TIRASPOL (ro) / TIRASPOLI (ru) / TIRASPOL (yid)
The modern city of Tiraspol was founded by the Russian generalissimo Alexander Suvorov in 1792, although the area had been inhabited for thousands of years by varying ethnic groups. Since the late 18th century, this city has always had a thriving Jewish presence. An organized community of 1406 existed by 1847. By 1897, the Jewish community equaled 27 percent of the total population of Tiraspol (8.668). During the Holocaust, Tiraspol served as a concentration camp for Jews from Bessarabia and Romania, nearly the entire Jewish community perished in Nazi concentration camps. After World War II, the Jewish community began to grow once again and, by the 1960s, there were nearly 1.500 Jews. Today Tiraspol has a tiny but active Jewish community.
In Tiraspol we should visit a Jewish cemetery with a modest but moving Holocaust memorial, and other places related to the historical and modern Jewish life.
© Jewish Heritage Moldova (Maghid NGO) Research, Education, Guiding