The Forgotten Society
Zwi Migdal, or Zvi Migdal was a criminal organization consisting of Jews from Eastern Europe, and operated throughout the mid-19th century (circa 1860) until the outbreak of World War II (1939).
This organization was especially dedicated to the trafficking of women destined for prostitution, from the Jewish community itself or from the non-Jewish populations that lived in the villages categorized as "Shtetl" or Jewish villages in Central Europe. This large region included parts of modern Poland, Russia, Germany, Lithuania, Estonia, Czech Republic, Ukraine, among other countries. The trade of people in this region is an old crime dating back to the European Middle Ages: the very word "slave" (slave, in modern English and archaic French, in modern French, "esclave") denounces the practice of slavery involving Slav peoples as their main victims.
The influx of prostituted Jews increased with the founding of the Zwi Migdal, an organization responsible for international trafficking in women, which had branches on several continents, monopolizing trafficking in Central Eastern Europe, in Warsaw, Paris, Berlin and the Port of Odessa. Names such as Warsaw Mutual Aid Organization were used by the organization as a facade to recruit poor girls from Eastern Europe. It is precisely from the name of the Organization for Mutual Aid of Warsaw that the Polish term originates, due to the connection with the Polish capital, where one of its headquarters was located. Many of the "Polacas" arrived in Brazil through Buenos Aires, capital of Argentina, where the organization coordinated all the activities of its branches and representations of the continent. In all affiliations, whether in Argentina or Brazil, the Warsaw Mutual Aid Organization operated offices, synagogues and cemeteries for the use of members of the organization.
(Argentine newspaper of 1930 announcing the arrest of 108 members of the organization.)
Brazil
The first ship bringing young Jewish women arrived in Brazil in 1867, and until 1913 the organization controlled hundreds of brothels in several Brazilian cities. At its peak, after the First World War, Zwi Migdal ran brothels around the world, from New York to Shanghai, including South Africa, India, and China. The center of activities was in South America, especially in large cities such as Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires, but also São Paulo, Manaus and Belém. Zwi Migdal had more than 3,000 brothels in Argentina alone.
The "Polacas" became famous in the Carioca urban mythology of the early twentieth century, and its presence was remarkable in the Vargas Era (1930-1945). The shipment of the caftens and the prostitutes to Rio de Janeiro was made in the port of Marseilles, in France, where there was a market for the purchase and sale of these women. When the first Jewish prostitutes arrived, they were distributed through central areas of the city of Rio de Janeiro. In the 1920s, with progressive police repressions, they ended up concentrating on Square Eleven, living with the rest of the Jewish community. In this period, the region was known as the Jewish quarter, being also denominated Mangue Zone, because of the channel that crossed the place. In both the brothels and the streets, a hierarchy was established: on the one hand, the French cocottes who represented the elite of the meretrício, good-looking women who circulated in the high wheels of the society; on the other hand, the Poles, who carried with them the image of proletarians of sex.
(Rufiano (pimp) attached to Zwi Migdal Society)
For almost a century, Jewish women born in Eastern Europe and known as "Polacas", who had prostituted themselves in Brazil, used expressions that gave rise to many popular words in Brazil. When they suspected that a client had a venereal disease, they said "ein krenke" ("illness" in Yiddish), which became "trouble". "Sacana" in Yiddish means "danger." When the police arrived, that word was heard. Pimp as a synonym for pimp, by analogy with "caftan" or "kaftan", a jacket or overcoat buttoned by the front that reaches the knees, with long sleeves, typically Russian, made with wool, silk or cotton, worn by the shopkeepers.
Name origin
Originally called the Warsaw Mutual Aid Organization, the organization changed its name to Zvi Migdal on May 7, 1906, after the Polish ambassador filed an official complaint with the Argentine authorities regarding the use of the name Warsaw.
The name of the association was chosen to honor Zvi Migdal, who was also known as Luis Migdal wereticky, one of the founders of the organization. Later the organization was divided, and one of the groups originating from this division headed by Shimon Rubenstein, founded another organization with the name Ashkenazim.
(Luis Zwi Migdal, Jewish gangster and pimp.)
