The Kadoorie synagogue library has ten thousand books in thirteen languages, some produced by the community itself since the time of the "Portuguese Dreyfus." This literary work has been constant and uninterrupted.

The PJN presents the first of ten chapters of the new book that the Jewish Community of Porto is preparing to launch on Amazon this August 2026, and which is already known to the Israeli government and the embassies of the most relevant countries in assisting Jews.

"On November 28, 2022, the young French Jewish leader Ilan Cohen was the first signatory of a petition that 44 French students sent to the Portuguese parliament. He was then the coordinator of one of the synagogues in the Porto Jewish Community. The student's petition – which was reported in the international Jewish press on the same day it was sent – asked the Portuguese State never again to illegally attack a Jewish community, as it had done months before with the one in Porto, and do never again to cooperate with the nocturnal burglars who robbed the president of SIRESP (Integrated System for Portugal's Security and Emergency Networks) and law offices to steal a server and computers, and with anonymous whistle-blowers who have spent time in psychiatric hospitals and sentenced in the criminal courts, in an attempt to incriminate people. Cohen stated to the Jewish News Syndicate that "The discrimination of the inquisition, was not enough for them to stop there!"

On November 29, 2022, a tire on Ilan Cohen's car was carefully punctured so as to be on the verge of bursting while he was having dinner at a kosher restaurant in Porto. After dinner, he went home on the highway, where speeds reached about 120km/h, and "miraculously the tire did not burst", Cohen said to The Portuguese Jewish news at the time. "Taking the VCI (highway), my car had trouble driving, and I was very lucky, I stopped and saw stab wounds in my tires." He also suspected that the authorship of the attempt against his life came from "a criminal network to silence me through a fatal accident", as he had been studying in Porto for five years and it was the first time this happened.

Despite then Ilan Cohen filing a police report (Case number 2042/22.6PIPRT), he has received no news about the matter to this very day. The authorities have not even notified him to be questioned as the whistleblower. Meanwhile, the damaged tire is on display at the Jewish Museum in Porto, in a room dedicated to modern antisemitism.

Strange as it may seem to the reader, this case begins with a multimillionaire usually portrayed in the press as a "Russian oligarch". Indeed, in December 2021, the so-called "Roman Abramovich case" became famous in Portugal, when the well-known billionaire became Portuguese. The political and media powers united as never before and ensured that he was Russian, Russian, Russian, of Russian, Russian, Russian, family, for thousands of years. No one admitted that the person in question could have – as the nationality law stipulated – ancestors with Portuguese names.

During this period of constant attacks, which extended throughout two years, the Jewish Community of Porto was unable to have a public voice. No one wanted to hear their version of the facts. The ferocity of the adversaries was tremendous. Portuguese socialists and communists, all with hammer and sickle in hand, pejoratively called the multimillionaire "Abramovich da Silva" and shouted agaisn't "the Russian oligarch", "Putin's friend", "war in Ukraine", "money, money". They punctuated their speech with the word Silva, a common Portuguese surname, to further mock the situation between laughter and accusations of corruption: "Abramovich da Silva, ah, ah, ah!"

However, the Jewish Community in Porto acted in good faith, in legal terms, supported by a prior opinion from Chabad Lubavitch. The Portuguese names of the Roman Abramovich's family were not one (Silva), but seven (Rocha, Leiva, Leja, Rosa, Paya, Abel, Barkover), with the aggravating factor that the surname Abramovich itself had been recorded in Sephardic communities in the 16th century, shortly after the expulsions from Portugal and Spain.
Until today the Community never forgot the ghost of "Abramovich da Silva" and therefore began to call the billionaire "Mr. Abel Benjamin Rocha da Leiva-Leão Leja Rosa Abramovich" or "Mr. 250 euros, thank you".

Portuguese nationality law required a certificate from the Jewish Community of Porto (or Lisbon) issued based on “family names” or “family memory.” The family memory of Abramovich was attested by Chabad Lubavitch. He is the son of Aharon Abramovich, who is the son of Nachman Leibovich (who was the son of Leiba Abramovich and Hanna Rosa Abramovich) and Tauba-Leja Berkover (who was the daughter of Shimon Berkover and Ite Berkover). The names of the applicant (Abramovich, Roman) and his immediate ancestors (Leibovich/Leão, Nachman, Berkover/Barkover, Rosa, Leiba/Leiva) are included in lists of names of Jews of Portuguese Sephardic origin, not even the name Paya escaping, an inquisitorial term meant an unbearable person.

1) Roman Abramovich (the “target of criticism”) has a surname that in 1580 was among the members of the Sephardic Jewish community of Zamość (Dr. Gelber N. M., History of the Sephardim in Poland, in Otzar Yehudi Sepharad, Vol. VI, Jerusalem, 1963).

2) Nachman Leibovich Abramovich (written with Lithuanian model and spelling: "Abramovichus Nachmanas") was the paternal grandfather of the multimillionaire. He was born in Eržvilkas and was a son of father Leiba Abramovich and mother Hana Rosa Abramovich (State Archives of Lithuania, fund 1817, inventory 1, case 322, marriage register no. 16 of 28 August 1925 in Tauragė). Leibo(vich) is the Yiddish word for Lion (Leiva/Leiba of his father, a word that appears in the Middle Ages in Spain and which we will talk about below), as well as Nachman was the name of the Iberian kabbalist Nachmanides (or for that matter, Moses ben Nachman). As for the nickname Abramovich and its presence in ancient lists of Iberian Sephardic Jews, we have spoken above.

