ABSTRACT
The Romanian fascist movement built itself upon the foundation of the Judeo-Bolshevism myth, a combination of the structural antisemitism of Eastern Europe with anti-Bolshevism, and identified a communist in every Jew. This chapter argues that in interwar Romania, the structural antisemitism of the Romanian society determined the political radicalization of the Jewish youth, who became either communist or Zionist or a combination of both. Communism was for many a refuge from economic, ethnic, and religious discrimination. The structural antisemitism put some Jews on a communist path – how many is still a matter of debate. They soon discovered that the Communist Party was not the bulwark they had hoped for against the form of antisemitism embraced by the Romanian fascist movement. The Romanian Communist Party promoted a constant but selective pro-minorities agenda, ignoring exactly the discrimination the Jews endured for centuries. Disappointed with the selective anti-fascism the radical left supported, the politically disoriented young Jews decided to go into exile, where they became involved in the anti-fascist resistance in France, the French colonies, Spain, China, and the Soviet Union. This chapter follows the life trajectories of five Jewish-Romanian activists, arguing that their communist commitment was rather loose and that they fought fascism from an anti-fascist platform. It demonstrates that in interwar Romania, anti-fascism was primarily a reaction of the Jews and, to a lesser extent, non-Jews to antisemitism perceived as a form of ethnic and religious discrimination.
