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law of Spanish nationality for Sephardic people

History
In 1924, the Dictatorship of Primo de Rivera approved a decree to enable Sephardi Jews to obtain Spanish nationality. Although the deadline was originally the end of 1930, diplomat Ángel Sanz Briz used this decree as the basis for giving Spanish citizenship papers to Hungarian Jews in the Second World War to try to save them from the Nazis.

Background
The legislation was first presented in November 2012 by Spain’s foreign and justice ministers. The Justice Ministry of Spain said that it had no estimate of how many Sephardic Jews might be eligible for Spanish citizenship

Today, Spanish nationality law generally requires a period of residency in Spain before citizenship can be applied for. This had long been relaxed from ten to two years for Sephardi Jews, Hispanic Americans, and others with historical ties to Spain. In that context, Sephardi Jews were considered to be the descendants of Spanish Jews who were expelled or fled from the country five centuries ago following the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492.

Application process
In 2015 the Government of Spain passed Law 12/2015 of 24 June, whereby Sephardi Jews with a connection to Spain could obtain Spanish nationality by naturalization, without the usual residency requirement. Applicants must provide evidence of their Sephardi origin and some connection with Spain, and pass examinations on the language, government, and culture of Spain.

The Law establishes the right to Spanish nationality of Sephardi Jews with a connection to Spain who apply within three years from 1 October 2015. The law defines Sephardic as Jews who lived in the Iberian Peninsula until their expulsion in the late fifteenth century, and their descendants. The law provides for the deadline to be extended by one year, to 1 October 2019; it was extended in March 2018. It was modified in 2015 to remove a provision that required persons acquiring Spanish nationality by law 12/2015 must renounce any other nationality held. Most applicants must pass tests of knowledge of the Spanish language and Spanish culture, but those who are under 18, or handicapped, are exempted. A Resolution in May 2017 also exempted those aged over 70.

The Sephardic citizenship law was set to expire in October 2018 but was extended for an additional year by the Spanish government.

The Law states that Spanish citizenship will be granted to "those Sephardic foreign nationals who prove that [Sephardic] condition and their special relationship with our country, even if they do not have legal residence in Spain, whatever their [current] ideology, religion or beliefs."

Eligibility criteria for proving Sephardic descent include: a certificate issued by the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain, or the production of a certificate from the competent rabbinic authority, legally recognized in the country of habitual residence of the applicant, or other documentation which might be considered appropriate for this purpose; or by justifying one's inclusion as a Sephardic descendant, or a direct descendant of persons included in the list of protected Sephardic families in Spain referred to in the Decree-Law of 29 December 1948, or descendants of those who obtained naturalization by way of the Royal Decree of 20 December 1924; or by the combination of other factors including surnames of the applicant, spoken family language (Spanish, Ladino, Haketia), and other evidence attesting descent from Sephardic Jews and a relationship to Spain. Surnames alone, language alone, or other evidence alone will not be determinative in the granting of Spanish nationality.

The connection with Spain can be established, if kinship with a family on a list of Sephardic families in Spain is not available, by proving that Spanish history or culture have been studied, proof of charitable, cultural, or economic activities associated with Spanish people, or organizations, or Sephardic culture.

The path to Spanish citizenship for Sephardic applicants remained costly and arduous. The Spanish government takes about 8–10 months to decide on each case. By March 2018, some 6,432 people had been granted Spanish citizenship under the law. A total of about 132,000 applications were received, 67,000 of them in the month before the 30 September 2019 deadline. Applications for Portuguese citizenship for Sephardis remained open. The deadline for completing the requirements was extended until September 2021 due to delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but only for those who had made a preliminary application by 1 October 2019.

Applicants
By January 2022, 153,000 people submitted applications under the law. Only 23 percent of those, 36,000, successfully obtained Spanish citizenship. The Spanish government rejected at least 3,019 applications due to fraud concerns, all but one in 2021.

Controversy
The low approval rate and byzantine process stoked calls that the law was more symbolic and an attempt by Spain to whitewash its history rather than a meaningful. Applicants had to prove their Sephardic heritage and receive a certificate; pass Spanish language tests only has four locations in the United States. Prospective citizens must also get their documents notarized in Spain.

Future
In 2014, as the law under consideration, chairman of the quasi-governmental Jewish Agency for Israel Natan Sharansky suggested that Israel explore offering citizenship to the descendants of conversos, Jews who converted to Christianity during the Inquisition, under the Law of Return. Sharansky estimated that there were millions of descendants conversos, including hundreds of thousands who were exploring ways of returning to their Jewish roots.

Law 12/2015 has also prompted debate about whether the descendants of Muslims who were also driven out during the Inquisition should be given a path to citizenship. In the early 1600s – nearly 120 years after Jews in Spain were told to leave – the Moriscos were also expelled. An estimated 275,000 people were forcibly resettled, the majority of them heading to Morocco, some to Algeria and Tunisia. stimated that 600 families in Morocco can trace their origins to Spain. Most no longer speak Castilian Spanish. insisted that the experiences of Muslims and Jews on the peninsula couldn’t be compared. “Persecution of Jews was just that, while what happened with the Arabs was part of a conflict, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/24/spain-sephardic-jews-islam-muslim