Little Yugoslavia in Eretz Yisrael: a History of Jewish Collective Aliyot 1948-52

Before the creation of the State of Israel several dozen Holocaust survivors from the nearly established socialist Yugoslavia were allowed by the local government to emigrate to the Holy Land according to the roles imposed by the British Mandatory Palestine. These rules changed in 1948 when the State of Israel was proclaimed and the Federation of Jewish Communities of Yugoslavia, an umbrella organisation of Yugoslav Jewish communities, began to organize collective emigrations. This presentation purpose is to provide a detailed account of the six waves of aliyot en masse from Yugoslavia effectuated between 1948 and 1952 when more than half of the Holocaust survivors opted for the homeland of their ancient ancestors. As a result, a total of 8.618 people emigrated while the distribution according to Yugoslav republics was as follows: 4.517 from Serbia, 2.747 from Croatia, 974 from Bosnia and Hercegovina, 308 from Macedonia, 68 from Slovenia and 4 from Montenegro.

Based on a variety of the primary historical sources author will analyze gro-political circumstances of the epoch, Yugoslav government`s policies regarding this issue as well as rules of the Federation of Jewish Communities covering the mentioned alliyot. Even though individuals moved before and after this period, in only four years an unprecedented number of Yugoslav Jews, considering the size of the community, settled in Israel. This paper will contribute to elucidating the insufficiently investigated immediate post-Holocaust history that equally binds both homelands and cultural spheres of the emigres, Yugoslavia and Israel.