History of the Jews in Switzerland#History

In Switzerland Today, about 18,000 Jews, which is about 0.2 percent of the total population (as of 2007 ), almost half of whom live in the greater Zurich area, about 80 percent of these Jews are a Swiss citizen. In the Old Confederation Jews lived since the early 17th century in the Commons rule bathing under an "expensive" special statute, with the final decision of the Diet, 1776., The residence of Jews was restricted to the two villages Endingen and Lengnau. Although the Helvetic pushed forward the idea of emancipation, but they did not prevail.

History

Partly archaeological finds (finger ring with menorah ) from the 4th century, which were made in Augusta Raurica, suggest that the first Jews arrived in the territory of today's Switzerland with the Romans. However, the sparse findings do not answer the question of whether it was in the ring around the lost possession of by traveling Jewish merchant or a souvenir of a Roman or whether it was based in Augusta Raurica Jewish families, or even a religious community. Although Jews were also mentioned in the edited after 500 Lex Burgundionum, but a Jewish settler activity is archaeologically detectable only since the second half of the 12th century in Geneva.

In 1213 the presence of Jews in Basel is attested, as the local bishop ordered the return of a deposit, which he had deposited with a Jewish moneylender. During the 13th century, Jewish communities in Lucerne ( 1252), Bern ( 1262 ), St. Gallen ( 1268 ), Winterthur (before 1270), Zurich ( 1273), Schaffhausen ( 1278 ), Zofingen and Bischofszell ( 1288), Rheinfelden ( 1290 ), Geneva ( 1281 ), Montreux and Lausanne founded; the most significant were in Bern, Zurich and Lucerne. During this time they were increasing persecution, often after the pattern of the blood libel, exposed. Thus in 1294 in Bern, under the pretext that Jews have murdered a boy, whacked a part of the Jewish population and sold the surviving remnant from the city. The boy was later worshiped under the name of Rudolf of Bern as a martyr.

As plague broke out in 1348 in Europe, the Jews were accused that they had poisoned wells and in many places burned at the stake, including in Bern, Solothurn, Basel and Zurich. The surviving Jewish population was expelled from the country, and so it was in Switzerland until the 19th century almost no Jews.

An exception were the two villages Aargau Endingen and Lengnau where Jews were allowed to take since the 17th century as foreign protection comrades residence and where therefore lived almost the entire Jewish population of Switzerland with 553 people at the end of the 18th century. Most knowledge of the Swiss Judaism of that time we owe the Protestant Zurich pastor Johann Caspar Ulrich and his 1768 published in Basel collection of Jewish stories that deal with this people in the XIII. and following centuries up to MDCCLX. in Switzerland occurred from time to time.

The French Revolution, the invasion of the French in 1798 and the Helvetic Republic introduced a turn for the emancipation of the Swiss Jews. In the Federal Constitution of 1848, the Jews were still discriminated against because of establishment and freedom of worship and equality in the legal proceedings was in it only for Christian Schweizer.

During the 19th century the situation of Swiss Jews became increasingly paradoxical, since, in particular, the French government began for the exercise of the rights of their fellow Jews, who were still exposed in Switzerland numerous discrimination. Only with the partial revision of the Federal Constitution of 1866 the Jews in Switzerland was granted the freedom of establishment and the full exercise of civil rights. This equality came into force in all cantons, with the exception of the canton of Aargau, where it was only adopted on January 1, 1879. Parallels in Switzerland remained anti-Jewish minded, which was reflected in the adoption of a popular initiative for a ban on ritual slaughter, for example 1893. 1894 began in neighboring France, the Dreyfus Affair, the Theodor Herzl published his 1896 book The Jewish State was moving, in which he demanded a separate state for Jews and Zionism founded. Under Herzl then the first World Zionist Congress was held in 1897 in Basel.

In a court process ( Berner process ), which took place in Bern 1933-1935, the anti-Semitic Protocols of the Elders of Zion were declared to pulp fiction and sentenced the editor to a fine. The judgment of May 1935, however, was collected in November 1937 from formal legal reasons. As an expert witness was at the former Carl Albert Loosli process involved, the anti-Semitism in 1927 in Scripture The bad Jews! had fought.

During the Second World War, at least 30,000 people were turned away at the borders of Switzerland, including many Jews. After negotiations with Switzerland, the passports of Jews were marked with a " J " stamp in Nazi Germany from 1939.

Today the Jewish population is concentrated in the cities, where there are both orthodox, conservative and liberal communities. The political organization of Swiss Jews is founded in 1904, the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities (SIG ).

Places with Jewish communities

  • Baden
  • Basel Jewish Community of Basel
  • The Jewish Religious Society of Basel
  • Liberal Jewish community Migwan
  • Jewish Community of Berne
  • Jewish Communities Tafers
  • Communauté Israélite Genève
  • Communauté Israélite Libérale Genève
  • Israeli Cultusgemeinde Zurich ( ICZ )
  • The Jewish Religious Society Zurich ( IRGZ )
  • Agudas Achim Zurich Jewish Community
  • Liberal Jewish congregation Or Hadash Zurich

The communities of Pruntrut, Yverdon, Avenches, Davos and Delsberg have dissolved due to lack members.

