Until

the Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...

Jew Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""Th ...

s were a significant part of the population of

Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russ ...

. Outside

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

, the largest population was in the European part of the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

, especially

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

(1.5 million in the 1930s), but major populations also existed in

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia a ...

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

, and

Czechoslovakia , rue, Чеськословеньско, , yi, טשעכאסלאוואקיי, , common_name = Czechoslovakia , life_span = 1918–19391945–1992 , p1 = Austria-Hungary , image_p1 ...

. Here are lists of some prominent East European Jews, arranged by country of origin. * List of Czech, Bohemian, Moravian, and Slovak Jews *

List of Hungarian Jews This is a list of Hungarian Jews. There has been a Jewish presence in today's Hungary since Roman times (bar a brief expulsion during the Black Death), long before the actual Hungarian nation. Jews fared particularly well under the Ottoman E ...

List of Polish Jews From the Middle Ages until the Holocaust, Polish Jews comprised an appreciable part of Poland's population. The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, known for its Warsaw Confederation, religious toleranceHugh Redwald Trevor-Roper, ''From Counter- ...

List of Romanian Jews This is a list of Romanian Jews who are or were Jewish or of Jewish ancestry. Academics * Aaron Aaronsohn, botanist * J. J. Benjamin, historian * Martin Bercovici, energy engineer * Randolph L. Braham, political scientist, historian * Nicolae Ca ...

List of Belarusian Jews Presented below are lists of notable Belarusians of Jewish descent, Jewish people born on the territory of present-day Belarus or of full or partial Belarusian Jewish origin. Scientists * Zhores Alferov, physicist, Nobel Prize (2000), born in ...

List of Ukrainian Jews Presented below are lists of famous or notable Ukrainian people of Jewish descent and other Jews born in the territory of present-day Ukraine, before 20 century borderland region in Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (later in Russian Partition a ...

List of Jews born in the former Russian Empire :''This List of Jews contains individuals who, in accordance with Wikipedia's verifiability and no original research policies, have been identified as Jews by reliable sources.'' The following is a list of Jews born in the territory of the for ...

(and the former

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

)

Azerbaijan

Max Black Max Black (24 February 1909 – 27 August 1988) was an Azerbaijani-born British-American philosopher who was a leading figure in analytic philosophy in the years after World War II. He made contributions to the philosophy of language, the philo ...

, philosopher *

Misha Black Sir Misha Black (16 October 1910 – 11 October 1977) was a British-Azerbaijani architect and designer. In 1933 he founded with associates in London the organisation that became the Artists' International Association. In 1943, with Milner Gray ...

, designer; brother of Max Black *

Bella Davidovich Bella Mikhaylovna Davidovich (Бэлла Миха́йловна Давидо́вич; born July 16, 1928) is a Soviet-born American pianist. Biography Davidovich was born in Baku, Azerbaijan SSR, into a Jewish family of musicians and began studyi ...

, pianist *

Gavril Abramovich Ilizarov Gavriil Abramovich Ilizarov (russian: Гавриил Абрамович Илизаров; 15 June 1921 – 24 July 1992) was a Soviet physician, known for inventing the Ilizarov apparatus for lengthening limb bones and for the method of surgery n ...

, Soviet physician, known for inventing the Ilizarov apparatus *

Garry Kasparov Garry Kimovich Kasparov (born 13 April 1963) is a Russian chess grandmaster, former World Chess Champion, writer, political activist and commentator. His peak rating of 2851, achieved in 1999, was the highest recorded until being surpassed by ...

, world chess champion of

jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

armenian Armenian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia * Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent ** Armenian Diaspora, Armenian communities across the ...

descent *

Lev Landau Lev Davidovich Landau (russian: Лев Дави́дович Ланда́у; 22 January 1908 – 1 April 1968) was a Soviet- Azerbaijani physicist of Jewish descent who made fundamental contributions to many areas of theoretical physics. His a ...

, physicist, Nobel Prize (1962) *

Lev Nussimbaum Lev Nussimbaum (October 17, 1905 – August 27, 1942), who wrote under the pen names Essad Bey and Kurban Said, was a writer and journalist, born in Kiev to a Jews, Jewish family. He lived there and in Baku during his childhood before fleeing th ...

, writer (a.k.a. Kurban Said) * Vladimir Rokhlin, mathematician

Moldova (formerly Bessarabia)

{{See also, Bessarabian Jews, Moldovan Jews, Israeli people of Moldovan descent * Lev Simonovich Berg, geographer & zoologist * Jacob Bernstein-Kogan * Gary Bertini, conductor * Bronfman family ** Samuel Bronfman, founder of Seagram * Samuel Cohen, composer of Hatikvah *

I. A. L. Diamond I. A. L. Diamond (born Ițec (Itzek) Domnici; June 27, 1920 – April 21, 1988) was a Moldovan–American screenwriter, best known for his collaborations with Billy Wilder. Life and career Diamond was born in Ungheni, Iași County, Bessarabia, R ...

