BEREGOVO

BEREGOVO (Cz. Berehovo; Hg. Beregszász), city in Sub-Carpathian Ruthenia (now in Ukraine). Toward the end of the 18th century Jews were first permitted to settle there on the estates of the counts Schoenborn and to pursue trade. Most of them originated from Poland. By 1795 there was an organized community with a synagogue and ḥevra kaddisha. abraham judah ha-kohen schwarz officiated as rabbi from 1861 to 1881, and Solomon Sofer (Schreiber) from 1884 to 1930. A Hebrew elementary school was opened after 1918, while Beregovo was within Czechoslovakia. There were 4,592 Jews living in Beregovo in 1921 and 5,865 (out of a total population of 19,379) in 1941. They owned 16 factories, three flour mills, and two banks, and were represented in the professions by 22 doctors and 17 lawyers. Most of the Zionist parties and youth were active in Beregovo. A number of Jews owned vineyards, and supplied the international market as vintners. After the Hungarian takeover in 1938, the Jews were deprived of their business licenses. Five hundred males were drafted into labor battalions and perished on the eastern front. In 1941 about 250 local Jews without Hungarian citizenship were deported to the German-occupied Ukraine and murdered there. In the winter of 1944 a ghetto and Judenrat were established, and in mid-May 1944 about 11,000 Jews were deported to Auschwitz, among them 3,600 from Beregovo with the others from the surrounding area. The big synagogue was confiscated while a service was being held during Passover 1959 in order to house the local theater. After that time, services were held in a rented room. The number of Jewish families was estimated at 300 in 1970. Presumably most left in the 1990s. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Y. Erez (ed.), Karpatorusyah (1959); Yedi'ot Yad Vashem, nos. 10–11 (1956), 20, 31. ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: PK Tshekhia, S.V. (Oskar K. Rabinowicz / Shmuel Spector (2nd ed.)