Finding lost Jews

Two weeks ago we went down to the Annual General Meeting of the Casa Shalom,
Center for Marrano-Anusim Studies, near Ashdod, at a place called Gan Yavne.
It was tucked away down some lanes, and behind a sprawling house there was the
new office complex. It is very small, but functional, and crammed with books
and papers. Several universities have made bids to take it over and
incorporate it, but ironically they want to be paid for the honor of doing
that rather than vice versa.
One of the highlights of the meeting was being introduced to a charming couple
with four children who came from Jerusalem especially for the meeting. This
couple came originally from Puerto Rico and so spoke English and Spanish.
Apparently when Gloria Mound, the Director of the Center, was in Puerto Rico
and gave a talk on Marranos, or as they prefer to be called crypto-Jews, this
couple heard about her talk and attended. Afterwards they approached her and
told her that they believed they were Jews. They had all the tell-tale signs,
including mothers who lit candles secretly on shabbat, etc. They lived up in
the hills in Puerto Rico, in an isolated place. Their surname was Cruz
('cross' in Spanish), but the husband's original family names was Migdal ('tower'
in Hebrew). One thing led to another, and they expressed their desire to become
practicing Jews and to make aliyah, to move to Israel.
I don't know all the details of the process, but at some point, in order to be
accepted as Israelis under the Law of Return, they have to establish that they
are Jews. Of course, being secret Jews for generations, they had no such
papers, no Jewish marriage certificate, no birth certificate stating that they
are Jews.
Gloria helped them find a lawyer, who decided instead of arguing their case
before the Rabbinate as one for conversion, he argued it as that they were
already Jews, that in their families there had been a pact to only marry
secret Jews like themselves, and that the documentation of his original family
name meant that the husband was Jewish. As usually happens with the
Rabbinate, months went by and nothing happened, and finally the lawyer was
told that they could not accept them as Jewish without proper documentation.
Then the lawyer threatened to take the case to the Supreme Court of Israel,
and to establish a precedent. This so frightened the Rabbinate, because the
Court is known for its liberal tendencies, that they capitulated, and gave
them the required certificates accepting them as Jews, so that they could
become Israeli citizens. Then they were re-married as Jews.
This "coming out of the closet" of secret Jews is fairly common among Spanish
speaking Jews, who were the true "marranos," who were forcibly converted to
Catholicism, and now that they have freedom, some are choosing to convert
back, sometimes hundreds of years later. But, of course this is a very small
number. There are probably millions of Spaniards and Portuguese who are
descended partly from Jews who were conversos, but don't expect any mass
conversion back any time soon.
On the BBC, I saw an item about Poles in Krakow, who have discovered that
they were Jewish, whose identity was hidden from them when they were children
during WWII. Krakow was a large center of Jewish population and culture.
Some of these people have re-discovered their roots, and are now, often
without their original parents and without documentation, are also coming "out
of the closet." There is now an active shool and a Rabbi in Krakow and his
flock is growing. There are now about a dozen men and women who have
re-identified as Jews, and are learning about Judaism and how to live as Jews.
This is a strange legacy of German and Polish anti-Semitism. Slowly some of
the remnants are returning to the fold.