The USSR quickly restocked modern weapons in the Arab countries and encouraged a war of attrition against Israel, at times participating directly in hostilities.

In 2012, information appeared that in 1968 a Soviet submarine was sent to the shores of Israel with the task of firing missiles with nuclear warheads at the country. The order was canceled due to the onset of unfavorable Soviet power events in Europe.

Political evolution of Soviet anti-Semitism after the Six-Day War

Discriminatory and punitive measures against Jews

In addition to the fight against Zionism, Soviet ideologists during this period developed a new concept of Soviet Jews. They announced that:

• the very assertion of the existence of the Jewish nation is Zionist;
• Jews form part of the nations among which they live, and only in the USSR, where the Jewish Autonomous Region exists, do Jews fall under the concept of “nationality” (therefore, in the passports of Soviet Jews, “Jew” is indicated in the “nationality” column);
• since anti-Semitism is “a product of class-antagonistic formations,” it has been eliminated in the USSR; and in capitalist countries it should not exist, since there is no Jewish nation (which did not stop Soviet authors from writing about “world Jewry”), and if there are manifestations of anti-Semitism, it is incited by the Zionists themselves.

All this gave the authorities the opportunity to persecute for Zionism anyone who claimed that anti-Semitism existed in the USSR.

In those same years, the concept was put into circulation according to which all Soviet Jews, by virtue of their origin, are susceptible to Zionist ideology(Such ideas regarding Poland were first expressed by the Polish party theorist A. Verblanc in 1968).

In 1971, a high-ranking party functionary, Academician G. Arbatov, stated that 90% of the Jews who remained in the USSR “look in an unfavorable light” (that is, unreliable), thus indirectly confirming that anti-Semitic measures, in particular personnel policies, are quite justified.

The tendency to restrict the admission of Jews to higher education institutions has intensified even further. Many faculties of Moscow, Leningrad, Kyiv and other universities, the Moscow Engineering Physics Institute, and the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology were completely or partially closed to Jews.

Jews were no longer hired at many academic institutions, and there were almost none of them left in the senior command of the Soviet army. This personnel policy was determined not by the degree of anti-Semitic sentiments of specific leaders, but by written and oral instructions coming from “above.”

Since the 2nd half of the 1970s. punitive authorities intensified the fight against the Jewish movement. In 1974–79 in the USSR, 21 were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment, and in 1980–87. - 40 Jewish activists.

Organization of Jewish Collaboration

The Soviet authorities actively used Jews in the anti-Zionist campaign. On January 13, 1970, Pravda published 11 letters from Soviet Jews condemning those who wanted to emigrate.

In February 1970, Moscow rabbi I. L. Levin and the editor-in-chief of the magazine “Soviet Heimland” A. Vergelis made anti-Zionist statements. On March 4, 1970, a press conference of “citizens of Jewish nationality” was held, among whom were generals, statesmen, scientists, artists (V. Dymshits, D. Dragunsky, A. Vergelis, A. Raikin), who made sharp anti-Israeli statements. On March 5, participants in a press conference signed a letter condemning Zionism and “aggressive Israel.”

The so-called airplane trials were accompanied by an unbridled campaign in the authorities mass media. Among the authors of the “angry” letters were many Jews. Thus, a letter to the newspaper “Pravda” on March 3, 1970 “We cannot remain silent” was signed by academicians I. Mints (1896–1991), M. Mitin (1901–87), G. Frank, G. Chukhrai.

Similar letters were published in all Union republics. In March 1971, a Conference of representatives of the Jewish clergy and Jewish religious communities USSR to discuss “the attitude of believing Jews in the Soviet Union to the provocative actions of international Zionist organizations and their fabrications about the situation of Jews in the USSR.”

In the early 1980s, the Anti-Zionist Committee of the Soviet Public was created in Moscow, an organization that included high-ranking “useful Jews” led by General Dragunsky. They were required to hold meetings and issue letters against Israel and Zionism. The committee existed until the end of Soviet power in 1991, formally ending in 1994.

Release of anti-Semitic literature

The anti-Semitic campaign in the country has affected all spheres of life, especially the sphere of mass media. In the USSR, the publication of socio-political literature was controlled, inspired and directed by the CPSU. All books or articles in the growing stream of anti-Zionist publications expressed not the author’s personal position, but the ideological position of the party and the evolution of its anti-Zionist concepts.

