Albania

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Jews likely arrived in Albania in the year 70 C.E. and were later joined by Jews from Greece and Spain. Albania proved to be hospitable to Jews where they experienced little anti-Semitism throughout the centuries. Before the Holocaust, as circumstances in other parts of Europe grew worse for Jews, over a thousand Jews moved to Albania from other countries, including Austria, Yugoslavia, Germany, and Serbia. During the Holocaust, though some were deported to the Nazi death camps, Albanian partisans worked to keep the majority of the Jewish population there safe. By the end of the war, about 2000 Jews remained in the country.

Today the country’s Jewish population is virtually non-existent, consisting of a mere 40 or 50 individuals out of a total population of 2.87 million. The few remaining Albanian Jews live in the capital city of Tirana, where the Heichal Shlomo Synagogue is operated by a Chabad rabbi.

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