History of the Jews in Makhachkala

Makhachkala Jews
יהודי מחצ'קלה
Махачкалинские евреи

Total population
300–430
Languages
Hebrew (in Israel), Judeo-Tat, Russian
Religion
Judaism
Related ethnic groups
Mountain Jews, Ashkenazi Jews.

The Jewish community of Makhachkala are Jews who have ever lived on the territory of modern Makhachkala, a city in the Russian Republic of Dagestan. During the Persian campaign in 1722 in Makhachkala was a camp for the troops of the Russian Emperor Peter I. Mountain Jews and Ashkenazi Jews were allowed to settle there.

History

Makhachkala Synagogue. 2022.

Khazars

During the era of the Khazars Khanate, near Makhachkala in the village of Tarki, there was a Khazars settlement. Many Khazar scholars believe that the capital of the Khazar Khanate, the city of Samandar, was located on the site of Makhachkala. According to Ibn Hawqal, in the city of Samandar back in the 10th century there lived Jews who had their own synagogues.

Russian empire

In 1862, the first synagogue was built in the city, in which both Ashkenazi Jews and merchants Mountain Jews prayed there (including 61 artisans and 20 soldiers of the local garrison).

• The city's rabbi in the 1860s was Rabbi Benjamin ben Rabi.
• In 1880, 93 Mountain Jews lived here.
• In 1886, ethnographer Ilya Anisimov registered 15 Jewish families consisting of 123 people. There was a Jewish school in the city. Jews owned 4 manufacturing shops and 7 grocery stores.
• In 1890, there were 143-230 Jews living in the city.
• In 1895 there were 436 Jews. There were 2 synagogues.
• According to the 1897 census, 97 thousand inhabitants lived in the district, among them 2,795 were Jews. Makhachkala (Petrovsk) had 9,753 inhabitants, of which 563 were Jews (5.8%).
• In 1899 there were 739 Jews here. There was a school at the synagogue (9 male students). The rabbi of the Ashkenazim was Abram Movshovich Lozner, the rabbi of the Mountain Jews was Morduchai Iliazarov.
• In 1910, 379 Jews lived (11.8%), there were 3 synagogues, a Jewish cemetery, and a Jewish public elementary school.
• In 1912, 453 Mountain Jews lived in Makhachkala.
• In 1914, a men's gymnasium was established.
• In 1917, the group "Kings of Zion" was organized.

Soviet Union

• In 1919, the "House of the Jewish People" opened, in which work was carried out among the youth of Mountain and Ashkenazi Jews.
• In the 1920s, a "Judeo-Tat" school operated in the city (the director until the 2nd half of the 1920s was Rabbi Meir Rafailov), and a drama club for Mountain Jews. At the same time, in the 1920s, during the Soviet Union, 2 synagogues were closed.
• In 1925, there were 222 Jewish.
• In 1926, 3,481 Jews lived in the city (including 2,050 Mountain Jews), approximately 11% of the population of Makhachkala.

Also in 1926, a Jewish pogrom took place in Makhachkala, provoked by a blood libel. In the fall of that year, a rumor spread in several villages of Dagestan that supposedly Mountain Jews had killed a Muslim boy (or two) for some "ritual purposes." The angry mob organized several pogroms in Makhachkala, Derbent and other populated areas of Dagestan.

• In 1930, a viticultural artel named after Joseph Stalin operated (about 26 farms, including 22 farms of Mountain Jews).
• In 1939, 1,930 Jews lived in the city.
• In 1959, there were 2,692 Jews, including 1,900 Mountain Jews (1.6% of the city's population).
• In 1970, 5,213 Jews (including 1,684 Mountain Jews) and 4 Karaites lived in the city. That year, the synagogue building in Makhachkala was requisitioned, and the community was given a smaller building on the outskirts of the city.
• In 1971, Bobi Iosifovich Ashurov was appointed rabbi.
• In 1979, 4,226 Jews lived in the city.

Russia

• From 1980 to 2016, Shimi Migirovich Dibiyaev (1928−2021) headed the Jewish community of Makhachkala, since 2008 he was the chairman of the Council of Jewish Communities of the Republic of Dagestan, and since 2015 he held the post of honorary chairman of the council.
• In 2016, Valery Shimievich Dibiyaev was elected chairman of the Jewish community of Makhachkala and the chairman of the Council of Jewish Communities of the Republic of Dagestan.
• In the late 1990s, a Jewish Sunday school was opened.

During the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria in 1998−1999, several representatives of the Jewish community were kidnapped for ransom. Many Jews of Makhachkala left for Israel and other countries and regions.

• In 2002, according to the census, there were 430 Jews in the city (0.08%), there were 61 Mountain Jews (0.01%), and 417 Muslim Tats (0.08%).
• On the night of December 24, 2007, in Makhachkala, anti-Semites broke the windows in the synagogue building. Anti-Semites also desecrated a Jewish cemetery and distributed anti-Jewish leaflets in the 2000s.
• In the 2020s, the city had a synagogue, a Jewish cultural center, a Sunday school, and a club for older people. The size of the community, according to some sources, ranges from 300 to 430 Jews.

Amidst the 2023 Hamas-Israel war, a group waving Palestinian flags and chanting anti-semitic slogans forcefully entered the Makhachkala airport, looking for Israeli and Jewish travelers arriving on a flight from Tel Aviv. The incident resulted in about 20 injuries, as reported by local health authorities. Passports of some passengers were scrutinized by the crowd.

During the attack in Dagestan on 23 June 2024, Makhachkala's synagogue was set on fire by armed gunmen, possibly affiliated with ISIS.

Notable Jews of Makhachkala

• Eduard Akuvaev (1945-2015), artist
• Hizgil Avshalumov (1913-2001), novelist, poet, playwright
• Mishi Bakhshiev (1910-1972), writer and poet
• Mark Eliyahu, musician
• Iosif Prigozhin, music producer
• Eduard Puterbrot (1940-1993), artist
• Anatoly Yagudaev (1935-2014), sculptor
• Gavril Yushvaev, businessman and investor

See also

• Judeo-Tat
• Judeo-Tat literature
• Judeo-Tat Theatre
• Mountain Jews
• Makhachkala Synagogue
• Judaism in Dagestan