The Jews of Suceava: the Gah Synagogue, a Vizhnitz Court and the Town’s Rabbis

In 1914 about 8,000 Jews lived in Suceava, and in 1939 the town had 12 functioning synagogues. One survives: the Gah synagogue (Gemilut Hasadim) of 1870. It is the starting point for the story of a community that produced rabbis such as Rabbi Moshe Chaim Lau and Rabbi Meir Shapiro.

From Moldavian Capital to Austrian Border Town

Suceava was the capital of the Principality of Moldavia in the 15th century, and sources mention Jewish merchants, physicians and diplomats from Poland and Turkey. But formal permission for Jews to live in the town came only in the early 18th century: under Prince Antioh Cantemir (1705–1707) according to the Suceava Yizkor Book, and in 1707 according to the YIVO Encyclopedia.

In 1775 Suceava passed with the rest of Bukovina to Austria. In 1774 the town had about 50 Jewish families — 203 people according to Hugo Gold, 209 according to the Encyclopaedia Judaica; in 1782 some were expelled by the Austrian authorities. The community grew strongly in the 19th century: the 1880 census counted 3,750 Jews among 10,104 inhabitants (37.1%); in 1901 there were 6,787, and in 1914 about 8,000.

The Gah Synagogue

The Gah synagogue (Gemilut Hasadim) was founded in 1870, renewed in 1910 and renovated in 1929, 1975 and 1983. According to the Yizkor Book, it is the only one of the town’s synagogues to survive; the communist authorities demolished the others. Its walls are painted with biblical and zodiac scenes, the Tribes of Israel and views of Jerusalem.

The synagogue was rededicated on 7 October 2016, during the commemorations marking 75 years since the deportation. On 21 March 2022 it hosted a bar mitzvah, the first in 23 years. It stands at Strada Dimitrie Onciul 7 and is used for prayer on Shabbat and holidays.

“Shotz”: The Hasidic Court

In 1892 Rabbi Moshe Hager, a grandson of Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Vizhnitz, founded a Hasidic court in Suceava — “Shotz” to its Jews — on Strada Ciprian Porumbescu, and served as the town’s rabbi for decades. His son, Rabbi Chaim Hager, was deported with the community to Murafa in Transnistria, returned, and emigrated to Israel in 1950; he died on 24 Tevet 5737 (1977).

Rabbis from Suceava

• Rabbi Moshe Chaim Lau served as rabbi of Suceava in 1920–1928, his first post. He later served in Prešov and Piotrków and was murdered in the Holocaust. He was the father of Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau.
• Rabbi Meshulam Roth, born in Horodenka in 1875, served as rabbi of Suceava for about ten years from around 1929 and was a Mizrachi leader. He reached the Land of Israel in 1944 and died in 1963.
• Rabbi Meir Shapiro, founder of Daf Yomi (1924) and of the Chachmei Lublin Yeshiva, was born in Suceava in 1887. Suceava was his birthplace; he did not serve there as rabbi.

A Hebrew, Zionist Community

In 1902 the first congress of the Zionist organisations of Bukovina met in Suceava. After Bukovina became part of Romania (1918), a Jewish gymnasium opened in the town (1920), along with a Talmud Torah, a Hebrew kindergarten and libraries, and movements such as Hashomer Hatzair, Mizrachi, the Revisionists and WIZO.

October 1941 and the Post-War Community

On 9–11 October 1941 the Jews of Suceava were deported from Burdujeni station in cattle cars to Transnistria: 3,253 from the town and another 1,634 from Burdujeni. By the end of 1941, 27 Jews remained. Survivors returned from 1944, and after the war, with refugees from northern Bukovina, the community numbered about 4,000. Most emigrated to Israel; in 2003 the town counted 94 Jews.

Visiting

Gah synagogue: Strada Dimitrie Onciul 7. Community office: Strada Armenească 8. No visiting hours are published; arrange with the community. The large Jewish cemetery is at Strada Ștefan Tomșa 18; a 2001 survey found it locked, with its oldest stones from the 19th century. The princely fortress of Suceava (Cetatea de Scaun) is close to the centre, and the town is the starting point of the Bukovina heritage route.