Such literature tried to connect Zionism with imperialism and show that any activity of world Jewry is anti-communist. Interpreting Zionism as “the ideology, political practice and system of organizations of the large Jewish bourgeoisie,” the ideologists emphasized the close connection of this bourgeoisie with the “monopoly circles” of the United States and other “imperialist powers,” which serve as the financial and political base of Zionism.

Due to its reactionary essence, Zionism is the enemy not only of the Arabs, but also of the USSR, the socialist camp and all “progressive humanity.” In an article by V. Bolshakov in Pravda in 1971, it was argued that every person who becomes a Zionist automatically turns into an enemy of the Soviet people.

Such concepts were an ideological innovation and created a quasi-legal basis for the prosecution of anyone whom the authorities wanted to declare a Zionist. An expansive interpretation of Zionism allowed Soviet propagandists to declare all Jewish organizations in the United States (even ORT and Jewish trade unions) to be Zionist, that is, enemies of the USSR and communism.

"Watch out: Zionism!"

The essay by Yu. Ivanov “Caution: Zionism!” (M., Politizdat, 1969) was republished annually until 1973, and was translated into Ukrainian, Belarusian, Armenian, Tajik and other languages ​​of the peoples of the USSR; into Polish, English, Spanish, French and Arabic.

In the 1970s Soviet anti-Zionist literature still pitted “working Jews” against the Zionists. Thus, the creation of the Jewish state was declared a “commercial enterprise” of the Jewish bourgeoisie, which was not a goal, but “a means of achieving other, much broader goals: restoring control over the Jewish masses...” (Yu. Ivanov).

Profits from the exploitation of Israeli workers, according to Ivanov, flow into the pockets of American, Western European and South African multimillionaires, and Israel itself is not a state at all, but an outpost and springboard of international imperialism in the Middle East.

Unlike other Soviet authors who kept silent about K. Marx's anti-Semitism, Ivanov pointed to the eternal merchant essence of Jewry, referring to K. Marx's article “On the Jewish Question,” in which the concept of Judentum (“Jewishness”) was used as a synonym for merchant capitalism. He emphasized that Marx’s concept of “Jewishness” is not exhausted by the concept of “bourgeois mercantile activity”; it “steps over the temporary boundary of capitalist society and retreats into the depths of centuries.”

At the same time, Ivanov did not forget to formally dissociate himself from anti-Semitism, attributing the traits of “Jewishness” only to the “Jewish elite.” Zionism thus has its roots in the distant past and its source is the Jewish religion.

Yu. Ivanov was the first to declare that Zionism is an ideology akin to fascism, “which it is quickly replacing.” The myth he presented about the Nazi-Zionist conspiracy during World War II followed logically from this.

The thesis about the fascist essence of Zionism allowed the USSR to present itself as the leader of the “world anti-fascist front”, the patron of “the forces of peace and progress throughout the world,” that is, to restore its prestige in the left circles of the West, undermined by the exposure of Stalin’s crimes. To achieve this, anti-Zionist literature was intensively translated into foreign languages and distributed abroad.

While working on this book, Yu. Ivanov was an employee of the international department of the CPSU Central Committee, where he supervised the Israeli Communist Party. The book by an official party specialist was supposed to set the main direction for anti-Zionist propaganda: it was widely quoted by fighters against Zionism in the 1970s.

Other policy publications

Other similar installation books:

• E. Evseev “Fascism under a blue star” (M., “Young Guard”, 1971), “Zionism: ideology and politics” (M., 1971),
• V. Bolshakov “Zionism in the service of anti-communism” (Moscow, Politizdat, 1972, translated into many foreign languages), collections
• “Zionism: Theory and Practice” (Moscow, Politizdat, 1973) edited by I. Mints,
• “Zionism: myths and reality” (Kyiv, Politizdat, 1973; in Ukrainian),
• L. Mojorian “The criminal policy of Zionism and international law” (M., “Znanie”, 1973),
• V. Semenyuk “Nationalist Madness” (Minsk, “Belarus”, 1976).

