Romanian Anti-Semitism

Romania and Anti-Semitism

     Before World War II the Jewish population in Romania consisted of approximately of 800,000 Jews.  At the end of World War II, at the end of that horrendous catastrophe, only 400,000 Jews remained in Romania. It was not unusual for them to exist unobtrusively and to be scattered in small towns in that country.  They attempted to live a peaceful life, to work hard, to earn their livelihood, and to make themselves as invisible as possible, to avoid unpleasantries, and to minimize any differences in looks and practices with their neighbors. Today there are only between seven and nine thousand of their co-religionists in Romania, since the others left for Israel and wherever else they could enter.  Those few who are still there are generally the elderly, who need assistance and have nowhere to escape. 

     The official number of Jewish people exterminated during the Second World War was enormous. It was not only Germans that were the murderers.  Romania was one of the countries that enjoyed exterminating their Jewish population with as sadistic measures that they could find.  They enjoyed robbing them of their last possessions and denying them so much as a morsel of bread. The military ruler was Marshall Ion Antonescu, a loyal supporter of Adolf Hitler, who encouraged the killing of as many Jews as possible through forced labor  camps.

     The sparse number of Jews that remained in Romania are scattered throughout that country.  If they could have done so, they would have left and escaped from that anti-Semitic country.  There is still the envy and falsehood that the Jews have all the businesses, the wealth, that they killed “Jesus,” and any other negative and prejudicial feeling and hatred that they can express, project, and conjure up.  Whatever Jews have the opportunity to escape that land will do so by disappearing, leaving not only for Israel but escaping  to Canada, the United States of America, or any other place that will allow them entrance.  It must be remembered that the escapees speak Romanian and have a very difficult time with learning their new environment, a foreign language, the mores and culture, especially since they are elderly and not infrequently depend on their relatives when they arrive in a foreign land and must remain in their unfamiliar environment for the rest of their existence.  Their independence is robbed by the anti-Semites that have caused their emotional destruction.

     Anti-Semitism is still “alive" in Romania.  The fact that there were and are anti-Semitic incidents still in the year 2014 is unfortunate, especially since the Jewish population is almost nonexistent.  There is still the denial of the Holocaust and the Romanian participation with gusto of the destruction of the Jewish people, the theft of all of their possessions, and the brutal  criminality committed against their Jewish neighbors.

 Lehitraot.

 Dr. Ursula A. Falk is a psychotherapist in private practice and the author of several books and articles.

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