Page 21 - TORCH Magazine #17 - Autumn 2020

The persecution of Jews at the hands of the Nazis began immediately after the German army entered Riga on 1 July 1941 after driving out the Soviet Red Army. Many of the non-Jewish population
of Riga welcomed the Nazis, but for Jews it was disastrous. Within a just few months, the Jewish community of Riga
– approximately 10 per cent of the city’s population– were murdered.
This barbarism was fuelled by an anti- Semitic propaganda campaign. A Riga newspaper, Tēvija ('Fatherland'), published an editorial on 11 July entitled The Jews— Source of Our Destruction.
On 2 July, the day after the German invasion, Latvian armed auxiliary units, instigated by the Germans, went about the city dragging Jews out of their homes and arresting them. They assaulted a number of Jews, some so severely they died, and others were shot dead. The same morning, all the telephones of Jewish homes were disconnected.
Jews were arrested and taken to police headquarters, or the 'prefecture'. There, young women were stripped naked and confined to cellars where they were raped sometimes in front of their husbands
These anti-Jewish riots, known as pogroms, included the burning of Riga's synagogues where many Jews had been rounded up and forced into. The Great Choral Synagogue was set alight on 4 July, with 20 Jews locked in the basement. The holy scrolls were dragged out of the synagogues and burned.
and children. Old and sick people were brought in naked. Traditionally-attired Jews, especially those with beards, were targeted for humiliations such as dragging them around by their beards and forced shaving. Others were forced at gunpoint to put on the talith (prayer shawl) and tefilin then dance and sing Soviet songs to smear them as ‘communists’.
By August 1941 the Germans were firmly established as occupiers and introduced measures of apartheid. Jews were banned from public places, including city facilities, parks, and swimming pools. A yellow star was required to be worn on their clothing, with violation punishable by death. Jews were also allotted only one-half of the
An elderly Jewish woman wears the star in the Riga ghetto. Yad Vashem Photo Archives US Holocaust Museum BY-SA 3.0
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