Among the authors of such literature in Ukraine there were also Jews. For example, L. Berenstein published nine books in 1971–84, including “Zionism - as a type of racism” (Kyiv, 1977; 21 thousand copies), “Anti-communist essence of the ideological concepts of Zionism” (Kyiv, 1984, 10 thousand copies); A. Edelman in 1970–80 published four books.

The new surge of the anti-Jewish campaign in the USSR was largely the result of a sharp strengthening of the ideas of great-power Russian chauvinism in the upper echelons of power.

Party apparatchiks (themselves anti-Semites) saw in anti-Semitism an opportunity to ideologically strengthen the regime and rightly believed that the postulates of anti-Semitism would be better accepted by the general population than Marxist dogmas. Relying on spontaneous anti-Semitism, they did not let things take their course, but pursued an organized policy. Anti-Semitic propaganda used traditional stereotypes, reshaping them and creating new ones.

A. Yakovlev, who was then acting as head of the propaganda department of the CPSU Central Committee, published an article on November 15, 1972 in Literaturnaya Gazeta criticizing the ideas of great-power chauvinism, for which he was removed from his post and sent as ambassador to Canada.

On the basis of anti-Semitism, a rapprochement took place between part of the party apparatus and right-wing nationalists, who actively promoted anti-Semitism in samizdat (the Veche magazine, books by G. Shimanov, etc.).

Historical-revisionist fabrications

Previously, Soviet publications usually suppressed the history of Jews and their role in the development of Russia and other countries. In the 1970s and 80s, in parallel with the development of the Zionist theme and the concept of Soviet Jewry, a revision of the history of Jews and Zionism from an anti-Semitic position began.

Never interested before Jewish history The magazine “Questions of History” published (No. 3, 1973) an article “Anti-national activities of Zionists in Russia,” signed by the pseudonym Vostokov. The author focused not on “world Zionism,” but on Russian Zionism, but the article was not so much about Zionists as about Russian Jews in general.

Vostokov stated:

• that Jews in Russia were by no means a discriminated against group of the population; on the contrary, they lived quite well, and not only within the boundaries of the Pale of Settlement;
• that a significant part of Russian trade was in the hands of Jews (55% of the merchants of the first and second guilds, who accounted for 40% of the total trade turnover; these two figures later began to wander from book to book;
• the proportion of workers among Jews was insignificant, the overwhelming majority of Jews were bourgeoisie;
• The large number of revolutionaries and socialists among Jews is a common misconception, but there were many Jews among opportunists and provocateurs.

In No. 5 of “Questions of History” for the same year, an article by E. Evseev “From the history of Zionism in Russia” appeared, which emphasized that Jews were the main exploiters of Russian workers, and their goal was not personal gain, but “enrichment by all means of the international Zionist corporations."

Evseev stated that at the beginning of the 20th century. Zionism infected not only the Jewish bourgeoisie, but also Jewish workers, so Zionism is not the ideology of the Jewish bourgeoisie, but of Jews in general.

These and other publications shifted the emphasis from certain unattainable Zionists to their own, Soviet Jews, which was very convenient for the authorities. The rising dissident movement could be explained by the “machinations of the Zionists” and identified as “Jewish.” Soviet ideologists began to directly address Russian pre-revolutionary anti-Semitism and its literary sources.

A number of popular science books from the Molodaya Gvardiya publishing house state that

• that the “cosmopolitan bourgeoisie”, using its influence on the Tsarina and G. Rasputin, poisoned the Russian patriot General Brusilov (S. Semanov “A. Brusilov”, series “ZhZL”);
• that cosmopolitans did everything to ensure that the Russian army was defeated in the First World War (K. Yakovlev “First of August 1914”, M., 1974);
• that the former cantonist General V. Geiman (1823–78) was responsible for the death of many Russian soldiers during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78. (S. Semanov “Heroes of Shipka”);
• in the book by A. Kuzmin “Tatishchev” (M., 1981, series “ZhZL”) it is hinted that the actual ruler of Russia in the 1730s. Duke of Courland E. Biron secretly professed Judaism, renouncing Christianity.

