News sites around the world decided to celebrate Columbus Day by giving wide visibility and sensationalism to the release of a Spanish documentary, which, in order to make great publicity and hope to bring lots of people to see it, launched the news that scientific studies show that Christopher Columbus was a Spanish Jew, and not a Christian from Genoa.

This is not the first time the Spanish, who call him Cristobal Colòn, try to steal the origin of the great explorer from Italy. Portugal and Poland also tried to claim his origin, failing as again fail will these Spaniards who, let's be clear, have brought legitimate opinions but no scientific proof or hard fact to the thesis launched in propagandistic tones to manipulate public opinion and push it to watch a documentary. And science is science because it proves facts, not because it suggests opinions.

In an article published two years ago, twenty (20!) pieces of documentary, historical and factual evidence are cited that prove Columbus was from Genoa, Italy. The article is not written by an Italian, it is not written by an Italian-American, but by a Puerto Rican of Taino descent, thus Native American: his name is Rafael Ortiz and he is perhaps Columbus' greatest and most active advocate.

According to Jonathan Ray, professor of Jewish studies at Georgetown University, who is author of the 2023 book Jewish Life in Medieval Spain: A New History, there is no proof that Columbus (1451-1506) lived a Jewish life, “nor even as a crypto-Jew,” and the historical record indicates he was Catholic. 

“The DNA issue that focuses on the so-called tomb of Columbus in Seville is fraught with political issues pertaining to national pride and with it, which country can claim Columbus as its own,” Ori Soltes, an author and former director of the B’nai B’rith Klutznick National Jewish Museum, told.

Andrew Koss, a historian and senior editor at Mosaic magazine, wrote that “I highly doubt the study ‘proves’ anything.“I don’t see how they can be sure they have Columbus’s DNA,” he wrote. “And DNA can’t prove someone was Jewish, only show it’s more or less likely.”

We also remember the book by Carol Delaney who has spent years doing research and has sieged better than anyone else Columbus' noble motives, which again confirm his Catholic religion and his Genoese origin.

One of the greatest Italian historians expert in these matters, who has written books and done a lot of research, is called Antonio Musarra, and yesterday he rightly said, “Columbus in his writings says he is constantly linked to Genoa, the Fieschi family and the Banco di San Giorgio and professed himself to be a Christian and a Genoese. He makes no mention of the presence in Genoa in 1492-1493 of hundreds of Jews fleeing from Spain. However, it must be said that mobility was a frequent phenomenon in the society of the time; the Mediterranean was a melting pot of cultures. Columbus may well have been of Sephardic Jewish origin and his family may well have settled in Genoa in the past and converted to Christianity, an equally widespread phenomenon. But in the end, does it really change anything?”

A colleague of hers, historian Gabriella Airaldi, explains well why the Spanish want so badly to steal the great explorer's origins from us: “Columbus changed the world, the sense of space and time, because 1492 became the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of the modern age.”

It would have been helpful, all these years, if Spain had put the same dedication and passion into defending Columbus from the unjust attacks of the cancel culture as they did in trying to steal Columbus' origins from Italy. And perhaps the positive thing that can come out of this whole thing might be that Italy now could be more committed to defending Columbus from those attacks, and from anyone who wants to steal the origins of a hero who changed, innovated and improved human history.

Happy Columbus Day to all: let's celebrate the Italian (born at a time when Italy did not exist, but in territory that is now Italy) who discovered America.