Holocaust Memorial Bălţi

Monumentul victimelor Holocaustului

Several monuments in the Moldovan city of Bălți (Russian: Beltsy) commemorate the city's Jews who perished between 1941 and 1944: they were expelled, died of the effects of forced labour or were murdered by German Einsatzgruppen.

History

The city of Bălți lies in the north of the historical region of Bessarabia. It is the most important urban centre in the North of the Republic of Moldova. In 1930, there were about 14,000 Jews living in Bălți, just under half of the total population. In 1940, the Soviet Union annexed Bessarabia, which had since 1918 been part of Romania - including the city of Bălți. German and Romanian troops occupied Bălți on July 9, 1941, following the invasion of the Soviet Union in June. Together with the regular army, the Sonderkommando 10a under command of Heinrich Seetzen arrived in Bălți. Many of the locals, including a majority of the Jews, had fled the approaching troops inland to the Soviet Union. Already in the first days of occupation, the Romanian soldiers indiscriminately abused Jews, killing several hundred. Romanian soldiers and members of Sonderkommando 10a took turns in shooting Jews in the following days, claiming the killings were in reprisal for attacks on their own soldiers. Shortly before withdrawing from Bălți at the end of July 1941, the members of Sonderkommando 10a shot another 45 Jews, including leaders of the Jewish community. The Sonderkommando moved on with the front, while Bălți stayed under Romanian occupation. The remaining Jews of Bălți as well as Jews from the entire district were gathered in the nearby camps at Limbenii, Râșcani and Răuţel. The Romanian authorities deported almost all of them across the river Dniester to the Transnistria region. There, many Jews did not survive the ghettos, forced labour, abuse and sicknesses they were subjected to.

Bălți, 1941, Destroyed houses following the German-Romanian invasion, Yad Vashem

Bălți, 1941, Execution of leading members of the Jewish community in July 1941, Yad Vashem

Victims

It is not exactly known how many Jews from Bălți perished in the Holocaust. Up to several hundred Jews were murdered during the violent riots of the Romanian units. The Romanian commander ordered his men to shoot a further 15 Jews. In the night of July 11/12, 1941, Sonderkommando 10a shot ten Jewish hostages; three days later, a further twenty Jewish hostages were shot. At the end of July 1941, shortly before their withdrawal from Bălți, members of Sonderkommando 10a shot 45 Jews, including leaders of the Jewish community.

The country now known as the Republic of Moldova comprises the majority of the historical province of Bessarabia to the east of the River Prut as well as a small area east of the Dniester River belonging to the region of Transnistria (meaning »beyond the River Dniester«). The country is Romanian-speaking. It was formerly part of the Russian Empire but after the First World War it became part of the Kingdom of Romania, with the exception of the Transnistrian area. There were around 205,000 Jews living here in 1939. Following the so-called Hitler-Stalin Pact, a secret agreement between the Third Reich and the Soviet Union defining their »spheres of interest« from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, the Red Army invaded Bessarabia in summer 1940. The Soviet secret service NKWD subsequently deported 11,000 »undesirables« to Siberia, including over a thousand Jews. As a consequence of these substantial territorial losses, Romania sought an alliance with Nazi Germany. In summer 1941, Romanian troops joined the German Wehrmacht in the invasion of the Soviet Union. Bessarabia and the entire Ukrainian region of Transnistria as far as the Bug River came under Romanian control. Between July and August 1941, members of the Wehrmacht and SS Einsatzgruppe D together with Romanian special commandos and police units murdered over 150,000 Jews from the region and looted the abandoned houses and shops. Any survivors were crammed into ghettos and camps. From September 15 they were deported via the River Dniester to Transnistria, along with political prisoners accused of having collaborated with the Soviet authorities. Between 7,000 and 10,000 Jews who had fled or been deported to the Soviet Union returned to the country after 1945. After the war, Bessarabia again became part of the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic. Liberation by the Red Army and the »victory« in the Great Patriotic War were commemorated. Everything »Romanian« was systematically removed. After the Republic of Moldova gained independence in 1991 there were lengthy discussions about a possible reunification with Romania. However, the majority Russian population in Transnistria blocked reunification. The fundamental conflict between the larger Romanian-speaking region in Bessarabia and the smaller, Russian-speaking region in Transnistria, since a short civil war in 1992 a separatist territory, coupled with major economic and social problems, have marginalised memory of the Holocaust and the Second World War. However, since the early 1990s a number of towns in Moldova have put up monuments, plaques or memorial stones to remember the massacre in summer 1941 and the murdered Jews. Examples can be seen in Dubossary, in today’s capital Chişinău, in the Jewish cemetery in Tighina or in villages such as Vertujeni and Pepeni.

Remembrance

In 1997, a memorial to the Jews who perished in the Holocaust was erected in the city centre of Bălți on the site of a mass shootig. The menorah at the front bears the following inscription in Hebrew, Russian and Romanian: »To the Jewish victims of the Fascist genocide during the years of World War II«. The memorial stele reads in Russian: »May you have peace, in eternal memory«.

The Jewish cemetery in Balti is the second-largest Jewish cemetery in the Republic of Moldova after Chișinău. There is another memorial there commemorating the murdered Jews from the region. In 2001, the remains of murdered Jews from the village of Tăura Nouă (Russian: Novaya Tsura), situated 25 kilometres to the south, were exhumed and reburied here. The local Jewish community erected a stele by the mass grave.

Bălţi, 2026, Holocaust Memorial with the inscription »Peace to you and eternal memory«, Stiftung Denkmal

Bălţi, 2026, Inscription in three languages on the menorah, Stiftung Denkmal

Open

Accessible at all times.

Contact

https://www.jcm.md/ru/communities/beltsy

aoe_beltsy@mail.ru

+373 (231) 28299

str. Ştefan cel Mare 43
3112 Balti

Bălți, 2005, Monument on the site of a mass grave on the Jewish cemetery, Stiftung Denkmal

Bălţi, 2026, Total view of the Holocaust memorial in the city centre, Stiftung Denkmal

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