At least 350 members of the community have died in the UK • In France the Jewish plot has filled up

The start of the closure eases and the gradual reopening of schools, shops and businesses indicates that Israel is in a relatively good position with the rest of the world when it comes to dealing with the outbreak of the Corona virus.

However, in Jewish communities outside of Israel, the epidemic charges a terrible price. Of the global population of 8 million Jews (more than 6.7 million Jews there are in Israel, but less than Israel's total population), the number of dead already reaches thousands, and continues to rise.

Exact data on the number of Jews who died from the virus are not available because governments do not count their Jewish citizens who have died separately from the rest of their lives, and in most places the Jewish community does not have a full account of those who died.

What is clear is that the death rate among Jews is high and unchanged in the Diaspora compared to Israel, and that the virus severely harms the Jewish world. In many places in the world, the rate of infection and death among Jews is much higher than that of the non-Jewish population.

Here is a snapshot of dealing with the Corona virus in Jewish communities around the world:

UK

So far, at least 352 Jews have died in the UK, representing about 1.7% of all dead, in a country where Jews make up only 0.3% of the population. There are some theories that attempt to explain why the mortality rate among Jews is almost six times higher than that of the general public in London, which is the epicenter of the outbreak, their relatively older age, and failure to adhere to social remoteness in the first phase in some ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods.

Among those who died were also Abraham Pinter, one of the most influential rabbis in the ultra-Orthodox Stamford Hill neighborhood in north London, who was the first rabbi in Britain to serve as a city councilor; The philanthropist Irving Carter, one of the great donors of Magen David Adom and Ala, the Israel Disability Association; And Yehuda Yaakov Rapson, Chabad senior rabbi in Leeds.

New York

The New York area has the largest Jewish community outside of Israel, with about two million Jews, including the suburbs of northern New Jersey, Westchester County, and Long Island. The virus has left a trail of destruction in these communities. Haredi media reported more than 700 dead in New York City alone. According to health department statistics, the focus areas where the Corona virus infection rates are highest are largely identified with the Hasidic neighborhoods in the city: Borough Park, Williamsburg, Crown Heights. Meanwhile, the numbers show that the death toll at home in Borough Park and Williamsburg in March and early April was ten times higher than in the same period last year. Most of those deaths are probably the corona virus, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said.

Rabbi Meir Berger, chief operating officer of the Kadisha Society of True Truth in Brooklyn, said the number of Jewish dead has risen fourfold since the start of the global epidemic, and the association has handled 500 funerals a month between Purim and Passover. "It is not in Iran nor in Syria or in videos from all kinds of countries where rows of corpses are seen waiting," he told the New York Times. "This is New York."

Nearly 300,000 people have been tested and found to be positive for the New York state, and more than 17,000 have died. In New York City, whose population numbers 8.5 million, just slightly less than Israel's 9.2 million, more than 12,300 have died. This is a 60-fold higher death rate than the 208 dead in Israel from the 19 cubid virus. Given the severe shortage of tests in the United States, the true infection rate is probably two to three times the verified infection rate, experts say, and the death rate is even higher.

The Parker's Jewish Institute for Health and Rehabilitation, a Long Island Jewish nursing home, reportedly found 179 positive for the virus and at least 57 died, as of mid-April. Nurses reported wearing garbage bags instead of protective pebbles (the institution denied these claims) Returns to the masks due to equipment shortages.

In New Jersey, the state with the second highest infection rate, more than 110,000 of the positive subjects were found, and more than 6,000 deaths were recorded. At least 955 of them were in Bergen County, a Jewish-populated area right across from Manhattan, across the river.

Other areas of the United States

America has more than a million verified cases and more than 56,000 coronary deaths are confirmed. The virus, which began its murderous rampage in New York and several other outbreaks, is now spreading, in part, due to the refusal of some governors and mayors to enforce closure.

In Massachusetts, the state with its third infection rate, two Jewish sheltered housing institutions from the same network, near Boston, reported at least 32 deaths from the Corona virus in mid-April. More than half of the 430 subjects of the virus in nursing homes of this network were found to be positive.

