A new monument has been unveiled in Murcia that pays tribute to the Jews expelled from Spain in 1492.
The monument, “El abrazo,” was sculpted by Mexican artist José Sacal and had its public debut in Cartagena, COPE reported.
The sculpture was sponsored by the Hispano-Jewish Foundation and the José Sacal Foundation of Mexico. The inauguration ceremony was attended by the President of the Region of Murcia Fernando López Miras.
López Miras called it a “symbol of union, of shared heritage and an invitation to move forward together.”
The sculpture was chosen to be placed in Cartagena because as a port city it was the only maritime route of the expulsion of Sephardi Jews.
López Miras said that the statue is in honor of “all those who were forced to leave their home and their life behind, but who never gave it up.”
“Cartagena is a Port of Cultures, because Spain is the sum of many of them, of all those who made this city, this region and our country great,” López Miras said.
He also said that today Murcia is “a land of solidarity and a place of welcome,” and noted that they are “opening our homes to thousands of people fleeing from Ukraine.”
Earlier in the year, the Lorca Synagogue in Lorca, in the region of Murcia, was noted as one of three ancient synagogues to be unearthed in Spanish towns.
The remainder of the synagogue was originally discovered in 2003 during the building of a hotel, tucked away in a medieval fortress.
The castle, which sprawls throughout the historic Alcalá neighborhood, has stood since sometime between the ninth and 15th centuries. The synagogue is the only one known to have been found with an intact bimah and Torah ark.