, and others with Fatah, but of course, there is no identification with Hamas since the overwhelming majority of them are Christians.
In the construction of their identity, the very notion of "return" doesn't have the same meaning and importance for Palestinians in Latin America that it can have for refugees. Considering that they already are first-class citizens of their countries of residence, with which they also fully identify as nationals, a process of massive return to a future state of Palestine would not make any sense, at least for now.
However, there is indeed the individual desire of some of them to go to Palestine, for personal reasons that range from identity to political aspirations. If Israeli authorities were not making it almost impossible for foreigners to come to live in the occupied territories, I am pretty sure that many more young Latin Americans of Palestinian descent would travel to Palestine.
What role can the Latin American Palestinian diaspora play in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
In my opinion, Palestinians in Latin America can play several roles. Politically, they can lobby their governments for stronger support to the Palestinians. They are already doing this. Their mobilization partly explains the wave of recognition of the Palestinian State by almost all Latin American countries.
This kind of support is important for balancing the pro-Israeli bias of US foreign policy in multilateral organizations, like UNESCO, the UN General Assembly, etc. Economically, the wealthiest businessmen can bring their financial support to important projects and institutions. Some are already contributing to the development of the University of Bethlehem. This is good, but more could probably be done, not only in terms of charity but also in terms of productive investments.
At the level of ideas, intellectuals and artists of Palestinian descent could play a greater role. We have not seen the emergence of a Latin American Edward Said yet, and I think it is a pity because their Latin American experience could certainly enrich the political debate in Palestine.
Baeza recently spoke at The Palestine Center and the Institute for Palestine Studies in a talk entitled: "Palestinians in Latin America: Between Assimilation and Long-distance Nationalism."
Interview: Latin America's dynamic Palestinian communities
Saudi Arabia Donates Dates for Thousands of School Children in Nicaragua
Published on 16 April 2015
Representatives of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and officials from the Ministry of Education and WFP at the donation ceremony.
MANAGUA – Thousands of children attending pre-school and primary school in Nicaragua are to receive dates in their school meals thanks to a contribution from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP).
Around 156,000 children will benefit from this second contribution of dates from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to WFP in Nicaragua in the past three years.
The KSA government is donating a total of 72 metric tons valued at US$167,000. The dates will complement the Nicaragua Ministry of Education’s Integral School Nutrition Programme for children in 12 municipalities of Jinotega and the Autonomous Region of the Northern Caribbean (RANC).
WFP received the donation during a formal ceremony today and attended by two representatives of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: Saad Bin Abdulaziz Al-Sunaidi, an official of the Ministry of Finance and Mohammad Alkadi, Second Secretary of the Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Mexico. Miriam Ráudez Ministry of Education, Salvador Vanegas, Advisor to the President for Education issues, Mohamed Lasthar, Advisor to the President for International issues and Norma Ortiz, Director of PINE for School Meal Programme.
"This new contribution of dates from Saudi Arabia allows us to add a highly nutritious food to children’s school meals in Nicaragua," said WFP Deputy Representative, Marc Regnault de la Mothe. "It's a great gesture of solidarity by the Kingdom and the Saudi people to share with Nicaragua the benefit of these sweet fruits that have an ancient cultural, historical and religious value".
Dates, which are a palm fruit produced by Asia and North Africa, have high calorific content and provide energy. They also help reduce anemia because they are high in iron, thiamin and riboflavin. Rich in sugars and carbohydrates, dates help improve mental alertness, concentration and strength after physical activity.
Nicaragua was the first country in Latin America to introduce dates to children through the school meals programme. In 2013, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia made its first contribution of 136 metric tons of dates worth US$266,000.
A campaign was initiated to promote dates and facilitate cultural acceptance of this new food. These fruits generated great interest among Nicaraguans who were eager to sample them.
Saudi Arabia is one of the largest producers of dates worldwide. After being harvested from the palm, the fruits are dried in the sun. One hundred grams of dates provide about 270 calories and contain the same nutritional value as a steak. Natural, eaten either ripe or dried, they are preserved in their own sugar and used to prepare sauces, pastries and cakes.
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WFP is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide, delivering food assistance in emergencies and working with communities to improve nutrition and build resilience. Each year, WFP assists some 80 million people in around 75 countries.
For more information, please contact:
Sabrina Quezada Ardila, WFP/Nicaragua. Tel 505 2278 4982, cel. 505 8930 2987
sabrina.quezada@wfp.org
Saudi Arabia Donates Dates for Thousands of School Children in Nicaragua | WFP | United Nations World Food Programme - Fighting Hunger Worldwide
