Eastern Galicia refers to the heartland of the medieval Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia, currently spread over the provinces of Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, and Ternopil in modern western Ukraine. Along with Poles and Ukrainians, Jews were one of the three largest ethnic groups in Eastern Galicia with almost 900,000 people by 1910. From the late 18th century until the early 20th century, eastern Galicia had the largest concentration of Jews of any region in Europe.Israel Bartal, Antony Polonsky. (1999). Focusing on Galicia: Jews, Poles, and Ukrainians, 1772–1918. Littman Library of Jewish Civilization
Under Austria (later Austria-Hungary) during 1795–1918 In 1795, Poland was divided between Russia, Prussia and Austria. Eastern Galicia became a part of Austria. Relations between Jews and Ukrainians were much more peaceful on the Austrian side of the post-1795 border than they were in the territories east of the Zbruch river that had become a part of Russia. The multiple pogroms that occurred in Russian-ruled Ukraine did not spread across the border into Galicia. Whatever anti-Jewish political agitation existed in Galicia was limited to Polish political parties operating in areas where not many Ukrainians lived.Frank Golczewski. (2008) Sheds of Grey: Reflection on Jewish-Ukrainian and German-Ukrainian relations in Galicia. In Ray Brandon, Wendy Lower (Eds.). The Shoah in Ukraine: history, testimony, memorialization. Indiana University Press: pp. 117–129
The national agitation that emerged among the Ukrainian community in the second half of the 19th century was anti-Polish and anti-Jewish in nature. Such was the nature of the newspaper , founded in 1879, that in its very first issue it declared that Ukrainians in Galicia have "two terrible enemies: one of them is the clever Jew, who sucks our blood and gnaws our flesh; the other is the haughty Pole, who is after both our body and soul." In 1881, Batkivshchyna praised the anti-Jewish pogroms happening in Russian Ukraine as being directed against exploitation and truly Cossack in spirit, but advised against organizing them in Galicia, since in the end only Jews gain from them.
Jews in Eastern Galicia were more likely to cooperate with Poles than Ukrainians, due to the superior political role of Poles, fear of pogroms by the mainly Ukrainian peasantry, and historically good relations between the Polish landed gentry and the Jewish community. Assimilation into Polish culture was also much higher than into Ukrainian culture, especially in 1880s. In the Austrian census of 1900, in which Yiddish could not be given, 77% of Jews gave Polish as their language of intercourse, 17% gave German, and only 5% gave Ukrainian.
Thus, while in the first election of 1873, Jewish assimilationists and Conservatives with pro-German views formed a joint bloc with Ukrainians, in the elections of 1879 and 1885 Jews formed an alliance with Poles. Jewish candidates ran on Polish lists and entered the in parliament. In the 1907 elections, Jews, specifically Zionists, after introduction of the universal manhood suffrage, allied themselves again with the Ukrainians. As a result, the Ukrainian national movement in Galicia opposed the Jews as allies of the Polish nobility.
Another pattern of conflicts was the economic competition. During the mid to late nineteenth century, Ukrainian community organizations created cooperatives and credit unions in which Ukrainians (mostly peasants) pooled their resources to buy and sell products collectively, without middlemen, and to obtain loans at low interest. Because the professions of moneylending and shopkeeping had traditionally been Jewish vocations in Galicia, the cooperative movement – whose focus was on keeping Ukrainian capital within the Ukrainian community – also created considerable financial hardship for the local Jewish community, by eliminating many Jewish jobs. The financial hardship caused antagonism between the two communities and was a cause for Jewish emigration from Galicia.Orest Subtelny. (1988). Ukraine: a History. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, pp. 324–325 and pp. 437–438.
To an extent, increasing Ukrainian nationalism also contributed to greater self-awareness among the Jews of Galicia and served as an example for Jews adopting a nationalist or Zionist self-identification.Ezra Mendelsohn. (1987). The Jews of East Central Europe between the world wars Indiana University Press, pg. 19
During the struggle for independence Following the collapse of Austria-Hungary in November 1918, eastern Galicia came under the control of the West Ukrainian People's Republic, which controlled much of eastern Galicia for approximately nine months before losing its war against Poland. Although relations between Poles and the West Ukrainian People's Republic were antagonistic, those between the Republic and its Jewish citizens was generally neutral or positive. Deep-seated rivalries existed between the Jewish and Polish communities, and antisemitism, particularly supported by the Polish National-Democratic Party, became a feature of Polish national ideology. A wave of pogroms swept parts of Poland in the fall of 1918, and many Jews came to associate the beginning of the armed Polish fight for independence with pogroms.William Hagen. (2005). The Moral Economy of Popular Violence: The Pogrom in Lwow, 1918. In Robert Blobaum (Ed.). Antisemitism and its opponents in modern Poland. New York: Cornell University Press, pg. 127 As a result, many Jews came to consider Polish independence as the least desirable option following the first world war.
