The Divergence of Judaism and Islam. Interdependence, Modernity, and Political Turmoil

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Sharing the Same Fate: Muslims and Jews of the Balkans · 63

to practice the articles of the treaty. For instance, Romanian citizenship
was not given to all the Jews who were living in the country. Romania, in
those years, had the biggest Jewish population of all the Balkan countries.
According to the census results of 1930, most of Romania’s 756,930 Jews
were traders and industrial workers.^54 Alexander Kittroeff claims that the
reason for anti-Semitism in Romania between the two world wars was
economic more than religious and national, and the Romanian church
simply condoned it.^55
Before World War II, the anti-Semitic winds of the Balkans passed
from Romania as well. Fascist governments that began in 1937 adopted
the “Romanization” policy. The agricultural lands of all non-Romans,
Turks, Jews, etcetera. were confiscated. Jews who were working in the
industrial and trade sectors were dismissed. The Jews were baselesly ac-
cused of inviting the Soviets in 1940 and 1941. In Jassy, 8,000 Jews were
killed. Some authors claim that the number of deaths was higher. When
185,000 Bessarabian and Bukovina Jews were sent into exile in Trans-
Dnistra on the Romanian-Ukranian border, only 30,000 survived. It is
claimed that the number of Jewish deaths of Bessarabia, northern Bu-
kovina, and Trans-Dnistria was 380,000. The Romanian government
and the Nazis agreed to deport 350,000 central Romanian Jews to Nazi
camps, beginning in September 1942. However, this did not happen.^56
After World War II, the Communist regime took over Romania. Although
some authors claim that the Jews filled all the posts in the Communist
Party, Hildrun Glass rejects this idea. He explains that the Jews in Roma-
nia were not empowered. The number of Jews in Romania was 428,000
in 1949 and 100,000 in 1967. This means 75 percent of the Romanian Jews
left the country in less than twenty years. Most of them went to Israel.^57
Migration of the Jews continued. At present there are about 10,000 Jews
living in Romania.
The Muslims of Romania were living in the Dobrudja region. Accord-
ing to the figures of Ubicini, there were 134,662 Muslims and 87,900 non-
Muslims in Dobrudja in 1879, one year after Romanian independence.^58
At the beginning of Romanian rule, Muslims and Bulgarians were the
largest groups there. Therefore, the Romanian government did not recog-
nize the political rights of the inhabitants of the region. The government
began to apply a new settlement policy. It changed the rules of landown-
ership. Romanian officers treated the Muslim population badly, and the

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