After New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts, the following states with the highest rates of infection are exactly where Jews live: Pennsylvania (including Philadelphia), Illinois (including Chicago), California, Michigan and Florida. In these eight countries, approximately 75% of the Jews live in America, estimated at 7.5 million. The elderly among American Jews is higher than usual. According to a 2018 study, 26 percent of them are over the age of 65, which puts them at greater risk of dying in case of a corona virus infection.

In some states in the United States where governors have begun to reopen business operations, such as Texas, Georgia and South Carolina, synagogues are taking more cautious approach and heed the health authorities' advice to avoid reopening.

Among the American Jews who got rid of the Corona virus: the singer and creator Adam Schlesinger; Rebbe of Noviminsk, Rabbi Jacob Perlow; Brooklyn longtime politician Noah Deer; Stanley Chera, real estate mogul and friend of President Trump who was a pillar of the Jewish community from Syria; Musical producer of Saturday Night Live program Hal Willner; Actor Mark Blum; And sociologist William Helmreich.

Italy

About three weeks after the big outbreak of the Corona virus in Italy began, the Jewish community in the country hit the news on March 16: Mikkela Shyama, one of the Jewish community's leaders in Milan and one of its past members, died of the virus.

As far as is known, about a dozen Italian Jews have died after the virus, which has so far killed 27,000 Italians. The Italian Jewish community turned the community site online into a memorial page for the deceased and found other ways to maintain the community online. In Milan, the community organized food deliveries and medicines for elderly Jews who had to stay in their homes.

About 20,000 Jews live in Italy; The largest community is the community of Rome, followed by Milan and then Florence.

France

France has the largest Jewish community in Europe, and its membership is estimated at 500,000. It is unclear how many of the 23,000 people have died of the Corona virus in the country, but the Jewish plot in Thiais Cemetery, designed to last for years, has filled up in recent weeks and has reached almost full capacity.

Representatives of the Jewish Medical Association, AMIF, told Haaretz that the rate of infection among Jews was probably disproportionately high, perhaps because Purim celebrations served as an arena for spreading the disease and because most French Jews live in Paris or Strasbourg, where the rates of infection are higher than in the rest of the country. .

In March, Joel Margie, a physician and president of the Consistency Organization that manages synagogues, Jewish schools and kosher food in France, gave a radio interview in which he spoke aloud of the hospital intensive care unit with the Jewish radio station Radio J, imploring the community to obey the social remoteness guidelines. Since he was released from the hospital. One of the dead in the Jewish community because of the virus is Andre Tobol, a Chabad rabbi who ran one of the most prestigious schools in France in Paris.

Netherlands

Unlike the rest of Europe, the Netherlands did not order full closure at the onset of the Corona eruption. A Jewish nursing home in Amsterdam, Beit Shalom, which has its own synagogue and community center, and next to it is a sheltered housing center, has taken a similar approach. He stuck to his open-door policy until March 20, even as the infection rate in the country began to climb. As a result, it has become the most severely affected Jewish institution, with 26 reported deaths so far, out of a population of 120 residents.

Now Beit Shalom is closed, and many of its occupants are confined to their rooms. To ease the occupants 'loneliness, a Dutch crane operator company, owned by Israeli-Dutch businessman Doron Livnat, has sent a crane to the center to hoist family members into the tenants' windows so they can visit them without danger to their safety. About 40,000 Jews live in the Netherlands. To date, more than 4,500 deaths have been reported in the country from a population of 17 million.

Morocco

Although there are only 1,500-2,000 Jews living out of a population of 36 million, the community lost a shocking share of its sons - 1%, at least 15 dead - after a wedding in Agadir was reportedly used as an infection site. Among the deceased are also two relatives of Labor leader Amir Peretz. The total number of deceased in Morocco is only 162.

Argentina

About 10 Jews died from the Corona virus in Argentina, out of a total of 200 dead in the entire country. In Argentina, which has about 200,000 Jews, is the largest Jewish community in Latin America. Most of them live in Buenos Aires, which is also the hub of the country. The country, which has a population of 40 million, has been in closure since March 20, which helps keep the infection rate relatively low.