In contrast to the antagonistic position by Polish authorities towards Jews, the West Ukrainian government actively supported Jewish cultural and political autonomy as a way of promoting its own legitimacy. The West Ukrainian government guaranteed Jewish cultural and national autonomy, provided Jewish communities with self-governing status, and promoted the formation of Jewish national councils which, with the approval of the Western Ukrainian government, in December 1918 established the Central Jewish National Council which represented Jewish interests in relation to the Ukrainian government and to the Western allies. The Council of Ministers of the West Ukrainian People's Republic bought Yiddish-language textbooks and visual aids for Jewish schools and provided assistance to Jewish victims of the Polish pogrom in Lviv. Ukrainian press maintained a friendly attitude towards the West Ukrainian republic's Jewish citizens, and Hebrew and Yiddish schools, cultural institutions and publishers were allowed to function without interference. Approximately one-third of the seats in the national parliament, an amount roughly equal to the share of the population, were reserved for the national minorities (Poles, Jews, Slovaks and others). The Poles boycotted the elections, while the Jews, despite declaring their neutrality in the Polish–Ukrainian conflict, participated and were represented by approximately 10 percent of the delegates. Localized anti-Jewish assaults and robberies by Ukrainian peasants and soldiers, while far fewer in number and less brutal than similar actions by Poles, occurred between January and April 1919. The government publicly condemned such actions, intervened in defence of the Jewish community, and imprisoned and even executed perpetrators of such crimes. The government also respected Jewish declared neutrality during the Polish–Ukrainian conflict. By the orders of Yevhen Petrushevych, it was forbidden to mobilize Jews against their will or to otherwise force them to contribute to the West Ukrainian military effort. In an effort to aid Western Ukraine's economy, the Western Ukrainian government granted concessions to Jewish merchants.
The West Ukrainian government's friendly attitudes towards Jews were reciprocated by many members of the Jewish community. Although Jewish political organizations officially declared their neutrality in the Polish-Ukrainian struggle, many individual Jews offered their support or sympathized with the West Ukrainian government in its conflict with Poland. Jewish officers of the defunct Austro-Hungarian Army joined the West Ukrainian military, and Jewish judges, lawyers, doctors and railroad employees joined the West Ukrainian civil service.Alexander V. Prusin. (2010). The Lands Between: Conflict in the East European Borderlands, 1870–1992. Oxford: Oxford University Press pg. 93 From November 1918, ethnic Poles in the civil service who refused to pledge loyalty to the West Ukrainian government either quit en masse or were fired; these positions were filled by large numbers of Jews, who were willing to support the Ukrainian state. Jews served as judges and legal consultants in the courts in Ternopil, Stanislaviv, and Kolomyia.Alexander Victor Prusin. (2005). Nationalizing a Borderland: War, ethnicity, and anti-Jewish violence in Eastern Galicia, 1914–1920. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, pp. 97–101. Jews were also able to create their own police units,Aharon Weiss. (1990). Jewish-Ukrainian Relations During the Holocaust. In Peter J. Potichnyj, Howard Aster (eds.) Ukrainian-Jewish relations in historical perspective. Edmonton, Alberta: Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies Press, pp. 409–420 and in some locations the Ukrainian government gave local Jewish militias responsibility for the maintenance of security and order. In the regions of Sambir and Radekhiv, approximately a third of the police force were Jews. Jews fielded their own battalion in the army of the West Ukrainian People's Republic.Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 2 1989 and Jewish youths worked as scouts for the West Ukrainian military. In general, Jews made up the largest group of non-ethnic Ukrainians who participated in all branches of the West Ukrainian government.
The liberal attitudes towards Jews by the West Ukrainian government could be attributed to the cultural influence of Austria-Hungary, whose tradition of inter-ethnic tolerance and cooperation affected the West Ukrainian intelligentsia and military officers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Between the First and Second World Wars After Polish victory over the West Ukrainian People's Republic in the Polish–Ukrainian War, Galicia's Jews and Ukrainians found themselves living within the Polish state – and were that state's largest ethnic minority groups. During this time relations between the two communities were initially positive – reflecting decades of previous cooperation – but subsequently deteriorated. In the early 1920s Ukrainians and Jews, at the initiative of Jewish leader Yitzhak Gruenbaum, formed a unified Bloc of National Minorities which sought to defend both groups' interests in the Polish government.Emanuel Melzer. (1997). No way out: the politics of Polish Jewry, 1935–1939 [sine loco]: Hebrew Union College Press, pp. 113–130.