BBC News reports: More than 500 years ago, tens of thousands of Jews fled Spain because of persecution. Now their descendants are being invited to return.

Before the infamous Spanish Inquisition of the 15th Century, some 300,000 Jews lived in Spain. It was one of the largest communities of Jews in the world.

Today, there are about 40,000 or 50,000 – but that number could be about to swell dramatically.

In November, Spain’s justice minister Alberto Ruiz-Gallardon announced a plan to give descendants of Spain’s original Jewish community – known as Sephardic Jews – a fast-track to a Spanish passport and Spanish citizenship.

“In the long journey Spain has undertaken to rediscover a part of itself, few occasions are as moving as today,” he said.

Anyone who could prove their Spanish Jewish origins, he said, would be given Spanish nationality. [Continue reading…]