The Municipality of Szeged has won the so-called Rediscover, expose and exploit the concealed Jewish heritage of the Danube Region project (DTP2-084-2.2) in the Environment and culture responsible Danube region Priority of Interreg Duna Transnational Program as a Lead Partner. In the project, funded by the European Union, 18 institutions from the Danube Region of Europe are participating, who are the following:

Szeged (HU, as Lead Partner), Szeged and Surroundings Tourism Nonprofit Ltd., City of Banja Luka (BA), Municipality of Galati (RO), Kotor Municipality (ME), Institute for Culture, Tourism and Sport Murska Sobota (SI), City of Osijek (HR), World Heritage Management City of Regensburg (DE), Municipal Museum of Subotica (RS) and Municipality of Timisoara (RO).

The partnership is based on cities of similar historical background with Jewish heritage and similar cultural and tourism missions. Thematic partners, associated with local governments are also involved in the project: City of Subotica, City Municipality Murska Sobota, Jewish Community of Szeged, Jewish Community Timisoara, part of Federation of Jewish Communities of Romania, Jewish Community of Osijek, Jewish Community of Montenegro, Jewish Community of Banja Luka and Romanian Institute for Research on National Minorities.

The Rediscover project’s launching coference and kick-off meeting was held by the Lead Partner in Szeged on 5-6th July at IH Event Center. The event started with a press conference at 9.00 followed by a formal welcome from János Kardos, head of the Cultural Department. After the opening addresses Hungarian lecturers gave inspiring and high quality presentations to the audience. László Marjanucz, PhD from University of Szeged was talking about the concrete historical processes of the coexistence and joint urban development of various Jewish groups of Szeged, from Norbert Glässer, PhD, also from the University of Szeged, along with András Zima, from the Budapest University of Jewish Studies, gave a presentation about changing Jewish community life, inherited cultural products, roles in local social development. At last, but not least, from the University of Szeged Krisztina Frauhammer’s lecture elaborated on the representation of intangible heritage in written sources of Judaism of the Danube Region.

After the launching conference, which was opened to the wide audience, the event continued with the kick-off meeting organised only for the project partners. This was the first time when the partners have met and had a chance to get to know each other better in person and create a friendly working environment. Besides the informal networking, during a one-and-a-half day meeting, partners got acquainted with the detailed concept, purpose and implementation rules of the project.

The project work has started and continues, the next partner meeting will be is Timisoara.