History of the Jews in Montenegro

The decision on forming a formal community was made in June 2011 at the home of Mrs. Đina Lazar in Herceg Novi.

Since its registration, the leadership of the Community, headed by Jaso Alfandari as president and Djordje Raičević as vice-president, managed to provide the basic funds for financing unobstructed work, the necessary business premises, its maintenance, as well as organizing modest celebrations of all holidays starting from the arrival of the new 5772, through Hanukkah, Purim, Pesah and the ceremonial Seder evening organized on this occasion.

[2] In 2017, Los Angeles-born Rabbi Ari Edelkopf of the Chabad Hasidic movement settled in the capital city Podgorica with the mission of promoting Judaism among the country's few Jews, as well as providing assistance to Jewish visitors to Montenegro.

Their first traces appear in the ancient Duklja, whose ruins are located in the immediate vicinity of the center of Podgorica, the capital of today's Montenegro.

This very important urban center of the Roman province Prevalitane, which in its zenith counted over 70,000 inhabitants in its necropolises, reveals the grave places that archaeologists have established that they belonged to the Jews, which is not at all odd if one takes into account the size and importance of Duklja as military, commercial and administrative center until its destruction in a devastating earthquake.

Most of this Jewish life belonged to the Sephardim who came from Spain and Portugal across Bosnia or directly from Constantinople to the early 16th century.

[5] Famous Czech medieval Lenka Blehova Čelebič recently published a pioneering work entitled "Traces of the Jews in Bay of Kotor", in which she emphasized the influence of the Jews for the development of trade in these areas, stating that in many trading deals, they were at the same level as the merchants from Dubrovnik.

After the wars with Napoleon and the occupation of the Boka and part of today's Montenegrin coast that was under Austrian territory, and later Austro-Hungarian, later on again, representatives of the Jewish nation appeared again.

The exact number of Jews who live and work in Montenegro today is difficult to determine because it is mostly about mixed marriages.

[1] Montenegro is one of a select few countries and the only one in the region where there is an enviable inter-religious and inter-faith fund and there is no public manifestation of antisemitism and general negative attitude towards the Jewish people and the state of Israel.