Theses about the depravity and racist nature of the Jewish religion and the connection between Zionism and Judaism, as well as the traditional anti-Semitic concept of Judaism as an immoral and perverted religion, came to the fore during this period. The Jewish religion was increasingly identified with Zionism: “Judaism is the philosophical and ideological basis of modern Zionism” (V. Begun “Zionism and Judaism”, Minsk, “Znanie”, 1972), and “the synagogue in the modern situation is a potential base for subversive activities” ( V. Begun “Creeping counter-revolution”, Minsk, “Belarus”, 1974).

V. Begun in the book “Creeping Counter-Revolution” (Moscow, 1974) wrote that the goal of Zionism is “to create a special version of ultra-imperialism”, “... to transform the Jewish bourgeoisie into the ruling caste of capitalist society” and to establish “domination over the world” . He called on Soviet people not to be afraid of accusations of anti-Semitism, because these accusations are “a means of moral terror on the part of Zionism.”

Antisemitism in fiction

The Soviet Union was also charged with anti-Semitism. fiction and literary journalism of the 1970s–80s.

Official writers, like I. Shevtsov, wrote anti-Semitic books on the instructions of party ideologists. At the same time, a group of “soil workers” was formed, conservatively inclined and critical of Soviet power. Their position strove for pre-revolutionary Black Hundreds (and subsequently arrived at it), but for now their books contained anti-Semitic allusions.

I. Shevtsov’s novels “Aphid”, “Love and Hate”, “In the Name of Father and Son” are permeated with hatred of the intelligentsia, xenophobia and anti-Semitism. All Jews and intellectuals are traitors and spies in the service of the West (“Love and Hate”, M., Voenizdat, 1970), and Jews are bandits and cruel murderers (the hero of the novel Naum Goltser kills his own mother), corrupting Russian youth, teaching them to drugs, etc.

Liberal magazines such as Yunost and Foreign Literature, according to the author, are in the hands of Jews and are full of images of a six-pointed star (“In the name of father and son”). The cautious criticism that Shevtsov was subjected to on the pages of Pravda and the sarcastic reviews in Yunost and Novy Mir did not stop the flow of publication of Shevtsov’s books.

In the 1980s authors of conservative-patriotic and pochvennik views are mainly grouped around the magazines “Young Guard”, “Our Contemporary”, as well as “October” and “Moscow”. Since in the multinational Soviet Union xenophobia could undermine state unity, Jews, who do not have their own republic and are not officially recognized as a nation, became a convenient target for national patriots, a successfully found antipode to the Russian and other Slavic peoples.

The trend of “changing the enemy” was reflected in the work of the most popular author of historical novels and stories, V. Pikul: if in his early works (1960–70s) the Germans were blamed for all the troubles of Russian history, then from the late 1970s. (“The Battle of the Iron Chancellors”, 1979; “At the Last Line”, 1980) the Jews become the culprits. The Russian Chancellor Count K. Nesselrode was only German in appearance, but in reality he was three-quarters Jewish, writes V. Pikul, and, therefore, was associated with “Zionist capital,” and G. Rasputin was just a toy in the hands of Jewish financiers, who through him influenced the tsar, directing Russian policy.

The latter idea was part of the historical concept of writers of the so-called “national-state” or “national-communist” trend, grouped around the magazine and publishing house “Young Guard”, especially the editors of its series “The Life of Remarkable People” (ZZL).

In contrast to A. Solzhenitsyn and his followers, who idealized pre-revolutionary Russia and had a negative attitude towards the Russian revolution, the “national statists” were oriented towards post-revolutionary Russia. The Russia of Nicholas II is an anti-national state ruled by German-Jewish capital, and it is not surprising that a Bolshevik, truly national revolution took place in this country. All authors of this school of thought portray old Russia as a country ruled by foreigners.

Y. Seleznev (“Dostoevsky”, ZhZL, 1981) writes that, contrary to the intentions of Nicholas I, the peasant reform in Russia was greatly delayed due to the machinations of “world capital”, which managed to enslave the Russian people again after the reform. “World Capital” is the house of the Rothschilds: “Even this baron’s grandfather saved his first gold by trading in live goods, or, simply put, by supplying unfortunate women to brothels, but his grandson, Monsieur James de Rothschild, once dictated his terms to Emperor Nicholas Romanov, and he, frightened, paid according to the highest command of Rothschild” (ibid.).

