Spain's parliament yesterday passed a law allowing descendants of Sephardic Jews to gain nationality, more than five centuries after their ancestors were expelled from the country, the Reuters website reports today (June 12, 2015).
The law could allow an estimated 3.5 million Sephardic Jews -- whose families settled in Israel, the United States, Argentina, France, and elsewhere -- to apply for citizenship. They would not have to give up their current nationality to do so.
The numbers of those applying are likely to be much lower, however -- running in the tens of thousands -- Jewish groups and the Spanish government believe.
The law -- suggested last year by Spain's center-right government -- nevertheless has historic resonance more than 500 years after Spain's Catholic monarchs Isabella and Ferdinand ordered Jews and Muslims to convert to Catholicism or leave the country.
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