Hungary Celebrates Birth Of Israel, Budapest
By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
BUDAPEST (Worthy News) – Representatives of Israel and Hungary have launched programs to remember the 150th birth anniversary of the city of Budapest and further encourage a Jewish revival here. They also joined the European Days of Jewish Culture underway in Hungary’s capital and alluded to the birth of Israel 75 years ago.
Opening the seven-month event dubbed “150 Years of Jewish Budapest,” Mayor Gergely Karácsony said Sunday that the 150th anniversary marks more than the unification of the regions of Pest, Buda, and Óbuda into one city.
He stressed that the anniversary is also about integrating Jewish and other cultures.
“Budapest was born out of the notion of Hungarianess and Europeaness, and this allowed Jews and Christians to coexist in this city,” the mayor explained. “Budapest will remain a city of bonds and diversity on which multi-colored palette Jewish culture is one of the nicest colors,” he stressed at a ceremony.
Yacov Hadas-Handelsman, the ambassador of Israel and chief patron of the event, noted “a large Jewish community thriving” in Budapest and Hungary.
About 100,000 Jews, probably more, currently reside in Hungary, primarily in Budapest, including Holocaust survivors, according to U.S. and Jewish estimates.
20 SYNAGOGUES
Nearly 80 years after the end of World War Two, in which some 600,000 Hungarian Jews died, including many from Budapest, Hadas-Handelsman observed that Hungary “has 20 synagogues in the capital”.
The Jewish prayer houses include the Dohány Street Synagogue, the largest synagogue in Europe and the second largest in the world after the Temple Emanu-El in New York City.
Budapest’s seventh district, the site of the Nazi-era Ghetto where tens of thousands of Jews were crammed, is once again a Jewish district where synagogues, kosher restaurants, and other Jewish places compete for attention.
Additionally, Hungary hosts several (Jewish) cultural institutions across the country, the Israeli ambassador noted.
He also said that the “programs this year celebrate not only the 150th anniversary of Budapest but also the 75th birth anniversary of Israel.”
Thousands of Hungarian survivors of the Holocaust, or Shoah in Hebrew, left for Israel after the war.
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