and transport employees. It should be stressed that almost 80 per cent of the shops were in the hands of Jewish merchants and that 56 per cent of the workshops were the property of Jewish craftsmen. As for Jewish social life in Volhynia, we should emphasise the strong position of Zionist organisations in communal boards and the significant accomplishments of Zionist-Hebrew education: in the province, Tarbut ran 43 per cent of kindergartens, 22 per cent of elementary schools, and 33 per cent of lower secondary schools. Consequently, the local branches of Zionist youth movements, such as HaShomer HaTzair, HeHalutz-Dror and Betar, and Gordonia were expanding rapidly.
The rich, though materially modest, life of the Jewish community of Volhynia came to an end with the outbreak of World War II and the subsequent Soviet occupation. Between 18 and 20 September 1939 the Wehrmacht was stationed in Luboml and, among others, in the suburbs of Włodzimierz Wołyński, but by 21 September the Soviets were at the Bug River. That short “interregnum” period did not result in an increased number of pogroms or other actions against the Jewish population.
The Jews participated in the political and social transformation conducted after the Soviet fashion in a similar way as their fellow brothers in Galicia and on the Polish north-eastern frontier. Some young Jews did take part in greeting the marching-in troops, but the Jewish engagement in the October sessions of the organs representing the people of “Western Ukraine” was minimal, with only two Jewish delegates elected in Volhynia.
The fate of the Volhynian byezhentsy was slightly better than on the other occupied Polish territories, as the deportation in June 1941 affected some 500 Jews from 20 localities.
All the Jews were affected by the Sovietisation of the economy, particularly by the compulsory quartering of newcomers from the east and the gradual nationalisation of private trade and craftsmanship. In January 1940 in Łuck there were already about 40 artels (cooperatives). The social life also underwent major changes. Hebrew schools were transformed into “progressive” schools with Yiddish as the language of instruction, which educated about 8,000 students (50 per cent of the number of pre-war students of Hebrew schools). A year later, seven such schools were transformed into schools with Russian or Ukrainian as the language of instruction. Much like everywhere else, after the closure of social organisations, the Komsomol monopolised the education of the young. Communal life ceased to exist. Even
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