CAM Joins Jewish Communal Call for Royal Spanish Academy to Remove Antisemitic Slurs from Official Dictionary

The Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) has joined two dozen other Jewish organizations calling on the Royal Spanish Academy to remove from its official dictionary definitions of the antisemitic slurs “judío” and “judiada.”

The campaign was initiated by the Jewish Community of Panama, and has been joined by the following groups from across the Spanish-speaking world, with CAM among them:

Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations; Israeli Circle of Bolivia; Jewish Community of Chile; Sephardic Hebrew Community of Bogotá; Israelite Zionist Center of Costa Rica; Board of Trustees of the House of the Hebrew Community of Cuba; Jewish Community of Ecuador; Israelite Community of El Salvador; Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain; Guatemalan Jewish Community; Hebrew Community of Tegucigalpa; Central Committee of the Jewish Community of Mexico; Israelite Community of Nicaragua; Jewish Community of Paraguay; Jewish Association of Peru; Israelite Center of the Dominican Republic; Central Israelite Committee of Uruguay; Confederation of Israeli Associations of Venezuela; American Jewish Committee; Anti-Defamation League, B’nai B’rith International; Simon Wiesenthal Center, and Latin American Jewish Congress.

The letter said, “We hereby inform you that from the Jewish Community of Panama we are advancing efforts so that the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) removes from its dictionary pejorative definitions referring to the Jewish people, a campaign for which we have proceeded to put together a legal body headed by Dr. Borja Lujan Lago, a professional in Spanish law who in recent months managed to get the RAE to suppress the definition of lawyer as a ‘talkative, entangling, talkative person.'”

“With this precedent and consequently to the new times where antisemitism is not accepted, we are optimistic with the diligence that we have undertaken, reason for which, and within the strategy to follow, we must add support from both the various Spanish-speaking Jewish communities, as well as international organizations related to the fight against antisemitism, discrimination and the violation of human rights,” it added.

Headquartered in Madrid, the Royal Spanish Academy was established in 1713 by Spain’s monarchy to safeguard correct use of the Spanish language. It maintains affiliations with national language academies in 22 Hispanophone nations through the Association of Academies of the Spanish Language.