To save the reputation of the Soviet country, the Jews were blamed for both the plight of pre-revolutionary Russia and the Bolshevik crimes. A striking example is V. Kataev’s story “Werther has already been written” (1980), in which the executioners of the Russian intelligentsia are Jewish security officers and only Jews. Yu. Trifonov in the story “The Old Man” talks about the cruelty of the Jewish Bolsheviks during the policy of decossackization.

The ideal scapegoat for the authors of the new anti-Semitic wave was the classic “Jewish-Bolshevik” Leonid Trotsky, who turned into a mythologized image of the “enemy of Russia.” Thus, the same I. Shevtsov in “Borodinsky Field” (Military Publishing House, 1978) portrays Trotsky as “the most terrible enemy of Soviet power,” and in M. Kolesnikov (“With an Open Visor,” Military Publishing House, 1977) Trotsky is a participant in a Masonic conspiracy.

In the 1980s Trotsky’s “enemy essence” is beginning to be openly associated with his Jewish origin. Belarusian writer I. Shamyakin in the novel “Petrograd-Brest” (published in the Belarusian magazine, part 1 - 1981; part 2 - 1983; in Russian - simultaneously in two different magazines, as well as in a magazine in Ukrainian - 1984; separate publication, M. “Roman-Gazeta”, 1986) repeatedly emphasizes Trotsky’s Jewish origin and the negative traits inherent in him as a representative of the Jewish people.

He attributes similar national traits to G. Zinoviev, L. Kamenev, M. Uritsky (1873–1918) and other figures of the revolution. In the literature of the 1970s–80s. Trotsky is blamed for all the crimes of the Leninist period: he organized the invasion of Afghanistan in 1919 and Estonia in 1920, the “decossackization” on the Don in 1919, which is defined as the genocide of the Cossacks, etc.

The authorities, initially favorable to the activities of the “patriots,” soon began to fear them, since “Memory” was clearly out of control. On May 6, 1987, the society held a demonstration on Manezhnaya Square in Moscow, after which its representatives were received by B. Yeltsin (then first secretary of the Moscow City Committee of the CPSU), who listened to the demands of the organization.

The manifestation was followed by the first timid criticism of “Memory” in the official press (“Komsomolskaya Pravda”, “Izvestia”, “Moskovskaya Pravda”); some members of Pamyat were expelled from the CPSU. An attempt by the Moscow Party Committee in the fall of 1987 to put “Memory” under its control led to a split in the organization (a group of “Stalinists” led by I. Sychev left it) and forced Vasiliev to dissociate himself from the CPSU.

On May 31, 1988, Vasiliev announced the transformation of the “Memory” society into the National Patriotic Front “Memory”, that is, he proclaimed the society a political organization. Thus, an official political organization appeared in the Soviet Union, whose views differed from those of the CPSU.

The anti-alcohol All-Union Club “Sobriety,” which emerged in 1988, put forward the thesis of “Zionist alcogenocide of the Russian people.”

Moscow "Memory" split into several different, often conflicting organizations operating in last years Soviet power and not long after its end.

The K. Smirnov-Ostashvili group, also known as the Union for National Proportional Representation “Memory” (NZNPP), broke away from one of the fragments of “Memory” in February 1989. On January 18, 1990, with the support of the communist authorities, it raided the Central House of Writers in Moscow, where a meeting of the liberal literary association “April” took place. Smirnov-Ostashvili was nevertheless sentenced to two years in prison (where he committed suicide).

The fragments of "Memory" advocated a ban on the emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union (since Jews should stand trial "for their crimes").

Along with various Moscow branches of the Memory organization, similar organizations in Novosibirsk, Sverdlovsk, and Leningrad were most active. The communist authorities did not interfere with them, considering them allies in the fight against the democratic movement.

After the collapse of Soviet power, the old Nazis from "Memory" gradually disappeared from the scene, giving way to new Nazi organizations in Russia and other countries of the former USSR.

"Intellectual" anti-Semitism

The official “Zionology” was replaced by samizdat “Zionology”, and later by the opposition. In 1988, an essay by a prominent Soviet mathematician and former dissident, I. Shafarevich, “Russophobia,” appeared in samizdat (in 1989 in the magazine “Our Contemporary”).

