Avraam Eliezer Benaroya (; ; ; ; ; 1887 – 16 May 1979) was a Jewish socialist, member of the Bulgarian Social Democratic Workers' Party (Narrow Socialists), later leader of the Socialist Workers' Federation in the Ottoman Empire. Benaroya played a key role in the foundation of the Socialist Worker's party of Greece in 1918, the predecessor of the Communist Party of Greece.
Early years
Benaroya was born to a Sephardi Jew in Bulgaria. He was raised in Vidin by a family of small merchants. A polyglot, Benaroya learned to speak six languages fluently. He studied at the University of Belgrade Faculty of Law, but did not graduate, becoming rather a teacher in Plovdiv. Here Benaroya became a member of the Bulgarian Social Democratic Workers' Party (Narrow Socialists) (although other sources suggest that he joined the Bulgarian Social Democratic Workers Party (Broad Socialists), he himself insisted that this was incorrect) and published in Bulgarian his work The Jewish Question and Social Democracy (1908).
After the Young Turk revolution of 1908 he moved as a socialist organizer to Thessaloniki. He founded here a group called Sephardic Circle of Socialist Studies and was in connection to the Bulgarian left-wing faction, close to the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO), called People's Federative Party (Bulgarian Section), as well as to some Bulgarian socialists, who worked there. Benaroya's influence grew, as he argued that any socialist movement in the city must take the form of a federation in which all national groups could participate. Due to the Bulgarian roots of its Jewish founder, the organization was viewed with suspicion by the Young Turks and later by the Greek government, as being close to the IMRO and Bulgarian socialist movement.<ref>"Due to the Bulgarian origins of its Jewish founder, Abraham Benaroya, the organization was viewed with suspicion by the Young Turks and later by the Greek government, as being close to the International Macedonian Revolutionary Organization and Bulgarian socialist movement. "Sociological papers", Volume 11, Universiṭat Bar-Ilan. Leon Tamman Foundation for Research into Jewish Communities, Bar-Ilan University, 2006, p.12.</ref>Benaroya, a Bulgarian Jew, came to Salonica in 1908 in order to establish an organized Jewish socialist movement in this city... However, the new CUP regime in the Empire was suspicious about the activities of Benaroya regarding his Bulgarian roots. Turkish Review of Balkan Studies, Volumes 10–11, Ortadoğu ve Balkan İncelemeleri Vakfı, Isis, 2005, p. 83.
The Fédération Socialiste Ouvrière
Idealistic and pragmatic at the same time, in Thessaloniki Benaroya played a leading role in the creation, in 1909, of the mainly Jewish Socialist Workers' Federation, or in Ladino, Federacion. The organization took this name because, built on the federative model of the Social Democratic Party of Austria, it was conceived as a federation of separate sections, each representing the four main ethnic groups of the city: Jews, Bulgarians, Greeks and Turks. It published its literature in the languages of these four groups (i.e., Ladino, Bulgarian, Greek and Turkish, respectively) but in practice the two latter sections were under-represented if not nonexistent. The democratic Federacion soon became, under Benaroya's leadership, the strongest socialist party in the Ottoman Empire. It created combative trade unions, attracted important intellectuals and gained a solid base of support among Macedonian workers while cultivating strong links with the Second International. From 1910 to 1911 Benaroya edited its influential newspaper, the Solidaridad Ovradera, printed in Ladino.
Unlike other parties which were organised on ethnic lines, as a cross-community group the Federacion was allowed by the Ottoman authorities. A prominent Bulgarian member, Dimitar Vlahov, was a socialist MP in the new Ottoman parliament until 1912.Mary C. Neuburger, Balkan Smoke: Tobacco and the Making of Modern Bulgaria, Cornell University Press, 2012, , p. 67. Indeed, its leaders initially supported the Young Turks, and Benaroya participated in the "Army of Freedom" march on Istanbul to help put down the Countercoup of 1909. Alarmed by the growing power of socialist groups, the CUP subsequently launched a crack down, under which Benaroya was jailed three times, in early November 1910, June 1911 (when he was deported to Serbia) and February 1912 (when he was deported to Greece).Mark Mazower, Salonica, City of Ghosts: Christians, Muslims and Jews, 1430-1950, 2004, pp. 288f.
