There is circumstantial evidence that he was a converso. He apparently sometimes made small notations in Hebrew on documents. He noted the departure of the Jews as he himself departed for his exploration. Several of his crew may have been converso's as well. Once he was awarded control over islands in the Caribbean, he excluded the inquisition.

Jonathan Wexler

My working theory is that (at least) one of Columbus’s grandparents were conversos, but that his parents were devout Catholics. 

Jonathan Persons

But the christians and Muslims can be proud of their heroes over the
centuries even though they did at least the same amount of
slaughtering their enemies. But better be smart than right?
Yonatan Ben-Ari

You may wish to see this subject in a generic sense, that it was Europeans who brutalized indigenous people of the New World. But if Columbus were proven Jewish, it could quickly become one more invective that anti-Semites can use against Jewish people. It would be no different than calling Jews “Christ killers” or the bogus claim in the Middle Ages that Jews used the blood of Christian children to make Passover matzah or the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion publication. I am not entirely sure what you are implying by saying that “history is history.” If you are saying that history can’t be undone that is true. But if you mean that people don’t view their current world through the prism of historical events, I respectfully take exception to that thought.

Jeffrey Gee
Arizona  

If he was of Jewish descent, I'm proud that he was because his story shows that when you oppress and displace a people, like what happened to the Jews of Spain and Portugal, there are unpredictable consequences, both near and far, both obvious and unexpected. Let that be a lesson to all. For example, travelers returning to Europe brought the "French Disease" (syphilis) back home with them, which was considered in those days to be nearly as awful and scary as the plague. Worse than that, the spirit of occupation and colonization did not end in the New World: Italy as well was 'discovered'. Many people don't realize that places like Milan, Naples, and Sicily soon thereafter became and remained colonies of the Spanish-Hapsburgs for several centuries. Eventually, plantation, i.e. West African slave, agriculture in the 'new world' caused the collapse of southern European agriculture (and hence the economy), because who can compete against free labor? That Columbus should now be considered a cause for celebrating Italian ancestry in America, especially by those whose ancestors suffered through the many centuries of Spanish colonization there, enabled by the 'discovery' of America, is truly ironic. How about picking someone else like Giuseppe Garibaldi to celebrate Italian heritage, a person who fought to liberate oppressed peoples around the world and would have been fighting with the Union in the US Civil War had he not been liberating Italy at that same time? Or perhaps re-invent the day entirely into Exploration Day where the cause celebre is the spirit of scientific discovery, invention and innovation, and forget all that nationalistic and imperialistic bally-hoo which has caused enough suffering already? So I say thank you Columbus, thank you for maybe being of Jewish descent.
 
 
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Adam Cherson,NY, NY
Benyakonski, Kherszon, Rubinovich, Solts, Grodsinski, Levine, Cohen, Kaplan, Lubetski, Karchmer, Horwitz, Rabinovich, Zussman (Lida, Voronova, Dieveniskes, Konvaliski, Smarhon, Vilna)
Genomics Publications and Presentations: https://independent.academia.edu/AdamCherson

Dears, the question exists in a much wider world than this tiny thread. You can't hide an elephant. If somebody wishes to blame Jews for something, the facts become irrelevant, and we will be accused anyway.
I wouldn't bother myself in my personal genealogical research with a question: what would GOIM say?

Alex Girshovich
Jerusalem

Europeans didn't do anything to indigenous peoples that they weren't doing to each other.  There are reasons why the US Cavalry always had Indian allies in their wars against the Sioux.  The Sioux had carried out genocide against the Blackfoot a generation earlier.    Also, the Columbus Jewish story pops up every 20 years.  All we know from documents is that he behaved like a pious devote Christian. 

Jules Levin, Los Angeles