Nuernberg, Germany

A Jewish community is first mentioned in the last third of the 12th century. In the late 13th century the Jews achieved a solid economic position, engaging mainly in money lending and money changing. The first synagogue was consecrated in 1280. In the Rindfleisch massacres of 1298, 740 Jews were murdered. Within a few years the community was revived by Jews from Frankfurt, reaching a population of around 2.000. A well-known yeshiva operated. The community was again destroyed in the Black Death persecutions. A small Jewish community was reestablished. In 1416 the Jews received a letter of protection from King Sigismund. In 1451 they were ordered to wear special clothes to distinguish them from Christians. After unrelenting pressure from local residents, the Jews were expelled by King Maximilian I in 1499. Most found refuge in Frankfurt. Thereafter Jews were not permitted to reside permanently in Nuremberg until the early 19th century and were only authorized to form a community in 1862. In 1867 the Jewish population reached 1.254 (total 77.895). A new synagogue was dedicated in 1874. The minority Orthodox Jews formed their own Adass Jisroel congregation. By 1900 the Jewish population had risen to 5.596 and in 1922 it reached a peak of 9.280. Anti-Semitism accompanied the development of the modern community from its beginnings. Nuremberg was from the outset one of the key Nazi centers. A leading role in anti-Jewish agitation was played by the Nazi organ “Der Stuermer”, founded in Nuremberg in 1923 by Julius Streicher, whose declared aim was to make Nuremberg the first Jewish-free (judenrein) city in Germany. Attacks on Jews in public places became an everyday occurrence and efforts were made to enforce an economic boycott. Jews were a dominant commercial factor in the city. The community provided extensive welfare and cultural services. Among the organizations active in Nuremberg were the Central Union (C. V.), the Zionist Organization, the Habonim youth movement, WIZO, the Maccabi sports club, Mizrachi and Agudat Israel. The Jewish library with 4.000 volumes was one of the first in Germany (founded in 1877). With the rise of the Nazis to power in 1933, the economic boycott was strictly enforced. SA forces together with Hitler Youth attacked Jews in the streets and with Streicher now Gauleiter of Franconia hundreds were arrested and many murdered at the Dachau concentration camp. The exodus that had commenced in the 1920s continued by 1935-36, with the continuing expulsion of Jewish students from municipal schools. Of the 7.502 Jews in Nuremberg in 1933 (total 410.400), 5.638 left the city through April 1939, 2.539 of them leaving Germany, including 1.030 to the U. S., 572 to England, and 226 to Palestine. On 10 August 1938 the Great Synagogue was destroyed. On “Kristallnacht” (9-10 November 1938), the Adass Jisroel synagogue was burned down and the East European Synagogue destroyed along with numerous Jewish stores while Jews were beaten and thrown from windows. During the riots, 26 Jews died (of a total 91 in all of Germany). Beginning in May 1939, Jews were subjected to forced labor. By November 1941, 1.800 Jews remained in the city. Their expulsion commenced on 29 November, when 535 were transported to Skirotawa-Jungfernhof near Riga, where they remained until March 1942, when 450 were sent to labor camps and the rest executed; 16 survived the war. Another 426 Jews, all those remaining in Nuremberg up to the age of 65, were deported to Izbica in the Lublin district (Poland) on 24 March; none survived. A transport of 533 aged Jews left for the Theresienstadt ghetto on 10 September 1942; 27 survived the war. The few dozen Jews remaining in Nuremberg were deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto and Auschwitz. After the war a new community was formed by concentration camp survivors from Eastern Europe. It numbered about 200 in 1990.