Jews began settling in Wlodawa in the seventeenth century. By the turn of the twentieth century, they numbered 3670 (66% of the population), then 4200 (67%) in 1921, and 5650 (75%) in 1939. The Germans created a ghetto to which they deported 800 Jews from Kraków and 1000 from Vienna, before exterminating them all in the camp near Sobibór, a mile or two from here in the forest, beside the Bug River.

Wlodawa possesses one of Poland’s most important Baroque synagogues . Built in 1762, it features a square shape with a high upper floor and sloped roof. Destroyed during the occupation, it was restored after the war. A scene from the film Shoah by Claude Lanzmann takes place here: the synagogue appears in close-up while the director interviews a witness from the era, Pan Filipowicz.