JABLONEC NAD NISOU

JABLONEC NAD NISOU (Ger. Gablonz an der Neisse), city in N. Bohemia, now in Czech Republic, center of the world-famous glass-jewelry industry. Jewish settlement in Jablonec, which began in 1847, was connected with the development of this industry. As the neighboring town of Smrzovka (Ger. Morchenstern), where most of the plants were situated, caused difficulties for the Jews, Jablonec became the industry's commercial center. A congregation (kultusverein ) was founded in Jablonec in 1872, a cemetery opened in 1882, and a Moorish-style synagogue dedicated in 1892; in 1893 a community was legally established, with a substantial number of foreign citizens, representatives of foreign firms. The community statute of 1928 granted them equal voting rights. Between the world wars, the majority of the population supported German nationalistic aims; in the same period the municipality prohibited sheḥitah in the slaughterhouse. During the Sudeten crisis and the annexation of the area by Germany (Oct. 1938), most of the Jews left Jablonec, some reestablishing their firms in the U.S. and England. The few who remained were deported to concentration camps. On Nov. 10, 1938, the synagogue was demolished. After World War II a small congregation was reestablished, most of its members from Subcarpathian Ruthenia; in 1969 it was affiliated to liberec . The Jewish population in Jablonec numbered 214 in 1869, 430 in 1880, 517 in 1895, and 799 in 1930 (2% of the total population). The municipality turned the cemetery into building plots in 1969. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Urabin, in: H. Gold (ed.), Die Juden und Judengemeinden Boehmens in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart (1934), 145–8; Freund, in: Selbstwehr, 22 (1928), no. 8 (24.2), 6–7; Pick, in: Jews of Czechoslovakia, 1 (1968), 399–400. (Meir Lamed)