History of Jews in Romania

Jews have been living in Romania since the Roman times, mainly along the Black Sea coast, when Romania belonged to the Roman province of Dacia.^[5]

Jews have been living in Romania since the Roman times, mainly along the Black Sea coast, when Romania belonged to the Roman province of Dacia.^[6]

More Jews moved to Romania in the 14th century when the Kingdom of Hungary expelled Jews, many of whom became merchants running the trade route between the Ottoman Empire and Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.^[7]

Later Jewish immigration due to expulsion from Spain and Moldova scattered Jews across Romania, who survived there until the 20th century despite centuries of pogroms, while facilitating Romania's industrialization.^[7]

In the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774, massacres of Jews reportedly happened in every part of the Danubian Principalities.^[8] Both the Ottoman Turkish Janissaries and Imperial Russian Army were responsible.^[8] During one of the massacres in Galați in 1797, local Jews were forced out of their homes and killed on the streets,^[8] with some of the victim bodies dropped into the Danube.^[8] Jews who hid in a local synagogue were also burned alive.^[8]

In the Russo-Turkish War of 1806–1812, Ottoman Kalmyk soldiers committed similar massacres against Jews in Bucharest.^[8]

During the Wallachian Uprising of 1821, Jews suffered from pogroms across Wallachia.^[8] Towns and cities where pogroms happened included Fălticeni, Hertsa, Piatra Neamț, Târgoviște, Târgu Frumos.^[8] The signing of the Treaty of Adrianople in 1829 allowed Russian-persecuted Ashkenazi Jews to move to Moldavia,^[8] some of whom became leaseholders and tavern-keepers.^[8] Jews in the region increased from 10,000 in 1825 to 80,000 in 1838, and 195,000 in 1859.^[8]

Following the Revolutions of 1848, Jews in Wallachia were granted equal rights.^[9] Persecutions of Jews continued into the 20th century however.^[8]

Romania's WWI victory as one of the Entente powers expanded her territory and Jewish population, when some Jews previously under Russian and Austro-Hungarian rule became Romanians, but antisemitism worsened in Romania.^[7][10] Adolf Hitler's takeover of Germany in 1933 catalyzed fascism in Europe to which Romania was not immune. Laws were passed in the Romanian parliament to restrict Jews from every part of society, while Jewish members no longer existed in the parliament.^[7]

Particularly, over 43,500 Jews lived and 146 synagogues existed in Iași right before WWII. As of August 2024, only 326 Jews and two synagogues remained, a 99.3% drop in Iași's Jews in comparison.^[11]

In 1940, Ion Antonescu became the Prime Minister of Romania as an Iron Guard member and began the Holocaust in Romania alongside Adolf Hitler.^[13][14] The Iron Guard (Romanian: Garda de Fier) was a pro-Nazi militant group founded by Romanian ultranationalist Corneliu Zelea Codreanu.^[15][16] By appealing to widespread antisemitism^[7][10] with mystical Christian nationalism,^[16][17] the Iron Guard attracted a huge public following^[10][17] and Romanian Orthodox Church's backing.^[18]

In 1937, the Iron Guard became the third-largest party in Romania's parliament.^[15][16] Between 1938 and 1941, it was outlawed twice due to the violent extremism of its members, especially in their January 1941 Bucharest pogrom, which killed 125+ Jews,^[19] and their rebellion against Ion Antonescu,^[15][16] who then cracked down on the Iron Guard, resulting in the imprisonment of 9,000 members. Many imprisoned members were later released to join the Iași pogrom and the broader Holocaust in Romania.^[14]

The pro-Nazi Romanian regime committed a series of genocidal massacres against Jews within her occupied territories, including the Iași pogrom and Odessa massacre, with the latter causing a 98.7% drop in Odessa's pre-war Jewish population.^[20][21] Between 1941 and Ion Antonescu's overthrow in the 23 August coup in 1944 led by King Michael I, as many as 400,000 Romanian Jews were killed, amounting to 52.8% of pre-war Romanian Jews.^[13]

Under Nicolae Ceaușescu's communist rule,^[22][23] Romania's role in the Holocaust was officially denied. It was blamed entirely on the German and Hungarian fascists.^[24] Romanians were taught about the "heroic anti-fascist resistance", emphasizing the anti-Nazi battles following Romania's defection to the Allies. Many former subordinates of Ion Antonescu served in the secret police of Nicolae Ceaușescu^[24] and to help him oppress Romanians.^[22][23]

Meanwhile, Nicolae Ceaușescu reportedly believed lies about Jews, including The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

Since the fall of Ceaușescu's communist regime,^[22][23] a systematic effort to whitewash the war criminals, especially Ion Antonescu, has been observed by scholars. Antonescu is praised by some so-called historians as a hero who waged a "holy war against Bolshevism."^[24]

Acts of Holocaust denial by politicians occurred from time to time, notable of whom include Ion Iliescu, the former President of Romania (2000–2004). He made similar claims to those of Ceaușescu that there was "no Holocaust within Romania" and that the Poles, Jews and communists "were treated equally", while denying the Romanian role in the Holocaust and the verified Romanian Jewish death toll.^[24]

An international inquiry, led by Romanian-American Jewish writer Elie Wiesel, identified all the evidence of Romania's role in the Holocaust. The Elie Wiesel National Institute for Studying the Holocaust in Romania (Romanian: Institutul Național pentru Studierea Holocaustului din România „Elie Wiesel”, INSHR), a state-funded Holocaust research center, was also founded in 2005.^[25]

In November 2021, the Romanian parliament passed a law, by a large majority, to require the teaching of the Holocaust and Jewish history from 2023. The only group opposing it was the nationalist party Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR). The AUR was condemned by the INSHR.^[26] Since September 2023, the Holocaust and Jewish history have become part of the high school curriculum in Romania.^[27][28]

• Antisemitism in Europe
• Secondary antisemitism
• Antisemitism in the Soviet Union
• Iași pogrom
• Odessa massacre (1941)
• Iron Guard