The Jewish Community of Zagreb, 1943-1945

The Independent State of Croatia (NDH) was proclaimed on April 10, 1941. The anti-Jewish measures were implemented swiftly and on April 30, the Racial laws were proclaimed (of 35,000 Jews in the NDH, around 12,000 were in Zagreb). Deportations to Croatian camps started in May 1941. Until the beginning of 1942 around half of the remaining Jews in Zagreb were deported. From August 1942 the Germans were included in the deportation process, and in the next and last mass deportation in May 1943, Jews were deported mainly to Auschwitz.

The Jewish Community in Zagreb was closed in April and reopened in May 1941, now in charge of all racially defined Jews. It was under direct control of pro-Nazi regime, and responsible for Jews imprisoned in concentration camps in the NDH, remaining Jews in Zagreb, the old people’s home(s), school, and registrar books. There was an acting synagogue as well. The community was financed by member fees and international Jewish organizations.

After the last big German-Croatian deportations of May 1943, only Jews in mixed marriages or honorary Aryans remained. They took over the leadership of the community, which continued to care about Jews in camps as well as the old people’s home. After liberation, they were still community leaders and took over new tasks following the same logic of the war-time period. The school and synagogue ceased to exist after May of 1943. There were still funerals in the Jewish section of the public cemetery, which survived the War intact.