, comedy writer * Meir Dizengoff, politician * Giora Feidman, musician * William F. Friedman, cryptographer * A. N. Frumkin, electrochemist *

Mikhail Gershenzon Mikhail Osipovich Gershenzon (russian: Михаи́л О́сипович Гершензо́н) ( Kishinev, - Moscow, 19 February 1925) was a Russian scholar, essayist and editor. He studied history, philosophy, and political science at Moscow ...

, historian *

Bianna Golodryga Bianna Vitalievna Golodryga (Russian: Бианна Витальевна Голодрыга; Romanian: Bianna Golodrîga) born June 15, 1978) is a Moldovan-born American journalist and news anchor who is currently serving as a senior global affair ...

, journalist * Nachum Gutman, painter * Idel Ianchelevici, sculptor * Mona May Karff, chess player *

Boris Katz Boris Katz (born October 5, 1947) is a principal American research scientist (computer scientist) at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge and head of the Labora ...

, artificial intelligence researcher * Gary Koshnitsky, chess player * Abba Ptachya Lerner, economist * Avigdor Lieberman, politician * Oleg Maisenberg, concert pianist * Lewis Milestone, director *

Sigmund Mogulesko Sigmund Mogulesko (16 December 1858 – 4 February 1914) — Yiddish: זעליק מאָגולעסקאָ ''Zelik Mogulesko'', first name also sometimes spelled as Zigmund, Siegmund, Zelig, or Selig, last name sometimes spelled Mogulescu &m ...

, singer, actor, composer *

Sacha Moldovan Sacha Moldovan (''Shaya Shnayder''; November 4, 1901 – 1982) was a Russian-born American expressionist and post-impressionist painter. Biography Born to a Jewish family in Kishinev, Bessarabia (in Imperial Russia), where his parents Gd ...

, painter *

Moishe Oysher Moishe Oysher () (March 8, 1906 – November 27, 1958) was an American cantor, recording artist, and film and Yiddish theatre actor.Zalmen Zylbercweig, ''Leksikon fun Yidishn teater'', Book 3, 2407. During the 1940s and 1950s he was one of the to ...

, Yiddish singer *

Boris Polak Boris Polak (בוריס פולק; born July 15, 1954) is an Israeli former world champion and Olympic sport shooter. Personal life Polak is Jewish and was born in Moldova, in 1954. He made ''aliyah'' (immigrated to Israel) with his family from Al ...

(born 1954), Israeli world champion and Olympic sport shooter * Mendel Portugali, An Hashomer founder * Sir Michael Postan, historian * Anton Rubinstein, pianist *

Joseph ben Yehuda Leib Shapotshnick Rabbi Joseph Shapotshnick (; 1882–1937) was a Jewish social activist in early-20th century London. Biography Shapotshnick was born in Kishinev. Shapotshnick's father, Yehuda Leib Shapotshnick, was a Hasidic leader in Kishinev, known as the B ...

, rabbi * Volodia Teitelboim * Andy Zaltzman, British comedian *

Mark Zeltser Mark Efimovich Zeltser (born 8 April 1947) is a Soviet-born American pianist. Biography Zeltser was born in Kishinev in 1947. His mother Bertha was a concert pianist and teacher.Nancy Beth JacksonWhen the Keyboard Won't Wait, an Instant Score 15 ...

, concert pianist * Meir Zorea, general in the Israel Defense Forces

Slovakia

* Joseph Goldberger, discovered cure for pellagra * Juraj Herz, actor and film director * Ignác Kolisch, chess player * Peter Lorre, actor * Robert Maxwell, media mogul * Ivan Reitman, film director *

Richard Réti Richard Selig Réti (28 May 1889 – 6 June 1929) was an Austro-Hungarian, later Czechoslovakian, chess player, chess author, and composer of endgame studies. He was one of the principal proponents of hypermodernism in chess. With the exc ...

, chess player * Herman Steiner, chess player *

Rudolf Vrba Rudolf "Rudi" Vrba (born Walter Rosenberg; 11 September 1924 – 27 March 2006) was a Slovak-Jewish biochemist who, as a teenager in 1942, was deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp in Occupation of Poland (1939–1945), German-occup ...

, coauthor of the

Vrba–Wetzler report The Vrba–Wetzler report is one of three documents that comprise what is known as the ''Auschwitz Protocols'', otherwise known as the Auschwitz Report or the Auschwitz notebook. It is a 33-page eye-witness account of the Auschwitz concentration ...

, chemist * Alfred Wetzler, writer