The Oligarch's Passport

In 2015, Portugal opened its doors to foreigners whose jewish ancestors had been expelled during the inquisition. Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich used his heritage to gain entry to the country and an all-access pass to the eu-exposing deep flaws in a well-intentioned policy

- BY Willem Marx

As Rabbi Daniel Litvak stepped out of the cab at the airport in Porto one Thursday morning last March, a cluster of plainclothes Portuguese cops swarmed him. His son, Malkiel, watched in shock as more than a dozen men halted traffic, seized bags, and bundled his father into a vehicle, speeding off without explanation. To Malkiel, it looked like a kidnapping.

The officers were from a branch of the federal Polícia Judiciária. They drove Litvak three hours south to their headquarters in Lisbon, where they booked him, photographed him, and placed him in a cell for the night, according to Litvak, alongside a man from Pakistan arrested for attempted murder and a local arrested for armed theft. The eventual charges against Litvak included document forgery, influence peddling, and money laundering—and he was arrested, he was told, based on an anonymous tip that he was trying to leave the country.

The next morning, the Lisbon team expanded their dragnet in Porto, searching several properties, including the city’s Kadoorie Mekor Haim Synagogue, named for a wealthy Jewish dynasty whose family members had helped fund the synagogue’s completion in the late 1930s, just before thousands of Jewish refugees began passing through neutral Portugal as they fled Nazi persecution. After the war, the country’s fascist dictatorship supported a policy known as “Re-Christianization” that left little room for minority religions. The building fell into disrepair until this century, when legislation to offer citizenship to those with Portuguese Jewish descent accelerated the revival of the Jewish community. The Comunidade Israelita do Porto is now 1,000 strong, with a headquarters and a small museum sitting catty-corner to the synagogue’s front gate.