While Kanye West’s deranged, antisemitic ramblings continue to draw global attention, a more insidious form of antisemitism has been making noise in South America, an antisemitism based on what one Brazilian academic calls “the imaginary Jew.”
In June, at the invitation of Jewish leaders in Florianopolis, capital of the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina, I met state legislator Felipe Estevão to discuss his sponsorship of bills to combat antisemitism in Santa Catarina and mandate Holocaust education.
Estevão’s efforts were, of course, welcome. But though I lived and worked in Brazil as a rabbi, and travel there frequently, only very recently did I grasp their importance.
