Holocaust memorial in Satu Mare

Monumentul Holocaustului din Satu Mare / Szatmárnémeti Holokauszt-emlékmű

Satu Mare is the most northwesterly major city of Romania close to the Hungarian border. A Holocaust memorial in the city remembers the more than 18,000 Jews from Satu Mare and surroundings who were deported to the extermination camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1944.

History

Since the Treaty of Versailles Satu Mare (German: Sathmar, Hungarian: Szatmárnémeti) is the most northwesterly city of Romania, close to the Hungarian border. Jews were allowed to settle in the city from the middle of the 19th century, from then on their number increased rapidly. The Jewish community was divided into several factions, reflected in the great number of synagogues. Satu Mare was home to many Hasidim but between the World Wars Zionism also gained strength.
Because of the Second Vienna Award, Satu Mare as well as Northern Transylvania was re-assigned to Hungary in 1940. As a consequence, all anti-Jewish Hungarian laws applied to the almost 13,000 Jews of Sathmar, who made up about a quarter of the city's population. In the summer of 1941 Hungary deported tens of thousands of Jews – mostly of unsettled citizenship – to the occupied Ukraine, many of them were murdered by the SS near Kamianets-Podilskyi, only a few returned. These measures affected up to 1,000 Jews from Satu Mare. Between 1942 und 1944 most of the Jewish men aged 21 to 45 were sent to forced labour battalions of the Hungarian army, many of them died at the eastern front.
Few weeks after the occupation of the country by the German Wehrmacht the Hungarian administration established a ghetto in Satu Mare: Approximately 18,000 Jews from the city and its surroundings were held for weeks in a cordoned off quarter. Police and constabulary regularly tortured Jews to get hold of their allegedly hidden money and valuables. The approximately 18,800 residents of the ghetto were eventually deported to the extermination camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau via Kosice in six transports between May 19, and June 1, 1944.

Satu Mare, about 1900, The no longer existing synagogue of the »status quo ante« community, common licence

Satu Mare, 1940, Hungarian regent Horthy heads the arrival of the Hungarian troops, common license

Victims

The Hungarian authorities deported more than 18,000 from Satu Mare to Auschwitz-Birkenau. The SS murdered the overwhelming majority by poison gas, however, the exact number of victims is not known. It is estimated that about 12% or 2,200 of the Jews deported from Satu Mare survived the Holocaust.

The Kingdom of Romania was politically unstable in the interwar period and threatened by territorial claims from its neighbours. The country sought an alliance with National Socialist Germany but the Nazi leaders in Berlin chose to support Hungary, Bulgaria and their temporary ally, the Soviet Union over the border issue. Romania had to agree to surrender large parts of its territory to these states during 1940. This led to increased radicalisation within the country. King Karl (1893–1953) granted unrestricted authority to General Ion Antonescu (1882–1946) but then had to abdicate to allow his son Michael (1921–2017) to come to the throne. The right-wing extremist »Garda de Fier« (Iron Guard), which was allied with Antonescu, immediately began to persecute the Jews. In 1941 Romania took part in the German attack on the Soviet Union. Romania organised the deportation of up to 155,000 Jews and 25,000 Roma from Bukovina and Bessarabia to the occupied Ukrainian territory of »Transnistria«. Tens of thousands died as a result of mass murder, imprisonment, forced labour, starvation and illness. Meanwhile, the Jews in northern Transylvania (part of Hungary since 1940) were subject to the anti-semitic legislation in this region. However, the majority were spared any violent persecution until the Wehrmacht invaded in 1944. The SS now began to deport Jews to Auschwitz in cooperation with the Hungarian authorities. The total number of murdered Romanian Jews is thus spread over various territories: 50,000 Jews from Bessarabia and Bukovina along with 20,000 Jews from central Romania were murdered and around 120,000 Transylvanian Jews died under the Hungarian-German occupation. In August 1944, the Red Army offensive caused Romania to change sides. Michael I stripped Antonescu of his powers and the country came under Soviet control. The dictator was executed in 1946 and the king abdicated the following year. In the initial post-war period memory focused on liberation by the Red Army. A monument to the fallen Soviet soldiers was built in Bucharest. Romania’s alliance with Germany was ignored. Under Nicolae Ceausescu (1918–1989), who ruled the country with his secret service from 1965, the »liberation from the yoke of fascism« was presented as the achievement of Romanian heroes. With the end of the Ceausescu regime in 1989 many Romanians preferred to adopt a contrary approach: the attack on the Soviet Union in 1941 was now more frequently viewed as a campaign against Bolshevism. There was growing admiration for Antonescu. In contrast, for some Romanians the king, now living in exile, became increasingly important as a symbol of democracy as he had toppled the dictator and was later expelled by the communists. There was no place for the Holocaust in post-war memory. Most survivors had already left the country by the 1950s. Memory was left to the Jewish communities, which established a small research centre in 1977 and a small museum in Bucharest the following year as well as a number of memorials. In 2004 a committee was set up to research the Holocaust and Romanian crimes. The committee was led by Elie Wiesel (1928–2016), a Romanian-born Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize winner. A National Institute has continued the research since 2005. In 2009, a central Holocaust memorial was inaugurated in Bucharest that also honours the Roma who had been deported to Transnistria. However, apart from this sign, there is still little remembrance to the more than 12,500 Romanian Roma murdered during the war.

Remembrance

After the war the survivors initially returned to Satu Mare and re-established the Jewish community. In 1947 already 7,500 Jews lived in the city, most of them coming from other regions, for many of them the city near the Hungarian border was to become a stepping stone to go further west. From the 1950s onwards the number of Jews decreased continuously, most of them emigrated to Israel. According to the latest censuses there are less than 100 Jews living in Satu Mare, most of them very old.
The synagogues are the only remnants in the cityscape to tell of the once busy Jewish life. The synagogue of the liberal community did not survive the Second World War, but the great orthodox synagogue in str. Decebal (Hungarian: Várdomb utca) is relatively well-preserved. Next to it is an older, also orthodox prayer house. Between the buildings is the Holocaust memorial, remembering the deported Jews of Satu Mare. On the memorial is an inscription in Romanian, Hungarian, English and Hebrew reading: »In memory of the more than 18.000 Jews from Satu Mare and surroundings that in May-June 1944 were deported on orders of the Hungarian fascist government to the death camps of Auschwitz Birkenau where the overwhelming majority were killed. May their memory be blessed forever!«

Satu Mare, 2008, Inscription on the Holocaust memorial, Margo Schwartz

Satu Mare, 2013, Commemoration at the Holocaust memorial, Szatmári Friss Újság

Open

The memorial is accessible at all times.

Contact

http://www.jewishcomunity.ro/en/index.php

cesatumare@gmail.com

+40 (0) 261 713 703

Satu Mare, 2008, Altar of the orthodox synagogue, Margo Schwartz

Satu Mare, 2013, Orthodox synagogue, Szatmári Friss Újság

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