Encyclopaedia Judaica
Jews in Rumania
(Romania) in WW II (01): Massacres and camps
Massacres - deportations - ghetto system -
confiscations - prohibitions of profession - "illegal"
emigration to Palestine - heavy tax burden - 57%
survived
from: Encyclopaedia Judaica
(1971), vol. 14
presented by Michael Palomino (2008)
[1941: Rumania
<In January 1941 Manfred von Killinger, a veteran Nazi
known for his anti-Semitic activities, was appointed German
ambassador to Rumania. In April he was joined by Gustav
Richter, an adviser on Jewish affairs who was attached to
Adolf *Eichmann's department. Richter's special task was to
bring Rumanian anti-Jewish legislation into line with its
counterpart in Germany.
During the War.
[German-Rumanian invasion since 3 July 1941 - massacres on
the Jews before]
On June 22, 1941, when war broke out with the Soviet Union,
the Rumanian and German armies were scattered along the
banks of the Prut River in order to penetrate into Bukovina
and Bessarabia. As this branch of the front became active
only on July 3, the Rumanian and German soldiers occupied
themselves with slaughtering the Jewish population of Jassy
on June 29, 1941
[[and it can be admitted that this was not the only one and
that the local population was helping the slaughter]].
When the soldiers finally went into action, they were joined
by units of
Einsatzgruppe
D, under the command of Otto Ohlendorf. Their
combined advance through Bessarabia, Bukovina, and the
Dorohoi district was accompanied by massacres of the local
Jewish population [[with the collaboration of the local
population]].
[[In the time between 22 June and 3 July a big part of the
Jews of South Eastern Europe could flee within the Red Army
to central "Soviet Union". Arbitrary flight was not
allowed]].
[Sending deportees back and
forth over the frontier to German occupied zone - and
massacres]
At the beginning of August 1941 the Rumanians began to send
deportees from Bukovina and Bessarabia over the Dniester
River into a German-occupied area of the U.S.S.R. (later to
be known as *Transnistria). The Germans refused to accept
the deportees, shooting some and returning the rest.
Some of these Jews drowned in the river and others were shot
by the Rumanian gendarmerie on the western bank; of the
25,000 persons who crossed the Dniester near Sampol, only
16,500 were returned by the Germans. Some of these survivors
were killed by the Rumanians, and some died of weakness and
starvation on the way to camps in Bukovina and (col. 401)
Bessarabia. Half of the 320,000 Jews living in Bessarabia,
Bukovina, and the Dorohoi district (which was in Old
Rumania) were murdered during the first few months of
Rumania's involvement in the war, i.e., up to Sept. 1, 1941.
[Installing ghetto system -
deportation and looted Jewish homes]
After this period the Jews were concentrated in ghettos (if
they lived in cities), in special camps (if they lived in
the countryside, or townlets such as Secureni, Yedintsy,
Vertyuzhani, etc.). German killing squads or Rumanian
gendarmes, copying the Germans, habitually entered the
ghettos and camps, removing Jews and murdering them.
Jews living in villages and townlets in Old Rumania
(Moldavia, Walachia, and southern Transylvania) were
concentrated into the nearest large town. The Jews of
northern Moldavia, which bordered on the battle area, were
sent to the west of Rumania: men under 60 were sent to the
Targu-Jiu camp and the women, children, and aged were (col.
402)
sent to towns where the local Jewish population was ordered
to care for the deportees (who owned nothing more than the
clothing on their backs). The homes and property of these
deportees were looted by the local population immediately
after they were deported.
[Rumanian Transnistria:
deportations to Transnistria and confiscations by the
Rumanian National Bank - further prohibitions of
profession]
On Sept. 16, 1941, those in camps in Bessarabia began to be
deported to the region between the Dniester and the Bug
rivers called Transnistria, from which the Germans had
withdrawn, handing control over to the Rumanians under the
Tighina agreement (Aug. 30, 1941).
The deportations included 118,847 Jews from Bessarabia,
Bukovina, and the Dorohoi district. At the intervention of
the Union of Jewish Communities in Rumania, an order was
given to stop the deportations on October 14; they continued
however until November 15, leaving all the Jews of
Bessarabia and Bukovina (with the exception of 20,000 from
Chernovtsy) and 2,316 of the 14,847 Jews from the Dorohoi
district concentrated in Transnistria.
In two months of deportations 22,000 Jews died: some because
they could walk no further, some from disease, but the
majority were murdered by the gendarmerie that accompanied
them on their journey. All the money and valuables were
confiscated by representatives of the Rumanian National
Bank.
The Jews then remaining in Old Rumania and in southern
Transylvania were compelled into forced labor and were
subjected to various special taxes. The prohibition against
Jews working in certain professions and the "Rumanization of
the economy" continued and caused the worsening of the
economic situation of the Jewish population.
[1942: NS statistics
mention 342,000 Jews in Rumania - deportation agreement to
Poland not fulfilled - some political deportations]
According to the statistical table on the potential victims
of the "Final Solution" introduced at the *Wannsee
Conference, 342,000 Rumanian Jews were destined for this
end. The German embassy in Bucharest conducted an intensive
propaganda campaign through its journal,
Bukarester Tageblatt,
which announced "an overall European solution to the Jewish
problem" and the deportation of Jews from Rumania.