Written at a fairly intellectual level, it sets out the theory of a “small people” living among “ big people"and alien to his tradition. Thanks to its minority status, a small people develops a high degree of internal solidarity and extraordinary fighting qualities, which makes it dangerous for a large people and its culture.

Although in the book the “small people” were not directly identified with the Jews, the reader could easily make such an identification, prompted, moreover, by the author’s illustration of his theory - the history of the Russian revolution and Soviet society in his own interpretation: the revolution was made by Jews who hated the Russian people, were alien to the Russian tradition and committed to the Western one.

The popularity of Shafarevich's work and widespread advertising of the book in the media contributed to the growth of anti-Semitic sentiments among the Russian intelligentsia.

Antisemitism of communist orthodoxies

At the end of the 1980s. Some communists went into opposition to the leadership and formed opposition communist organizations that were in favor of a return to the “pre-perestroika” order, including Soviet anti-Semitism.

On March 13, 1988, Sovetskaya Rossiya published a manifesto letter (reprinted in dozens of Soviet newspapers) by Nina Andreeva, a teacher at the Leningrad Technological Institute, “I Can’t Give Up Principles,” calling for the rehabilitation of Stalin and the re-Stalinization of the country, which contained a characterization of Jews as a counter-revolutionary nation.

The core of the current Russian Communist Workers' Party, which emerged in 1989, adopted the latest nationalist anti-Semitic ideology.

Trials against anti-Semites

In 1987–88 The ideological monopoly of the CPSU was eliminated, pluralism arose, and an independent press appeared. Official restrictions on the admission of Jews to work and universities were lifted, the persecution of unofficial Jewish organizations stopped, etc.

The opportunity to criticize the government’s policies was immediately expressed in publications against the authors of anti-Zionist publications. In one of the first articles of this kind (A. Cherkizov “On genuine values ​​and imaginary enemies”, newspaper “Soviet Culture”, June 1987), the creators of the version about the existence of a “Zionist-Masonic conspiracy in the country” are named - V. Begun, E . Evseev and A. Romanenko, whose articles and books are “... anti-scientific and essentially misleading to the reader.”

Cherkizov pointed out the connection of these authors with the anti-Semitic society “Pamyat”, whose main lecturers they were. In response, V. Begun, E. Evseev and A. Romanenko filed a lawsuit against the newspaper and the author of the article. On October 5, 1987, the case was heard in one of the Moscow district courts. An expert opinion from the Institute of the USA and Canada of the USSR Academy of Sciences was read out, which, among other things, indicated seven cases of direct borrowing by V. Begun of a text from A. Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” with the replacement of the word “Jewish” with “Zionist”. Cherkizov won the case.

A similar lawsuit (Leningrad, 1988) by A. Romanenko against the writer Nina Katerli, who accused him of racism and anti-Semitism, turned into an endless lawsuit; The court of first instance (district) recognized the defendant’s correctness, but at the request of Romanenko, the case was transferred for review to the city court and dragged on for a long time.

Thanks to the processes of 1987–1988. anti-Zionist ideologists were no longer inaccessible to criticism, and the authorities were forced to recognize A. Romanenko’s book “On the Class Essence of Zionism” as erroneous and withdraw it from sale.

After the opening of the possibility of departure

Arsons of Jewish apartments occurred in Moscow, Leningrad, Sevastopol and other cities. In the spring of 1988, rumors spread in Moscow about an impending pogrom against Jews and that Pamyat activists were collecting addresses of Jews from housing offices in Moscow, Leningrad and other cities.

In the 1990s. Numerous attacks on Jews (especially those traveling to Israel) have been recorded throughout the Soviet Union - both for the purpose of robbery and without this purpose. The authorities did not even try to investigate these incidents.

A serious anti-Semitic incident was the pogrom in Andijan (Uzbekistan) in June 1990. A crowd (according to some sources - several thousand people) broke into a mixed Jewish-Armenian quarter, set fire to about 30 houses, and destroyed businesses owned by Jews and Armenians; the pogrom was accompanied by robbery and rape. The authorities did nothing to stop the riots of the crowd. At the same time, anti-Jewish riots, but not on such a scale, occurred in Samarkand.

In the summer of 1991, an attack on Jews in the city of Surami (Georgia) escalated into a fight between Jews and Georgians.

