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JewishHistoryעברית

Novi Sad raid

Date
21 January 1942 – 23 January 1942Hebrew date: 3rd of Sh’vat, 5702 – 5th of Sh’vat, 5702
Location
Novi Sad (Újvidék) and the Bačka regionSerbia
Then part of
Kingdom of Hungary
Perpetrators
  • Hungarian army units (Military)
Killed (estimate)
600 – 2,500[1]Jews killed in the January 1942 raids. Yad Vashem states that 800 Jews and 500 Serbs were murdered in Novi Sad on 21–23 January, and that by 23 January more than 5,000 people in the Bačka district, half of them Jews, had been murdered. USHMM's Hungary article gives about 1,000 Jews and 2,500 Serbs killed in the Bačka raids. USHMM's Yugoslavia article gives around 600 Jews and 2,500 Serbs shot in Novi Sad.
Country

0.073% – 0.34% of the Jewish population of Kingdom of Hungary (c. 1941)[45]

Worldwide

0.0036% – 0.015% of the worldwide Jewish population (c. 1939)[4]

Category
Massacre, Pogrom
Confidence
DisputedFor Novi Sad city, Yad Vashem gives 800 Jews killed and USHMM's Yugoslavia article gives around 600. For the wider Bačka raids, USHMM's Hungary article gives about 1,000 Jews; Yad Vashem's district figure of more than 5,000 dead, half Jews, implies about 2,500. The range covers city versus region.

Summary

Hungarian forces occupied Novi Sad in April 1941 after the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia. On 21–23 January 1942, Hungarian army units, citing partisan activity, sealed the city and took Jews and Serbs from their homes to killing pits and the frozen Danube. Yad Vashem records 800 Jews murdered in the city those three days. Hungarian courts later tried officers for the massacre; some escaped to Germany and returned in 1944.

Sources

  1. Hungarian policemen and soldiers standing over murdered Jews in Novi-Sad, 23 January 1942. Yad Vashem
  2. The Holocaust in Hungary. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  3. Axis Invasion of Yugoslavia. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia

Jewish population (estimates)

  • Worldwide: 16,500,000 – 16,633,675[4]c. 1939DellaPergola's revised core estimate for 1 January 1939 is 16.5 million. The American Jewish Year Book 1948–49 compiled 16,633,675 at the end of 1939.
  • Kingdom of Hungary: 725,007 – 825,007[45]c. 1941Greater Hungary after the 1938–1941 annexations. USHMM Hungary article: 1941 census counted 725,007 people who identified as Jews (about 325,000 of them in annexed territories), plus about 100,000 more counted as racially Jewish under the Second Jewish Law; Losses table lists 825,007 for "Hungary (borders of 1941)."

Sources for population estimates

  1. Sergio DellaPergola, World Jewish Population, 2024. American Jewish Year Book 2024, via Berman Jewish DataBank (2025)
  2. Sergio DellaPergola, Notes toward a Demographic History of the Jews. Genealogy 8(1) (2024)
  3. Jewish Population of Europe in 1933. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  4. Jewish Population of the World. American Jewish Year Book 1948–1949, via Berman Jewish Policy Archive (1949)
  5. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Voluntary Conversions and Diaspora: A Human Capital Interpretation of Jewish History. American Economic Association annual meeting paper (2007)
  6. Jews in the USSR (1926–1959). Demographic Changes. JewishGen Belarus SIG (table compiled from the 1939 All-Union census)
  7. Mandate for Palestine. Report of the Mandatory to the League of Nations (Palestine Administration, 1922). United Nations UNISPAL (British mandatory report) (1922)
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  9. The Contagion of Violence. 1391 and the Jews of the Spanish Kingdoms. Palgrave / Springer chapter (preview) (2021)
  10. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Religious Norms, Human Capital, and Money Lending in Jewish European History. Handbook chapter PDF via zvi-eckstein.com
  11. Sergio DellaPergola, Some Fundamentals of Jewish Demographic History. Berman Jewish Policy Archive (PDF) (2001)
  12. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, THE CHOSEN FEW: HOW EDUCATION SHAPED JEWISH HISTORY, 70–1492 (book summary). Bar-Ilan University Economics seminar PDF (Princeton University Press forthcoming summary)
  13. Joseph Jacobs, Statistics. Jewish Encyclopedia (1906)
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  20. Sergio DellaPergola, World Jewish Population, 2024. American Jewish Year Book 2024, via Berman Jewish DataBank / Israel CBS host (2025)
  21. Sergio DellaPergola, Demographic Trends in Israel and Palestine: Prospects and Policy Implications. American Jewish Year Book 2003, via Berman Jewish DataBank (2003)
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  23. US Jewish Population Pocket Demographics 2.0. Berman Jewish DataBank / Jewish Federations of North America (2018)
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  29. Robin R. Mundill, The Jews under Edward I (PhD thesis). University of St Andrews
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  31. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Appendix A: Sources and Methodology for Section 2 (Jewish and total population in Germany-Austria and Poland-Lithuania). Authors' appendix PDF (citing Weinryb, Stampfer, Kupovetsky, Guggenheim, Toch, Battenberg, Israel) (2018)
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  33. Jews in Arab Countries. American Jewish Year Book excerpt, Berman Jewish Policy Archive (1978)
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  37. Davis Trietsch, Die Juden der Türkei. Länder und Völker der Türkei, Heft 8 (Leipzig) (1915)
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  41. Yitzhak Arad, “Operation Reinhard” | Death Camps of Belzec, Sobibor & Treblinka. Yad Vashem
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  43. Bulgaria. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
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  46. France. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  47. Belgium. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  48. Norway. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  49. Denmark. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  50. Greece. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  51. Lithuania. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  52. German Jews during the Holocaust, 1939–1945. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  53. Statistics of Jews (World and US Jewish Population). American Jewish Year Book 1946–1947, via Berman Jewish DataBank (1947)
  54. Jacqueline Shields, Jewish Refugees from Arab Countries. Jewish Virtual Library
  55. Lebanon Virtual Jewish History Tour. Jewish Virtual Library
  56. Jewish Populations in the Arab World. Jewish Virtual Library (citing Sergio DellaPergola, World Jewish Population, 2021 / AJYB 2023)
  57. Algeria (Vital Statistics). Jewish Encyclopedia (1906)
  58. Archives juives n°45/2 — Les Juifs d'Algérie. Archives Juives / Les Belles Lettres (2012)
  59. EHRI Country Report — Tunisia. European Holocaust Research Infrastructure
  60. Leon Shapiro, World Jewish Population. American Jewish Year Book 1981 (estimates for 1979), via Berman Jewish DataBank (1981)
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  62. Sara Koplik, The Demise of the Jewish Community in Afghanistan, 1933–1952. SOAS University of London (PhD thesis abstract / deposit page) (2001)
  63. Argentina Virtual Jewish History Tour. Jewish Virtual Library
  64. All-Union 1959 census — ethnic composition of the USSR. Demoscope Weekly (РГАЭ РФ fond 1562)
  65. All-Union 1959 census — ethnic composition of the Uzbek SSR. Demoscope Weekly (РГАЭ РФ fond 1562)