Jews of Slovenia

Ancient community

The Jewish community of Slovenia existed before the Slavic colonization of the Eastern Alps in the VI century AD ^[2] . According to archaeological evidence, the first Jews arrived on the territory of modern Slovenia during the Roman Empire and settled in Maribor and Lower Kraine . An engraved menorah dating from the 5th century AD was found at the cemetery in Shkotsianskys, Lower Kraina ^[3] .

In the 12th century, Jews fled to Slovenian lands from poverty in Italy and Central Europe. Despite the fact that they were forced to live in the ghetto , many Jews prospered. Relations between Jews and the local Christian population were generally peaceful. In Maribor, Jews were successful bankers, winegrowers and flour mills. In Styria, there were several “Jewish Courts” (Judenhof) that resolved disputes between Jews and Christians. Israel Isserlein ^[4] , who authored several essays on medieval Jewish life in Lower Styria, was the most important rabbi at that time in Maribor. In 1397, the Jewish ghettos in Radgona and Ptuj were set on fire by unknown anti-Jewish attackers.

The first synagogue in Ljubljana is mentioned in 1213. After receiving permission from the local authorities (Privilegium), Jews were able to settle in the Ljubljana region, located on the left bank of the Ljubljana river. The streets "Židovska ulica" ("Jewish Street") and "Židovska steza" ("Jewish Lane"), which are currently located on this site, still resemble that period. The wealth of the Jews gave rise to indignation of the local Austrian nobility and burghers, many of whom refused to pay off debts to Jewish moneylenders. The estates of the provinces of Krajina, Styria and Carinthia began to expel their Jews in the 16th century and continued until the expulsion of the last Jews in 1718.

The modern era

In 1709, the Roman emperor Charles VI ^[5] , ruler of the Habsburg monarchy, issued a decree allowing Jews to return to Inner Austria . Nevertheless, Jews at that time settled mainly in the commercial city of Trieste and few in the city of Gorizia (now these cities belong to Italy). The decree was annulled in 1817 by Francis I, and Jews received full civil and political law only with the Austrian constitution of 1867. Slovenia remained virtually without a Jewish population, with the exception of Gorizia, Trieste, the Prekmurje region and some small towns in the western part of the counties of Gorizia and Gradiska, whose population spoke mainly Friulian . According to the 1910 census, only 146 Jews lived on the territory of modern Slovenia, with the exception of the Prekmurje region.

Few Jews decided to settle in the area due to outrageous anti-Semitism . In the 1920s, after the formation of Yugoslavia , the local Jewish community merged with the Jewish community of Zagreb, Croatia ^[6] .

According to the 1931 census, there were about 900 Jews in Drava Banovina, mainly concentrated in Prekmurje, the former part of the Kingdom of Hungary until the beginning of 1919. This was the reason that in the mid-1930s Murska Sobota became the seat of the Jewish community of Slovenia. During this period, the Jewish population was activated by many immigrants who fled from neighboring Austria and Nazi Germany to the more tolerant Kingdom of Yugoslavia . However, anti-Jewish laws passed during the pro-German Stoyadinovich regime and Anton Koroshech ’s anti-Semitic discourse from the conservative Slovene People’s Party made Slovenia a less desirable place.

According to official data from Yugoslavia, the number of self-proclaimed Jews (by religion, not pedigree) in Yugoslav Slovenia rose to 1533 from 1939. In the same year, 288 Jews were registered in Maribor, 273 in Ljubljana, 270 in Murska Sobota, 210 in Lendava and 66 in Celje. The remaining 400 Jews are scattered throughout the country, a quarter of them in the Prekmurje region. Before the Second World War , two synagogues operated in Slovenia, one in Murska Sobota and one in Lendava. The total number of Jews before the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941 was estimated to be around 2,500, including baptized Jews and refugees from Austria and Germany .

Holocaust

The Jewish community, which was very small even before World War II and the Holocaust, declined as a result of Nazi occupation between 1941 and 1945. Jews in northern and eastern Slovenia (Slovenian Styria Gorenjska, Slovenian Carinthia and Posavie), which was annexed to the Third Reich , were deported to concentration camps in late spring 1941. Very few survived. In Ljubljana and in Lower Krajina, which fell under Italian occupation, Jews were relatively safe until September 1943, when most of the zone was occupied by German troops. At the end of 1943, most of them were deported to concentration camps, although some of them managed to escape, especially to the areas liberated by the Yugoslav partisan resistance. The Jews of Prekmurje, where most Slovenian Jews lived before the Second World War, suffered the same fate as the Jews of Hungary. After the German occupation of Hungary, almost the entire Jewish population of the Prekmurje region was deported to Auschwitz . Only a few survived.

Post-War Community

Under the socialist regime of Yugoslavia, the Jewish community of Slovenia numbered less than 100 people. In 1953, the Mursk Sobot synagogue, the only survivor of the Holocaust, was destroyed by local authorities. Many Jews were expelled from Yugoslavia as “ethnic Germans” and most Jewish property was confiscated. The Jewish community in Ljubljana was officially reformed after the Second World War. Its first president was Arthur Cohn, and then Alexander Schwartz, and after - Rosa Fertig - Schwartz in 1988. In 1969, it had only 84 members, and its membership is declining due to emigration. In the 1960s and 1970s there was a revival of the Jewish theme in Slovenian literature, almost exclusively by female authors. Berta Bozheti was the most famous Jewish author who wrote in Slovenian. Other authors are Miriam Steiner and Zlata Medic-Vokach.

After 1990

According to data from November 2016, the modern Jewish community numbers from 400 to 600 people ^[7] , although only 130 are members of the organization of the Jewish community of Slovenia. The community consists of Ashkenazi Jews and Sephardic Jews . In 1999, the first chief rabbi of Slovenia was appointed since 1941. Prior to this, religious services were provided with the assistance of the Jewish community of Zagreb. The current chief rabbi of Slovenia, Ariel Haddad, is in Trieste and is a member of the religious movement of the Lubavitcher Hasidim . The current president of the Jewish community of Slovenia is Andrei Kozar Bek ^[8] .

Since 2000, there has been a noticeable revival of Jewish culture in Slovenia. In 2003, a synagogue was opened in Ljubljana ^[9] . In 2008, the Isserlein Association was founded with the aim of promoting the heritage of Jewish culture in Slovenia. She organized several public events that received positive feedback from the media, such as the public coverage of Hanukkah in Ljubljana in 2009. Public interest in Jewish historical heritage in Slovenia has also significantly increased. In 2008, the Jewish cemetery in Rožna Dolina near Nova Gorica ( Rožna Dolina ) was restored thanks to the efforts of the local Democratic Party, as well as pressure from the neighboring Jewish community of Gorica and the American embassy in Slovenia. In January 2010, the first Holocaust monument in Slovenia was unveiled in Murska Sobota . In 2015, the synagogue in Maribor was declared a national monument of Slovenia ^[10] .

• Mikelstedter, Carlo
• Ascoli, Graziadio

• http://www.osce.org/en/odihr/18819?download=true