Charlotte Knobloch
Encyclopedia
Zentralrat der Juden in Deutschland
The Zentralrat der Juden in Deutschland is a federation of German Jews organizing many Jewish organisations in Germany. It was founded on July 19, 1950, as a response to the increasing isolation of German Jews by the international Jewish community and increasing interest in Jewish affairs by the ...
in June, 2006. She is also Vice President of the European Jewish Congress
European Jewish Congress
The European Jewish Congress, , was founded in 1986. It is based in Paris, with offices in Brussels, Strasbourg, Berlin and Budapest...
and the World Jewish Congress
World Jewish Congress
The World Jewish Congress was founded in Geneva, Switzerland, in August 1936 as an international federation of Jewish communities and organizations...
. She has for many years been one of the primary leaders of the Jewish community in Munich, as President of the Israelitische Kultusgemeinde München und Oberbayern since 1985.
Knobloch was born into a well-to-do Jewish family of lawyers. She is the daughter of Munich lawyer and Bavarian senator Fritz Neuland
Fritz Neuland
Fritz Neuland was a Bavarian lawyer, Jewish leader and Senator.In the 1920s he had a law office in Munich together with the later Bavarian Prime Minister Wilhelm Hoegner....
. Her mother Margarethe was born a Christian, but converted to Judaism upon marrying Neuland. However, her parents divorced in 1936. She was subsequently raised by her grandmother Albertine Neuland. Upon the arrest of her father, Knobloch recalls being saved by the former housekeeper of the Neuland family, that woman took her in her hand and brought her to her Christian family in Franconia. From 1942 onward, she lived with Catholic farmers in Franconia
Franconia
Franconia is a region of Germany comprising the northern parts of the modern state of Bavaria, a small part of southern Thuringia, and a region in northeastern Baden-Württemberg called Tauberfranken...
, who pretended she was their own illegitimate daughter.
Charlotte Neuland married the late Samuel Knobloch in 1951, and has three children.
One of her achievements is the Jewish Centre (Jüdisches Zentrum) in Munich, with a new principal Ohel Jakob synagogue
Ohel Jakob synagogue
The Ohel Jakob synagogue was built 2004-2006 as the new main synagogue of the Munich Jewish community, located at Sankt-Jakobs-Platz. The synagogue was inaugurated on November 9, 2006, on the 68th anniversary of Kristallnacht. The opening ceremony was led by Charlotte Knobloch, President of...
and a Jewish museum. She was made an honorary citizen of Munich in 2005.
Knobloch is especially concerned with the problem of antisemitism in Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...
. In the World Jewish Congress
World Jewish Congress
The World Jewish Congress was founded in Geneva, Switzerland, in August 1936 as an international federation of Jewish communities and organizations...
she works to promote the German-speaking Jewish communities and to build bridges to Jewish communities in other countries.
In January 2009, she decided that the Central Council was temporarily breaking off contact with the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
because of the lifting of the excommunication of controversial bishop Richard Williamson.