The Jewish Trail of Tears The Evian Conference of ... - Haruth.com

established on chicken farms in remote areas. However, local circumstances and the
backgrounds of the colonists precluded success. Most of the settlers were non-farmers of
middle class origin from urban environments and consequently, many sought to re-enter
their pre-emigration professions and businesses. 20 This prompted the Government under
Provisional President General Gil Alberto Enríquez Gallo to decree on January 19, 1938
that “hundreds” of refugee Jews who had entered under the guise of being agriculturalists
but who had in reality intended to engage in business would be forcibly expelled. 21
“All
alien Jewish traders” were given thirty days to commence farming or face deportation. 22
This decree, however, was later repealed following negotiations between the Austrian
Jew Julius Rosenstock (selected by the Ecuadorian Government to manage the
construction of the Sibambe-Quito railway) and Gallo. Overall, only 3,500-4,000 Jews,
primarily of German origin, entered Ecuador by 1945. 23
Francisco García Calderón Rey, the Peruvian delegate, pledged his nation’s
cooperation and agreement to admit German refugees to the “extent of its possibilities” as
defined by its immigration laws. Peru had received a number of Jewish scientists and
academics who were “like leaven or ferment…of value to all nations.” The nation was
ready to accept agricultural workers and industrial technicians but could not admit
“traders or workmen” who potentially could disrupt domestic equilibrium and generate
20 Jacqueline, Shields, “The Virtual Jewish History Tour Ecuador,” 1998 available from
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vjw/Ecuador.html; Internet; accessed September 4, 2010;
Loval, We Were Europeans, 225.
21 The U.S. News, January 24, 1938.
22 Newsweek, January 31, 1938, 21.
23 “Ecuador,” Jewish Virtual Library; Maria-Luise Kreuter, Wo liegt Ecuador? Exil in einem
unbekannten Land 1938 bis zum Ende der fünfizer Jahre (Berlin: Metropol-Verl., 1995), 89.
206