Les Juifs de Zagreb (Agram)

Zagreb (Agram in German) was home to the principal Jewish community of Croatia, composed mainly of German- and Hungarian-speaking Ashkenazim who settled from the early nineteenth century onward as residence restrictions were lifted. Highly integrated into the urban bourgeoisie, the community was active in commerce, industry, medicine, and the liberal professions, and established modern institutions as well as a grand synagogue. Communal life combined Neolog (Reform) and Orthodox currents, in keeping with the Austro-Hungarian sphere. After the establishment in 1941 of the Independent State of Croatia under the Ustaše movement, allied with Nazi Germany, the community was subjected to persecutory laws and then deportation, and the great majority of its members were killed in Ustaše and Nazi camps. A reduced community reconstituted itself after 1945.

Sources & resources

• Encyclopaedia Judaica — 2e éd., Keter/Macmillan
• Jewish Virtual Library ↗