History of the Jews in Monaco
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The history of the Jews in Monaco goes back at least a century, most notably to the time of the Holocaust. Monaco had a very small Jewish presence before World War II, numbering approximately 300 people.[1] During the war, the principality's government issued false identity papers to its Jewish residents to protect them from Nazi deportation.[2] Prince Louis II refused to dismiss Jewish civil servants and protected Édouard de Rothschild from deportation.[3] However, Monaco's police arrested and turned over 42 Central European Jewish refugees to the Nazis.[1] Sixty Jews were arrested 27–28 August 1942, and ninety in total, according to The Algemeiner.[4]
In 1948, the Association Cultuelle Israelite de Monaco was founded as the official organization of Monaco's Jewish community, and it provides the community with a synagogue, Hebrew school and kosher food store.[2] Today's Jewish community in Monaco consists primarily of retirees from France and the United Kingdom, and there is also a small population of North African and Turkish Jews.[5]
While Monaco has almost no Jewish citizens, approximately 1,000 Jewish expatriates of other countries comprise about 2.86% of Monaco's total residents (citizen and non-citizen combined).[6] This means Monaco has the highest per capita total of Jewish residents of any country in the world outside Israel (though not the highest per capita number of Jewish citizens).