Sarata Jewish Cemetery

There is almost no information on the Jewish cemetery of Sarata. It is marked on the Yizkor book memory map of Sarata, which shows the town’s interwar location. According to data from the Jewish Preservation Committee expedition of 1994, the last burial at this cemetery took place in 1950. The post-WWII Jewish population of Sarata used the municipal cemetery.

The first mention of the Jewish community in Sarata dates back to the mid-19th century. In the early 20th century, 150 Jewish families settled in Sarata. Most of them rented houses. The Jewish community owned stalls and was engaged in commerce and agriculture. In the 1920s, the community built a Beit Ha-Am, which served as a synagogue on the great holidays, and in which various Zionist activities were carried out. Theatre groups performed Yiddish plays there as well. Some Jews owned private libraries. The Zionist youth movements Beitar and Gordonia were active until Sarata’s occupation by the Soviets in 1940. In 1930, the Jewish population numbered 316 (12% of the total population). Antisemitic propaganda spread during the 1930s among local Germans. The Jewish population of the town was decimated during the Holocaust. In 2005, a small number of Jews were living in Sarata.