Kurt Metzger (German, 1909-1992)
Rundschreiben Rabbinatsbezirk
(Trans. Circular of the Rabbinic district of Landau/Pfalz)
1936
Landau, Pfalz, Bezirksrabbinat Landau/Pfalz
From the Isser and Rae Price Library of Judaica

This newsletter produced in the district of Landau – just four pages in length – is a special issue commemorating the 70th birthday of a prominent Jewish leader in the Jewish regional associations, Albert Joseph. On the second page, an article under the title Standhaftigkeit (steadfastness) by S. Muller in Heidelberg discusses the current situation for Germany Jewry in the country, the region and in Landau. The third page lists notices, anniversaries and news items. The final page provides a Jewish calendar, a book review, and personal news bulletins. The Jewish community of Landau, which numbered over 800 at the end of the 19th century, had dwindled to just over 500 by 1933 and started to decline even further following a reign of terror in which gangs of Nazis assaulted locals, damaged their property and forced them to parade through the streets wearing obscene posters. Jewish firms and firms in which Jewish funds were invested were all boycotted after 1935, and in 1938, the severe situation for Landau Jewry resulted in an emergency assembly of 35 community representatives convened under the chairmanship of Rabbi Kurt Metzger, the editor of this newsletter. That same year, Metzger was arrested in Breslau and sent to Buchenwald concentration camp. Metzger survived the Holocaust and eventually made his way to America where he served as the Rabbi to the Glen Falls community in New York. In 1940, the 89 Jewish people remaining in Landau were deported to the Gurs concentration camp. A record of this newsletter is not found at any other institution.