26 Friday, December 30, 1983
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
•
•
Prague Preserves 'Golden Age' of Jewry Despite
Scarcity
of Jews
By MILTON JACOBY
Jewish cultural treasures
and the paucity of Jews.
A mere 1,500 people con-
sider themselves members
of the Jewish community,
one-quarter of the entire
Czech Jewish population.
No locale in all of Europe
has more to offer the Jewish past. But the present is
visitor than the city of quite different.
Prague. A feast for the eyes
Though Jews have inha-
and the heart, the historical bited Prague for 1,000
Jewish treasures of this years, and according to
Eastern European capital Jewish officials here, were
are inversely proportional present before the arrival of
to the number of Jews it Christians in the 10th Cen-
presently contains. tury with St. Wencelsav,
Communal headquar- today the presence of Jewry
ters are at 18 Maislova St. is almost more of a symbol
in the Old Town in the than an actuality.
DINING & COCKTAIL LOUNGE
center of an incredible
In 1938 there were more
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Jewish State Museum, vived World War II. Dr. De-
and the old • Jewish sider Gaisky, the president
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cemetery dating back to of the Council of Jewish
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All of these magnificent that there may be as many
sites concentrated be- as 5,000 Jews in Prague and
LENNY
AT THE PIANO BAR
tween the Town Hall and about 15,000 in the country,
RANDALL
MON. THRU SAT.
the majestic Moldau but that the majority refuse
• .
iver at test to a shim!' .
to be identified as Jews.
Gaisky said that Czechos-
lovakia was one of the first
r ♦ IP lip
4i
countries, together with the
►
4
Soviet Union, to vote in the
CONSISTENTLY k
United Nations in support
VOTED
•
of the Jewish state in 1948,
that only the Czechs sent
weapons to the Hagana in
1948, and that soldiers for
4
DETROIT FREE PRESS
the resistance organiza-
IP
DETROIT NEWS
tions were trained near
V
•
CHANNEL
7
Prague.
•
CHANNEL 2
1, •
He claimed that should
AAA
there be peace in the
DETROIT'S MI MI.
Middle East, Czechos-
lovakia would support
SQUARE DEEP DISH PIZZA SINCE 1937
Israel, as it does not pre-
sently. Indeed, there are
frequent diatribes in the
local press condemning
Israel, but Gaisky in-
sisted that the average
Prague citizen is not
anti-Semitic and disliked
the Palestinian students
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in the city rather than
any of its Jewish resi-
dents.
NORTHWESTERN HWY. at MIDDLEBELT, Farmington Hills
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"We are in the same posi-
tion as all the other refl.-
— gious groups, all the differ-
ent churches; if you are a
Jew, it's your own business,
simply a private matter,"
Gaisky said. "No identity
card, passport, census form
or any other application
bears any reference to reli-
gion." With regard to the
government, he pointed out,
there are liberal and flexi-
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ble forces who are more
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sympathetic toward his
community than conserva-
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tive members.
He deals quite effectively
the Ministry of Cul-
tural Affairs and with the
Division of Church Affairs.
It is noteworthy that priests
and rabbis are paid by the
state, and that the Council
of Jewish Communities, in-
cluding the cities of Prague,
Pilsen, Ostrava, Brno and
Usti, derives a substantial
part of its budget from the
government. Another large
benefactor is the American
Jewish Joint Distribution
Committee.
The Prague community
has no rabbi, but Gaisky
announced that a young
man named Daniel Mayer,
who is now completing his
studies at the rabbinical
seminary in Budapest, will
soon become the rabbi of the
Jerusalemska Street
Synagogue. (Only 20 years
ago there were two rabbis in
town.) The Other synagogue
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used for services by Prague
Jews is the early Gothic,
PRAGUE (JTA) — The
ancient city of Prague is a
study in contrasts: baroque
splendor and contemporary
grayness; intellectual
awareness and social re-
gimentation; unparalleled
De Luca
A
# 1
It
■
4
v
Old-New Synagogue, one of
the oldest active
synagogues in the world,
dating back to the 14th Cen-
tury.
Gaisky is very proud of
the kosher restaurant in
his building, which feeds
not only hundreds of
Jews every day, but
many other Czechs be-
sides. His Council also
helps Jews who cannot
live on low government
pensions, and supplies
them with additional
funds to enable them to
survive fairly comforta-
bly.
No visit to this superb city
is complete without an
hour's journey to Terezin,
the largest concentration
camp in Czechoslovakia
during World War II. More
than 140,000 prisoners,
most of them Jewish, and
not only from Czechos-
lovakia, but from other
parts of Europe as well,
passed through it enroute to
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