The Jewish presence in Macedonia dates from the Roman city of Stobi with archeological evidence of a 1st century BCE synagogue for those Jews taking advantage of Roman Empire trade and commerce. The Jewish community remained through Slavic and Byzantine control. The Expulsion resulting from the Spanish Inquisition attracted Ladino-speaking Sephardim to Macedona (and the Ottoman Empire), who flourished economically and socially until 1941, when the Bulgarian-Nazi alliance deported about 20,000 Jews to other parts of in Macedonia as well as northern Greece, southern Serbia, and Bulgaria. In 1512, 38 Jewish families were documented in Stip. While under Bulgarian occupation In 1943, 560 Jews from the city's Jewish quarter, almost the entire population, were deported to Treblinka. A Holocaust memorial in the town was created by Metodi Andonov. Today, Stip only has one Jewish family. [March 2009]
Stip Cemetery: Located outside Štip, access to the hillside site is difficult without a local guide. No wall or fence surround the about 120 still visible gravestones that are vandalized and heavily damaged with many fragments scattered along the slope. A scheduled cemetery renovation project under the auspices of the Institute and Museum of Shtip is headed by Zaran Chitkushev and financed by the Macedonian government. The 14,000 square meters site will also receive a fence and parking lot, pedestrian walkways, benches and monuments. [January 2009]
Cemetery project information. [May 2011]