On July 22, 1942, Richter obtained Vice-Premier Mihai
Antonescu's agreement to begin the deportation of Jews to
Poland in September. However, as a result of the efforts of
the clandestine Jewish leadership and the pressure exerted
by diplomats from neutral countries, as well as by the papal
nuncio, A. Cassulo, Ion Antonescu canceled the agreement. He
could afford a measure of independence, since Hitler was
then seeking the mobilization of additional divisions of the
Rumanian army against the Soviet Union.
Nevertheless, Eichmann's Bucharest office, working through
the local authorities, succeeded in contriving the
deportation of 7,000 Jews from Chernovtsy and Dorohoi and
groups from other parts of Rumania to Transnistria because
they were "suspected of Communism" (they were of Bessarabian
origin and had asked to return to the Soviet Union in 1940),
had "broken forced-labor laws", etc.
[December 1942: Permissions
for Palestine - Jewish "illegal" immigrants from Rumania]
At the beginning of December 1942 the Rumanian government
informed the Jewish leadership of a change in its policy
toward Jews. It would henceforth permit Jews deported to
Transnistria to emigrate to Palestine. Defeat at Stalingrad
(where the Rumanians had lost 18 divisions) was already
anticipated.
In 1942-43 the Rumanian government began tentatively to
consider signing a separate peace treaty with the Allies.
Although the plan for large-scale emigration failed because
of German opposition and lack of facilities, both small and
large boats left Rumania carrying "illegal" immigrants to
Palestine, some of whom were refugees from Bukovina, Poland,
Hungary, and Slovakia.
Between 1939 and August 1944 (when Rumania withdrew from the
war) 13 boats left Rumania, carrying 13,000 refugees, and
even this limited activity was about to cease, as a result
of German pressure exerted through diplomatic (col. 403)
missions in Rumania, Bulgaria, and Turkey. Two of the boats
sank: the
Struma
(on Feb. 23, 1944 with 769 passengers) and the
Mefkure (on Aug. 5,
1944 with 394 passengers).
[No deportations to the
"East" - but more prohibitions of professions - and
special taxes against the Jews]
Despite German efforts, the Rumanian government refused to
deport its Jews to the "east". At the beginning of 1943,
however, there was a return to the traditional economic
pressures against the Jews in order to reduce the Jewish
population. This was achieved by forbidding Jews to work in
the civilian economy and through the most severe measure of
all, forced labor (from which the wealthy managed to obtain
an exemption by paying a considerable sum). In addition,
various taxes were imposed on the Jewish population in the
form of cash, clothing, shoes, or hospital equipment. These
measures, particularly the taxes to be remitted in cash - of
which the largest was a levy [[duty payment]] of 4 billion
lei (about $27,000,000) imposed in March 1943 - severely
pressed Rumanian Jewry. The tax collection was made by the
"Jewish center". W. *Filderman, chairman of the Council of
the Union of Jewish Communities, who opposed the tax and
proved that it could never be paid, was deported to
Transnistria for two months.
[end of 1943: deported Jews
from Transnistria coming back - German actions against
Herzl Zionists - Red Army occupying Rumania - no
liquidation of the remaining Jews]
At the end of 1943, as the Red Army drew nearer to Rumania,
the local Jewish leadership succeeded in obtaining the
gradual return of those deported to Transnistria. The
Germans tried several times to stop the return and even
succeeded in bringing about the arrest of the leadership of
the clandestine Zionist pioneering movements in January and
February 1944; however, these leaders were released through
the intervention of the International Red Cross and the
Swiss ambassador in Bucharest, who contended that they were
indispensable for organizing the emigration of those
returning from Transnistria and refugees who had found
temporary shelter in Rumania.
In March 1944 contacts were made in Ankara between Ira
Hirschmann, representative of the U.S. *War Refugee Board,
and the Rumanian ambassador, A. Cretzianu, at which
Hirschmann demanded the return of all those deported to
Transnistria and the cessation of the persecution of Jews.
At the time, the Red Army was defeating the Germans in
Transnistria and there was a danger that the retreating
Germans might slaughter the remaining Jews. Salvation came
at the last moment, when Antonescu warned the Germans to
avoid killing Jews while retreating. Concurrently,
negotiations over Rumania's withdrawal from the war were
being held in Cairo and Stockholm, and thus Antonescu was
eager to show goodwill toward the Jews for the sake of his
own future. In the spring Soviet forces also conquered part
of Old Rumania (Moldavia), and they made an all-out attack
on August 20. On August 23 King Michael arrested Antonescu
and his chief ministers and [[?]] declared a cease fire. The
Germans could no longer control Rumania, for they were
dependent on the support of the Rumanian army, which had
been withdrawn.
Eichmann, who had been sent to western Rumania to organize
the liquidation of Jews in the region, did not reach
Rumania.
[57% survived Jews]
Fifty-seven percent of the Jewish population under Rumanian
rule during the war (including the Jews of Bessarabia and
northern Bukovina) survived the Holocaust. The following
statistics give the death toll. Out of a Prewar Jewish
population of 607,790, 264,900 (43%) were murdered. Of this
number, 166,597 perished during the first period of the war,
151,513 from Bessarabia and Bukovina and 15,064 from part of
Old Rumania. The rest died during the deportations to
Transnistria or in the camps and ghettos of this region:
some were murdered; others died in epidemics, of famine, or
of exposure. In areas from which Jews were not deported,
78.2% of the Jewish population were left without a
livelihood as a result of the discriminatory (col. 404)
measures up to 1942, the date at which statistics were last
calculated. he demographic effect was that the ratio of
births to deaths fell to 34.1% in 1942 from the 1934 figures
of 116.5%.> (col. 405)
