Jews settled in Narewka at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, and their percentage of the town’s population quickly increased. In the peak period (i.e. 1880), they constituted 90% of all inhabitants of Narewka.

In the 19th century, the Jewish population grew gradually to reach 90 percent of all the inhabitants in the 1980s. In 1897, the percentage of Jews had dropped to 79, even though the actual number of Jews in the town had increased. In the first half of the 19th century, the Jews of Narewka established a community (kehila) and built a wooden synagogue with a cheder and a mikvah.

Jews lived mainly around the market square, on its southern side, in the southern part of the town, and on the Narewka River. They also lived on Szkolna, Nadrzeczna and Kryniczna streets. They earned their living mainly from small trade (shops), itinerant trade, and various types of manual work. Most of the Jews lived around Targowa Street.

The Jews of Narewka - almost all of them - were considered to be mitnagdim, i.e. opponents of Hasidism, and were very religious. Even the poorest Jews knew the Torah and Gemara (early rabbinic analysis of and commentaries on the Mishna - a code of law derived from oral tradition). Children attended traditional cheders or Talmud Torah schools run by the community. We know that Rabbi Fejwel Grinberg was a local rabbi at the beginning of the 20th century.

After the outbreak of World War I, some young men from the community were forced to serve in the tsarist army. During the German occupation, the local economy suffered a huge slump. The Germans confiscated agricultural products and food; the townspeople suffered from hunger. Many people had to perform forced labour for the occupier. All children from the town, regardless of their religion, were forced to study in German in a school opened by the occupant. Jewish children had Hebrew and religion classes twice a week.

At the end of the war, the Jews restarted their businesses, but the economic situation deteriorated significantly. The main problem were the taxes imposed by the Polish government on small traders and shopkeepers, i.e. on Jews. Many were forced to shut down their businesses; workers' wages also decreased. Some Jews were employed in the local glass and bottle factory and in the turpentine factory, but many were unemployed. As economic problems escalated, Jewish emigration increased.

In the interwar period, Zionists became active in Narewka. There were fundraisers for Zionist purposes; local branches of the pioneering youth movements HeHalutz and HeHalutz Hatzair started to operate. During that period, most Jewish children attended the state primary school in Narewka; some also studied Hebrew and religion in cheders. The last rabbi of Narewka was Rabbi Jechoszua (Szejko).

After the outbreak of World War II, from September 17, Narewka was under Soviet occupation. On June 22, after German invasion of the USSR, the Soviets began to retreat east in a hurry. On June 23, German troops entered Narewka. After just a few days, the Germans drove men and young Jews aged 14-60 to a labour camp to serve the German army. Their task was to burn down farmers' houses in several nearby villages. After completing the task, they were taken back to Narewka. The day after their return, on July 15, 1941, they were herded into a nearby forest and murdered there. On the same day, the Germans drove women, children and the elderly into a train going to Kobryń in Polesia.

In November 1941, a ghetto was set up in Kobryn; approximately 8,000 local Jews and refugees from Białowieża, Hajnówka and Narewka were crammed into several small houses. Hunger, crowding, lack of water, and dirt caused an epidemic of infectious diseases. The mortality rate was at a very high level. Soon after the establishment of the ghetto in Kobryn, Germans demanded that the Judenrat hands over several hundred people with mental illnesses. Since no such persons were found, the elderly, the sick and children were delivered; most were chosen from among refugees. Hundreds of Jews who were handed over to Germans were murdered outside the town. At the beginning of 1942, the Jews who were skilled craftsmen were moved with their families to the neighbouring ghetto. Both ghettos were surrounded by barbed wire. Hundreds of young people from the Kobrin ghetto worked on building roads and were housed in camps away from the town. About 500 Jews worked in workshops, 100 women worked in a crochet factory; other women worked in services. In June 1942, several hundred Jews were transferred to a new labour camp set up in barracks outside the town.

In July 1942, a great Action (Aktion) was organized in Kobryn. A group of about 3,000 Jews, including women and children from Narewka, families of craftsmen, as well as medics and patients from the Jewish hospital in the ghetto, were transported by trucks to a clearing in the woods, a place known as Brona Góra; there they were shot and buried in ditches previously dug for this purpose. Several Jews managed to escape to the ghetto in Siemiatycze - some managed to survive the war. After this "Action", the young - boys and girls - organized an underground resistance movement in the Kobrin ghetto. Another "Action" took place in Kobryn on October 14; The Jews who remained in the ghetto were murdered and buried in ditches in the nearby forest. Members of the resistance group tried to fight with the few weapons they managed to get hold of. Few of them died in the fighting; many of those who managed to escape and hide were eventually caught and murdered. The rest joined the Soviet partisans. Several craftsmen who were still alive in the Kobryn ghetto after the Action of October 1942 were murdered in December of that year.

Bibliography

• Spektor, Sz.: Pinkas Hakehilot Polin, vol. V, Volhynia and Polesia, Jerusalem, 5750, p. 309.
• Tur-Szalom, A. (ed.): Kehilat Siemiatycz (Jewish community of Siemiatycze), Tel-Aviv, 1965, pp. 213-214
• Datner, Sz.: “Eksterminacja ludności żydowskiej w okręgu białostockim”, BŻIH 60 (1966), pp. 9,15
• Wiśniewski: Bóżnice Białostocczyzny, pp. 177-179.