Chile

EXPLORE ONE OF THE LARGEST SOUTH AMERICAN JEWISH COMMUNITIES!

With over 18,000 Jews, Chile’s Jewish community is one of the largest in South America. The first Jews in Chile were conversos, or forced converts to Catholicism, who arrived with the Spanish Conquistadors in the 17th century. Most of the converso Jews assimilated and stopped practicing Judaism. The Jewish population only began to expand significantly at the beginning of the 20th century thanks to an influx of Jews from Germany, France, and Russia, as well as Sephardic Jews from the Ottoman Empire. Today, Chilean Jews are active in public life, with Jews having held, at various points, the position of Foreign Minister, Minister of Justice, and even President of the Chilean Supreme Court.

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