Jewish communities outside Israel are now almost entirely urban – in cities such as New York, London, Paris, and Cape Town. Yet history tells a richer story: we once lived not only in bustling cities (when permitted) but also in small towns and remote villages across the globe.
Travellers in Europe often stumble across reminders of this heritage – an Ulica Żydowska, La Giudea, or Calle Hebraica – and feel a thrill of recognition. I have felt it myself on visits to towns in Spain, Portugal, and Eastern Europe.
What’s striking is that it’s not only Jews who respond warmly to these traces. On a recent tour to Poland with the Cape Town Holocaust & Genocide Centre (CTHGC), I saw how local non-Jewish residents take responsibility for abandoned sites reflecting their town’s Jewish past – a past almost erased by the Nazi occupation.
In some places, these sites are coming back to life. We visited the old synagogue in Łańcut, near Tarnów, lovingly cared for by an elderly Polish man who has learned Hebrew; a cemetery in Kazimierz Dolny, restored by a local man who built a memorial wall from old tombstones; and the Jewish Museum in Oświęcim, created by non-Jews in tribute to the community that once lived there.
I had seen this spirit before in a documentary brought to Cape Town by the CTHGC. It told the story of Polish Olympic kayaker Dariusz Popiela, who identifies and restores forgotten Jewish cemeteries around the country.
We should acknowledge – and treasure – the contribution of people such as these.
These experiences came to mind when reading this month’s SAJBD submission in the Chronicle (P40), about rural Western Cape communities working to protect their unused synagogues and cemeteries from decay.
In both Poland and South Africa, these are the remnants of once-thriving Jewish communities whose members contributed richly to local and national life. The physical traces – a building, a gravestone, a street name – are not just historical curiosities. They are enduring links to lives, stories, and values that shaped the places we live in today.
Preserving them is more than an act of remembrance. It’s a statement that these histories matter – not only to Jews, but to the broader human story.
This Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we pray for peace the world over, and especially for our brethren in the State of Israel. We look forward with hope to a year in which the current horrific wave of antisemitism is stopped in its tracks and a year filled with more love than hatred. The CJC team wishes you a Chag Sameach!
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