3) Leiva Abramovich was the great-grandfather of the multimillionaire. Son of father Berel Abramovich and mother Malca Abramovich, Leiva was born in 1826 and died on 18-02-1927, at the age of 101 (State Historical Archive of Lithuania, fund 1817, inventory 1, process 83, record 5, with Death register in the metric book of Tauragė, 1927). Leiva or Leiba is an Iberian name, from León (hence Nachman took the name Leibo/León), from the tribe of Judah, from the Spanish province Leiba or from the Castilian kingdom of the same name. In turn, León/Leão is a name that appears in the preamble to Decree-Law No. 30-A/2015 of February 27. The Portuguese Inquisition martyred a large number of people with the surname Leão. 22% were merchants, 3% farmers/mill owners, 6% traders, 11% merchants, 11% doctors, 8% lawyers, 6% military personnel, 3% contractors, 3% goldsmiths, 3% religious figures, and 24% had other professions. More data: 42% were fathers/professionals, 19% mothers/widows, 29% sons and daughters, 62% were sentenced to prison and the wearing of the habit, 15% were burned alive at the stake, 2% were killed under torture, 2% were sentenced to imprisonment in the galleys, 19% received other penalties, 2% were punished during the reign of the House of Avis, between 1500 and 1579, and 98% were punished during the reign of the House of Braganza, between 1641 and 1750.

4) Berel Abramovich, the great-great grandfather of Roman Abramovich, was born in 1780 in Jurborg, son of Wolf Abramovich (1745) and a mother whose name has not been preserved (State Historical Archive of Lithuania, concerning the Census of the Jews of Eržvilkas, 1816).

5) Rocha Volfovich was daughter of Berel (Historical Archive of Lithuania, concerning the Census of the Jews of Eržvilkas, 1816. Family No. 16: Abramovich family, owned by Berel's brother, also originally from Jurbog, who moved to Eržvilkas in 1812.)
Nor by chance, Rocha is a traditional Portuguese surname. It translates directly to "rock" or "boulder" in Portuguese and originated as a topographical name for someone who lived near a rocky cliff or outcrop. It is also very common in Brazil and other Portuguese-speaking countries.

6) Paya, wife of Berel Volfovich, the son of Berel Abramovich (Historical Archive of Lithuania, concerning the Census of the Jews of Eržvilkas, 1816. Family No. 16: Abramovich family, owned by Berel's brother, also originally from Jurbog, who moved to Eržvilkas in 1812.)
What is Paya/Paia/Paio? It is the Iberic word that in the Middle Ages denoted a non-Catholic and that in Portuguese inquisitorial slang means an unsympathetic person.

7) Tauba Leja Berkoker, paternal grandmother of Roman Abramovich, was born in Jurbarkas, and was daughter of father Simon Berkover and mother Ite Goldstein (State Archives of Lithuania, fund 1817, inventory 1, case 322, marriage register no. 16 of 28 August 1925 in Tauragė). It is worth clarifying that Leja, like Leça (in Portugal), derives from pre-Roman terms linked to the Spanish geographical name Leza. In addition, the surname Berkover was also recorded in Sephardic communities as diverse as Türkiye, Bulgaria, Egypt, Morocco, and France. Berkover (or Barkover) means precisely "boat/barko owner" in Yiddish. We will see why below.

8) Abel Benjamin Berkover, brother of Tauba, great-uncle of Roman Abramovich (Kaunas Regional Archive, fund I-49, inventory 1, process 32793, sheet 7 verso. In the Jurborg census of Jews of February 1915, under number 44, the Berkover family appears.) Abel and Benjamin, while biblical names, are not written or pronounced in this way in Hebrew, but Hebel/Binyamin. In Abel Benjamin's marriage register (1930), the declared year of birth is 1902, and the ship transporting people and goods that he managed with the family maintained the tradition of the family that went back to the Hanseatic League and Hamburg. That’s why Berkover (Barcover) means precisely "boat/barko owner" in Yiddish.

9) Hana Rosa Abramovich, Roman's great-grandmother and married to Leiva Abramovich (State Archives of Lithuania, fund 1817, inventory 1, case 322, marriage register no. 16 of 28 August 1925 in Tauragė). Rosa is a Portuguese name that appears in the illustrative lists in the preamble to Decree-Law No. 30-A/2015, of February 27, as well as in the name lists of the "Kahal Kadosh" Portugal of Smyrna, and the Sephardic communities of Bulgaria, Amsterdam, Livorno, and others. In the lists of those condemned by the Portuguese Inquisition, which martyred a large number of people with the name Rosa, the following facts are known: 17% were merchants, 21% traders, 10% merchants, 14% doctors, 3% lawyers, 3% soldiers, 3% tailors, and 29% had other professions. More data: 39% were fathers/professionals, 26% mothers/widows, 35% were sons and daughters, 94% were sentenced to prison and forced to wear a habit, 6% were burned alive at the stake, 2% were punished during the reign of the House of Avis, between 1500 and 1579, and 98% were punished during the reign of the House of Braganza, between 1641 and 1750.

10) The furious opponents could at least have been lucky enough to know that the multimillionaire's name was Vladimir. Instead, the name Roman (Abramovich) itself comes from the Latin Romanus, meaning Roman, and also appears both in lists of Jews who lived in Portugal in the 14th and 15th centuries, and in lists relating to historical families of the Portuguese diaspora, including those present in the synagogues of Edirne, Adrianople, Turkey, specifically the "Kahal Kadosh" Portugal and the "Kahal Kadosh" Évora (Arthur Villares, 2017)."