 The first large group of Jews to settle in Puerto Rico were European refugees fleeing German–occupied Europe in the 1930s and 1940s.The second influx of Jews to the island came in the 1950s, when thousands of Cuban Jews fled Cuba after Fidel Castro came to power.The native Taino population began to dwindle, with the arrival of the Spanish in the 16th century, through disease and miscegenation.