In the 1920’s, Zhmerinka had over 5000 Jews and nine synagogues. During World War II, the few thousand remaining Jews were concentrated within a ghetto, hundreds on this street. Many were forced laborers at Zhmerinka’s industrial hub - its railway station. The Rumanians, allied with the Nazis, controlled Zhmerinka during the War and sent 2000 Jews from the Zhmerinka ghetto to the Germans to appease Hitler and maintain control over the region.

Today, the railroad tracks are eerily quiet. The good news is that the station, still Zhmerinka’s biggest business, employs a Jewish President. Most of the 280 remaining Jews are elderly. One young man reported that there were five fellow Jews with him in his fifth grade class, but by his high school graduation, there were none left. There may be only two dozen Jews under 30 left in Zhmerinka. Nonetheless, since the community was reestablished in 1994, people have become more involved. Community meetings draw 75 people at the town’s grandest building - the “State Cultural Center,” a former synagogue. The leaders work toward the restitution of one of their former synagogues, which they hope to open in the next several years with foreign assistance. It will be the first functioning synagogue in Zhmerinka since the Communists shut down the last one in 1960.

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