Anti-Jewish violence in Czechoslovakia (1918–1920)

Wave of anti-Jewish rioting and violence in Czechoslovakia

After World War I and during the formation of Czechoslovakia, a wave of anti-Jewish rioting and violence was unleashed against Jews and their property, especially stores.

Causes

The main accusations leveled against Jews in Slovakia were that they were Hungarian-speakers and agents of the hated Hungarian state, from which Slovakia was trying to break free. In Bohemia and Moravia, many Jews had supported the Habsburgs, especially early on in the war, arousing the hatred of Czech patriots. Also, Jews were blamed for profiteering and black marketing during the wartime shortages. Another cause of the violence was the breakdown in Habsburg authority and weakness of the new Czechoslovak state, which had not yet established a monopoly on violence. Riots between Czechs and Germans also occurred.

November pogroms

In Slovakia, violence occurred in November 1918. In Považská Bystrica (near Žilina), David Büchler's general store was robbed and destroyed on 5 November, causing damage of 300,000 Czechoslovak crowns (US$8,880 in 1920). Bands of former soldiers roamed the countryside looking for shops to rob, most of which belonged to Jews due to pre-existing economic patterns.

December pogroms

In December 1918, the most severe pogroms occurred in Bohemia and Moravia. The worst was in Holešov on 3–4 December. Jewish-owned houses and shops were robbed, the synagogue and community offices were vandalized, and two Jews were murdered. Eventually the army intervened.

Effect on international relations

While the violence was ongoing, Edvard Beneš, Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, and other Czechoslovak politicians at the Paris Peace Conference portrayed Czechoslovakia as a liberal and tolerant country, relatively free of the antisemitism that plagued neighboring countries. A Czech Agrarian newspaper claimed that the violence was engineered by "Judeo-Germans ... organizing and hiring provocateurs" in order to ruin Czechoslovakia's reputation abroad. In 1919, the international Zionist activist Chaim Weizmann expressed concern about the violence, noting that it was "in complete contrast to the avowed Czech policy in Paris, and also to the public utterance of Minister Beneš".

Aftermath

The violence continued from the disintegration of the Habsburg monarchy to the Paris peace treaties signed in 1919 and 1920. It was not nearly as severe as in Poland and Ukraine, where tens of thousands of Jews were murdered. After 1920, the violence died down. Interwar Czechoslovakia was the safest and least antisemitic country in central Europe for Jews, and it was the only one to retain a democratic government into the mid-1930s.

Historiography

References

^ Láníček 2013, pp. 6, 10.
^ Klein-Pejšová 2015, pp. 23–24.
Polonsky & Riff 1981, p. 88.
Polonsky & Riff 1981, pp. 84–85.
^ Miller 2019, p. 652.
^ Miller 2019, p. 650.
Orzoff, Andrea (2009). Battle for the Castle: The Myth of Czechoslovakia in Europe, 1914-1948. Oxford University Press. p. 62. ISBN 978-0-19-970995-3.
Láníček 2013, pp. 6–7, 10.
Láníček 2013, p. 6.
Polonsky & Riff 1981, p. 92.
Láníček 2013, pp. 10–11.

Sources

Klein-Pejšová, Rebekah (2015). Mapping Jewish Loyalties in Interwar Slovakia. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. ISBN 978-0-253-01562-4.
Láníček, Jan (2013). Czechs, Slovaks and the Jews, 1938–48: Beyond Idealisation and Condemnation. New York: Springer. ISBN 978-1-137-31747-6.
Miller, Michael L. (2019). "The Forgotten Pogroms, 1918". Slavic Review. 78 (3): 648–653. doi:10.1017/slr.2019.226. S2CID 211676325.
Polonsky, Antony; Riff, Michael (1981). ""Poles, Czechoslovaks and the 'Jewish Question', 1914-1921: A Comparative Study". Germany in the Age of Total War. London: Croom Helm. pp. 63–101.

Misplaced Pages