Motal or Motol (;
Russian and
West Polesian: Мотоль; ; ''Motele'') is an
agrotown in
Ivanava District,
Brest Region,
Belarus
Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...
. It is located about 30 kilometres west of
Pinsk on the
Yaselda River
The Yaselda (, alternative transliteration ''Jasieĺda'', , ) is a river in Brest Region in south-west Belarus. It is linked via the Dnieper–Bug Canal to the city of Pinsk. It is a left tributary of the Pripyat. The Yaselda is connected to the ...
.
History
Founded as a
royal city of the
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1554 by
Queen Bona Sforza. A part of the Pinsk ‘ekonomia’ or royal land, in the late 18th century it was also part of the Pińsk
of the
Brest Litovsk Voivodeship.
After the Partitions of Poland, Motal became part of the Russian Empire. It was in the
Kobrinsky Uyezd of
Grodno Governorate
Grodno Governorate was an administrative-territorial unit (''guberniya'') of the Northwestern Krai of the Russian Empire, with its capital in Grodno. It encompassed in area and consisted of a population of 1,603,409 inhabitants by 1897. Gro ...
until the collapse of the
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...
in 1917. Between
World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
and
World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
it was in the
Drohiczyn powiat of the Polish
Polesie Voivodeship. It is near the center of
Polesia
Polesia, also called Polissia, Polesie, or Polesye, is a natural (geographic) and historical region in Eastern Europe within the East European Plain, including the Belarus–Ukraine border region and part of eastern Poland. This region shou ...
which constituted an irregular rectangle of roughly from east to west and from north to south.
Motal was a
Shtetl
or ( ; , ; Grammatical number#Overview, pl. ''shtetelekh'') is a Yiddish term for small towns with predominantly Ashkenazi Jews, Ashkenazi Jewish populations which Eastern European Jewry, existed in Eastern Europe before the Holocaust. The t ...
. In 1937, Motal had 4,297 inhabitants, of whom 1,354 were Jews. (Reinharz, 1985).
During the war an
Einsatzgruppen
(, ; also 'task forces') were (SS) paramilitary death squads of Nazi Germany that were responsible for mass murder, primarily by shooting, during World War II (1939–1945) in German-occupied Europe. The had an integral role in the imp ...
perpetrated a mass execution of the local Jewish community in the
Motal Ghetto.
''The Destruction of Motele'' (Hurban Motele) was published in Hebrew by the Council of Motele Immigrants in Jerusalem in 1956. It was edited by A.L. Poliak, Ed. Dr. Dov Yarden. The book has 87 pages and contains memoirs and events leading up to the destruction of the Jews of Motele in 1942.
Anshe Motele Congregation, an Orthodox Jewish synagogue, was founded in Chicago on Sept. 3, 1903, by 14 immigrants who named it after Motel.
[
]
Economics
The largest company in Motol i
Agromotol
Education
Motol has 2 secondary schools and an art school.
Notable people
*
Chaim Weizmann
Chaim Azriel Weizmann ( ; 27 November 1874 – 9 November 1952) was a Russian-born Israeli statesman, biochemist, and Zionist leader who served as president of the World Zionist Organization, Zionist Organization and later as the first pre ...
, Israel's first President
*
Saul Lieberman, rabbi and a scholar of Talmud
*
Leonard Chess
Leonard Samuel Chess (born Lejzor Szmuel Czyż; March 12, 1917 – October 16, 1969) was a Polish-American record company executive and the founder of Chess Records alongside his brother Phil. He was influential in the development of the recor ...
(Lejzor Czyż) and
Phil Chess
Philip Chess (born Fiszel Czyż; March 27, 1921 – October 18, 2016) was a Polish-born American record company executive, the founder of Chess Records alongside his brother Leonard.
Early life
Chess was born to a Polish-Jewish family in the ...
(Fiszel Czyż), founders of
Chess Records
Chess Records was an American record company established in 1950 in Chicago, specializing in blues and rhythm and blues. It was the successor to Aristocrat Records, founded in 1947. It expanded into soul music, gospel music, early rock an ...
*
Étienne Wasserzug, French biologist
*
David Bartov, Israeli judge and the head of Nativ
*
Serguei Palto, Russian physicist
Motal in literature
*
The Slaughterman's Daughter by
Yaniv Iczkovits
References
Sources
*
Jehuda Reinharz, ''Chaim Weizmann: The Making of a Zionist Leader'' (1985).
* Itzhak Epstein,
pdf Jewish Motol: Genealogical and Family History Bibliography'
External links
Photos at radzima.orgShtetl Links: Motol Home Page
Populated places in Brest region
Historic Jewish communities in Belarus
Jewish Belarusian history
Holocaust locations in Belarus
Ivanava district
Agrotowns in Belarus
{{Belarus-geo-stub