Haapalah / Aliyah Bet

Antwerpen
Antwerpn
Antwerp
Anvers

In 1261, Henry III, Duke of Brabant and Margrave of Antwerp, expressed his wish that the Jews of Brabant should be expelled, and destroyed because they were all considered usurers.

In the mid 14th century, John III, Duke of Brabant, conducted a massive anti-Jewish campaign in Brussels and Leuven, and drove the Jews from the city.

In the early 16th century, Jewish immigrants began to settle in Antwerpen, a relatively safe haven for crypto-Jews fleeing persecution and expulsion from Spain and Portugal.

In 1794, with the arrival of the French Revolution, for the first time, Jews were allowed to settle freely in Antwerpen.

On September 21, 1832, the first public synagogue in Antwerpen opened on Paardenmarkt 83.
In 1846, the synagogue was closed, and the community opened a new one on the Grote Pieter Potstraat in the building of an old church, built in 1433 and turned into a warehouse from 1802 to 1846.
In 1898, a second Jewish community was organized by the Portuguese Jews of Antwerpen, which has since been known as the Jewish Community of Portuguese Rite.
In 1892, the third Jewish community known as Machsike Hadas was organized by Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, and in 1918, they opened their synagogue was opened on Oostenstraat.

In May 1940, Antwerpen was occupied by Germany.
On the eve of the Holocaust, Antwerpen was home to 53.8% the Jews in Belgium, about 29,500 persons, more than half were of Polish nationality, concentrated around the main railroad station, the first place in Belgium where round-ups of Jews were conducted.
The majority of the Jews of Antwerpen fled to other regions in Belgium and to France.
In October, 1940, the Germans introduced a long series of anti-Jewish measures, and 13,000 Jews were registered in a special Judenregister; they were forbidden to leave their homes from evening till morning, enter public parks, and Jewish owned businesses were marked with signs in Flemish, French and German.
Between December, 1940, and February, 1941, more than 3,000 Jewish immigrants who had entered Belgium after 1938, were deported at the order of the German Army from Antwerpen to the Belgian province of Limbourg.

On April 14, 1941, the Antwerpen Pogrom was organized against the Jews of Antwerpen by local pro-Nazi groups, especially the Vlaams Nationaal Verbond, De Vlag, and De Algemeene SS-Vlaanderen, with the aid of the German forces..
200 Flemish Nazi supporters looted Van den Nestlei and the Oostenstraat synagogues, and burned two synagogues in the Oostenstraat.

In May, 1942, all Jews were compelled to bear the yellow-star badge.
In May-September 1942, 1500 Jewish men from Antwerpen were transferred to forced labor in Northern France, to build the Atlantic Wall for the Todt organisation.
On Friday night, August 28, 1942, most of the Jews in Antwerpen were arrested and deported, and the remaining Jews who held Belgian citizenship or belonged to the Judenrat, established in November 1941 as the Association des Juifs en Belgique AJB, were arrested on September 4, 1943.
On three occasions, from the end of July until November 1942, Jews in Antwerpen were rounded up by the Nazis, with the collaboration of the local police.

On September 4, 1944, Antwerpen was liberated by the British 11th Armoured Division.
From a community of around 35,000 Jews in Antwerpen, before the war, about 15,000 remained in the city after 1945.

On July 22, 1955, HMS Empire Lifeguard HMS Maiden Castle was scrapped, in Antwerpen.