Synagogues

  • Basel synagogue
  • Synagogue Bern
  • Synagogue Endingen
  • Synagogue Lengnau
  • Synagogue Baden
  • Synagogues in Zurich

Cemeteries

  • Israelite cemetery Basel
  • Jewish Cemetery Bern
  • Jewish Cemetery Endingen

Prominent Swiss Jews

Prominent Swiss Jews ( in chronological order ):

  • Markus G. Dreyfus (1812-1877), champion of the emancipation
  • Alfred Stern (1846-1936), a historian at the ETH Zurich
  • David Farbstein (1868-1953), the first Jewish National
  • Edmond Fleg (1874-1963), French writer of Swiss origin
  • Albert Einstein (1879-1955), a physicist with a Swiss passport
  • Pink Bloch- Bollag (1880-1922), pioneer of the labor movement
  • Ernest Bloch (1880-1959), composer
  • Fritz Strich (1882-1963), literary scholar
  • Regina Fuchs Kaegi - man (1889-1972), women's rights activist and humanitarian activist
  • Camille Bloch (1891-1970), chocolate manufacturer
  • Leopold Szondi (1893-1986), psychiatrist, founder of the " fate analysis "
  • Albert Cohen (1895-1981), writer
  • Ernst Levy (1895-1981), composer
  • Lazar Wechsler (1896-1981), film producer
  • Kurt Guggenheim (1896-1983), writer
  • Tadeusz Reichstein (1897-1996), chemist and Nobel Prize winner
  • Willy Guggenheim, called Varlin (1900-1977), painter
  • Kurt Hirschfeld (1902-1964), director and dramaturge
  • Leopold Lindtberg (1902-1984), Director
  • Felix Bloch (1905-1983), physicist and Nobel laureate
  • Edith Oppenheim -Jonas (1907-2001), children's book author ( Papa minor) and artist
  • Veit Wyler (1908-2002), lawyer and Zionist politicians
  • Lothar Rothschild (1909-1974), Swiss rabbi and writer
  • Rolf Liebermann (1910-1999), composer
  • Jeanne Hersch (1910-2000), philosopher
  • Max G. Bollag (1913-2005), art dealer and original
  • Hans Joseph son (1920-2012), Swiss sculptor
  • Sigi Feigel (1921-2004), lawyer and fighter against racism
  • André Kaminski (1923-1991), writer
  • Pinkas Braun (1923-2008), actor
  • Victor Fenigstein (* 1924), composer and piano teacher
  • Robert Frank (* 1924), Photographer
  • Buddy Elias ( born 1925 ), Swiss actor, cousin of Anne Frank
  • Franz Wurm (1926-2010), author and translator
  • Arthur Cohn (* 1927), film producer
  • Rolf Bloch ( born 1930 ), chocolate producer, entrepreneur and president of the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities from 1992 to 2000
  • Alfred Donath (1932-2010), Swiss physician and president of the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities 2000-2008
  • Ralph Zlotchov (1933 ), President of the Swiss Football Association
  • Ruth Dreifuss ( born 1940 ), first President of the Confederation
  • François Loeb ( born 1943 ), entrepreneur ( Loeb ) and the National
  • Konrad Feilchenfeldt (* 1944), literary scholar
  • Roger Schawinski ( b. 1945 ), media entrepreneur and media pioneer
  • Charles Lewinsky ( born 1946 ), writer
  • Jossi Wieler ( born 1951 ), theater director
  • Bea Wyler (* 1951), rabbi and author
  • Pierre Rothschild ( * 1952 ), journalist, media entrepreneur, TV and film
  • Ralph Lewin ( born 1953 ), State Councillor in the Kanton Basel-Stadt
  • Dani Levy ( born 1957 ), actor and director
  • Anatole Taubman (born 1970 ), Swiss actor

Swiss " Righteous Among the Nations "

See main article List of Righteous Among the Nations from Switzerland

After the Second World War, the term was used righteous among the nations to refer to non-Jewish people who risked their lives in order to save Jews from the Holocaust. In Switzerland, among other things, included the following persons to these " righteous ":

Population development 1860-2000

After the performed since 1860 censuses, the number of persons who are known to the Jewish faith (1860 and 1870 were " Israelites and other non-Christians " counted and 1870 and 1880 only the local present population) developed in relation to the total population as follows:

Tagsatzung Lengnau, Aargau Menorah (Temple) Well poisoning Der Judenstaat Berne Trial Baden, Switzerland Bremgarten, Aargau La Chaux-de-Fonds Kreuzlingen Léopold Szondi Ernst Levy (jurist) Hans Josephsohn Friedrich Born Aufbau History of the Jews in Estonia History of the Jews in France History of the Jews in Latvia History of the Jews in Norway History of the Jews in Poland History of the Jews in Slovakia History of the Jews in Spain History of the Jews in the Czech Republic History of the Jews in Hungary
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