The Forgotten Death List of Vukovar

IsraCast publishes for the first time documented list of 284 Jews who were murdered by Croatians during WWII

Israel remembers six million Jews who perished in the holocaust

On the eve of holocaust remembrance day, IsraCast is publishing the first time a list of 110 Jewish families, some 284 victims who were murdered in Croatian controlled Vukovar during World War II. Serbian officials compiled the documented list of the Jews after Serbia took over the area after the war. The list of families is in alphabetic order and includes the victims’ birth date and also their date of execution. Nearly all the Jews were murdered in 1941-1942. Avi Yaffe of IsraCast visited Vukovar shortly before it was handed back to Croatia and saw evidence that the Serbs have gathered the remains of holocaust victims from mass graves and given them a proper burial.

In the year 1996, Avi Yaffe was a member of an Israeli delegation that visited the town of Vukovar before it was transferred from Serbian to Croatian control in line with a U.N. decision. Yaffe asked if there was a Jewish cemetery in the town and his Serbian hosts accompanied the delegation to the site. To his surprise he saw mass graves of entire families and heard an astonishing account of what had happened to the Jewish community of Vukovar. The graves were of former Jews who had converted under duress to Catholicism  during World War II. The Jewish community of Vukovar was comprised of native born and German-Jews who had fled from Nazi Germany. Many were doctors and lawyers and considered to be well to do. The Pavelic regime started deporting the town’s Jews to Croatian concentration camps.

“The Croatians offered Jewish residents to convert to Catholicism and in return they would not be sent to the death camps.”

The Croatians offered Jewish residents to convert to Catholicism and in return they would not be sent to the death camps. The procedure was that these Jews would submit a request to the town council to join the Catholic church. If approved, the council would then issue a conversion certificate signed by the town mayor. The Jews who converted to the Catholic church were forced to contribute their private property. (See conversion document #1 of Dr. Daniel Klein, dated 1942).

Independent State of Croatia (NDH)
Ministry of Justice and Religion

Department of Religion
No. 2585-B-1942

Date: Zagreb, March 20th, 1942

Subject: Dr. Klein Daniel
Conversion

MUNICIPALITY of VUKOVAR

Based upon the circular letter of the Croatian Government  from July 30th, 1941, No 48468-ex-1941, it is approved that Dr. Daniel Klein, lawyer in Vukovar, together with his wife Lily and niece Elisabeth can convert from Moisianic to Rimo-Catholic faith.

Information about the decision to the party.

The Ustasha kept their promise not to send Klein and the others to concentration camps. Instead they were taken to a nearby forest and executed. (See death document #2 of six Klein  family members who all  ‘died’  together in 1942. Three other Klein relatives were apparently murdered the year before. 

Yaffe retrieved similar documents of other  Vukovar families who suffered the same fate (See Document #3 & #4 of Renka Rosenfeld who was both converted and murdered in 1942). In Vukovar, Yaffe saw hundreds of similar documents preserved by the Serbs; however, these probably no longer exist under Croatian control.

Municipality of Vukovar

No. 3809/1941
Vukovar, Nov. 27th, 1941

 

Subject: Renka Rosenfeld from Vukovar

Conversion
To the City police in Vukovar

The request of Renka Rosenfeld from Vukovar by which she has asked the permission for the conversion from Moisianic into Rimo-Catholic faith, that has been submitted to this Municipality already in July 17th, 1941, with request to inform the authorities about the applicant’s behavior and in accordance with Ustashi authorities to bring out the certificate about the honesty for the named person and to return it together with this document to this Municipality for further proceedings.

The Mayor

 

Document #5  is a property list of another Jewish woman who ‘converted’ to Catholicism including the value of each item.

Jewish mobility’s given up and evaluated that were by the order of State Treasury in Zagreb No.T.65 from January 14th,1943, given to Mr. Raguz Ilija, the head emissary of the Head Directory for associations and social care of the Ministry of Interior, respectively authorized in writing to MM Osrecki Albert and Ilija Dabelic from Vukovar, and to Petar Persic as an emissary, that is a Secretary of the Central Board for refugees, as follows:

The Jewish cemetery was built by the Serbs after World War II. During Yugoslavia’s civil war during the nineties, the Croatians desecrated the cemetery and Jewish museum which contained much of the relevant documentation. IsraCast has a detailed list of 110 families, Jewish children, women and men who were murdered in Vukovar after ‘converting’ to Catholicism. Some of these Jews are buried in the Vukovar cemetery.An unknown number of Jews from Vukovar perished in the Croatian death camp.

Part of the information and documents was supplied to Mr. Yaffe by Serbian residents of Vukovar before control of the town was handed over to Croatia in accordance with a UN resolution. IsraCast requests anyone with further information or documentation on Croatia’s Jewish community to contact IsraCast@IsraCast.com

List of Names