Legacy
Cemeteries created by Jewish prostitutes' associations were the starting point in the recognition and interest of the history of these women. They are being restored and preserved by members of the Brazilian Jewish community despite strong opposition from other members who are uncomfortable with the past of their friends, companions, or ancestors. In the city of Cubatão, in the state of São Paulo, there is a Jewish cemetery that has been recently restored. In the city of São Paulo, due to municipal ordinances, almost all tombs of Jewish women were removed in 1971 from their original location in the Chora-Menino cemetery to anonymous tombs near the walls of the Butantã Jewish cemetery. In Rio de Janeiro, the Chesed Shel Emes Cemetery, located near Inhauma Cemetery, with nearly 800 tombs, is abandoned, but some social organizations work to protect, restore and preserve it.
(newspaper of Brazil with the information of the prison of Jose Krant)
Argentina
Mordechai Alpersohn, a Jew who immigrated to Argentina in 1891, said that "near the gates of the immigration house [they] found a few dozen elegantly dressed women and fat men in top hats." Through the gates, "said Alpersohn, the pimps talked to [the immigrants'] wives and gave the children chocolates. " Buyers bribed the police in exchange for a free hand in the city and enjoyed wealth, power, and a ostentatious lifestyle. An early twentieth-century account gives these details:
"They use huge diamonds, they go to the theater or the opera every day. They have their own clubs, where the" goods "are classified, auctioned and sold, They have their own secret code [...] They feel comfortable in the Jewish quarter knowing that many of the tailors, shops and jewelers depend on them as customers."
(Journalist Albert Albert, who did on the activities of the international sex syndicate, died at sea his orgasm, MS Georges Philippar, sighed for some reason alleged to be a suspect.)
It was finally the testimony of one of the prostitutes, a Polish woman named Raquel Liberman, who defined the end of the "white slave trade" in Argentina. She was able to provide valuable information to a police officer, Julio Alsogaray, and a judge, Rodriguez Ocampo, who were not willing to accept the bribes of the offenders.
(Raquel Liberman)
However, none of the other women in the service of the pimps would testify and was left to the dictatorial government formed by the general Jose Felix Uriburu in 1930 to deal with the coup of grace with the Zwi Migdal, restricting the immigration and the naturalization.
Those Jews who opposed the prostitution union did this not out of moral indignation, but out of concerns about the possible repercussions of the low profile of Jewish immigrants.
(Jose Felix Uriburu)
"Liberman's courageous action [in testimony against Zwi Migdal] had not completely destroyed prostitution trafficking, but it had very effective consequences: Most brothels in Buenos Aires were closed and hundreds of traffickers were arrested or had to flee."
Raquel Liberman
Rachel Lieberman, was born in Lódž, Poland. She, like many others, was tempted to travel to Buenos Aires responding to a marriage announcement, but was taken to Jonin Street where she was forced to prostitute herself.
(Rachel Lieberman and two of her children)
After five years, she had enough money to enter the antique furniture market to support herself and her children, but the ruffians made that impossible for her. They did not want her to set an example for the other slaves. But this woman has never been stopped.
In desperation, he contacted Superintendent Julio Elsogray. She heard his name mentioned on the street as the one who would not take Zwi Migdal's money and was really looking for ways to destroy the organization. She came into the office one day and gave a detailed account of the connections between the various pimps (pimps) in managing the organization.
His testimony was sufficient reason to begin an extensive investigation. This time, unlike the previous occasions that did not lead to anything, the findings reached Dr. Rodríguez Ocampo, a judge who would not accept the bribes of the Zwi Migdal as well.
The long trial ended in September 1930 with 108 detainees. "The very existence of the Zwi Migdal Organization directly threatens our society," the judge wrote in his verdict, releasing long prison sentences.
However, in prison, pimps pulled some old ropes, appealed their sentences in January 1931, and senior Justice Ministry officials left only three of the prisoners in jail, freeing the rest.
When the media reported this, the public was very upset and pressured the authorities to reverse the release decision. Subsequently, hundreds of pimps (pimps) were deported to Uruguay. "Over the years, they have slowly come back one by one, but the era of the huge brothels has ended," Sheinfeld summed up this story.
Raquel Liberman died on April 7, 1935 from a throat cancer, having her 35 years of small children and the illusion of returning to Poland to rebuild her life.