The activities of the Nazis continued after the end of Soviet power in line with the struggle against the democratic authorities of Russia. In March-April 1992, the Lubavitcher Hasidic synagogue in Moscow was attacked - a swastika was painted on the walls, and a Molotov cocktail was thrown into the building.

Scientific research on anti-Semitism in the USSR

Materials on anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries are collected and studied at the Center for the Research and Documentation of Eastern European Jewry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The Center publishes (since 1986) the journal “Jews and Jewish Themes in Soviet and Eastern European Publications” (in Russian and English).

SOVIET UNION in EEE Notification: The preliminary basis for this article was the article

My friends reproached me right now: are you an anti-Semite or just out for a walk? It’s been a long time since anything serious appeared on your blog about Jews, about ZOG there, about anti-Semitism and about matzah made from the blood of Christian babies...

They say, the Anti-Semite and his blog are no longer the same cake, and finally, it’s time for me to change the name of the blog to “anti-hochlit”. If so, get it! We kindly ask!

With the father of an Israeli Jew, V. Rivlin.

And anti-Semitism in the USSR is the favorite hobby of the Zionists. Researchers from various institutions are trying hard - they are persistently looking for documents that would substantiate their claims about the persecution of Jews in the USSR. Journalists also try and write (As Ostap Bender used to say: The office writes!).

Emigrants willingly share their grievances, telling how bad it was for them in the USSR, how they were oppressed under the fifth point, how not only they themselves, but also their relatives and friends suffered. To be fair, it should be said that during the Khrushchev and Brezhnev era, anti-Semites in the USSR did not hide, and even moreover, they behaved quite brazenly. I myself had to deal with something similar back in school, and not so rarely. They could have sent him to Israel and called him a “Jew” or a “Malanian.” Moreover, it was not only classmates, fellow students or colleagues who were sent to Israel or spoke in less than pleasant terms about Jews (to put it mildly).

Much less often, but similar things could be heard from a school teacher, from a university professor, not to mention the army or any other authorities. In short, there were enough anti-Semites in the USSR. The impudence of anti-Semites came from confidence in their own impunity. In addition, the article of the Stalinist constitution, according to which a “Jew” was subject to a five-year prison sentence, during the times of Khrushchev and Brezhnev not only was no longer in force, but simply did not exist. They, apparently not without reason, expected to find support at any level. There were plenty of anti-Semites in the USSR, as, indeed, in any other country. Including in very responsible positions at all levels. Of course, having penetrated the government and the media, this public had a very significant influence on all aspects of the life of the country and society.

However, I consider it completely ignorant to talk about state anti-Semitism as a purposeful anti-Semitic policy of the Soviet state. The official Soviet ideology was built on internationalism, and until the collapse of the USSR, this principle remained unchanged. But that's not the point. In order to define the state policy of a country as anti-Semitic or generally directed against anyone, there must be corresponding documents defining such a policy. But, thank God, in the Soviet Union there were neither officially established percentage standards for Jews for admission to higher education institutions, nor the Pale of Settlement. Moreover, it was the Soviet government that abolished all these restrictions, not to mention the role the USSR played in the rescue of Jews during the Second World War and in the formation of the state of Israel. Of course, one can object to me that no official documents or instructions were issued regarding the restriction of the rights of Jews in the USSR, but, for example, norms for the admission of Jews to universities existed unofficially, and therefore, we can talk about an unofficial policy of anti-Semitism in the USSR.
This question is best answered by facts.

So, the facts:
What data about the Jews of the USSR does Professor Mordechai Altshuler provide in his study: “Jews of the CIS on the threshold of the third millennium” ACTA SLAVICA IAPONICA Volume 16 (1998) http://src-h.slav.hokudai.ac.jp/publictn/acta /16/alt/altshuler-4.html

“The Jewish population of the Soviet Union and the CIS is characterized by three main features:

a) Unlike other nations, the Jewish population is entirely concentrated in cities. According to the 1989 census, 98.8% of Jews lived in cities, and this situation has not changed to this day.

b) The majority of the Jewish population lived in large cities. According to the 1989 census, almost half (49.4%) of the Jews of the Soviet Union lived in the 11 largest cities of the USSR.
The overwhelming majority of Jews belong to the stratum of the intelligentsia.... Jewish women - and this is perhaps most important - are characterized by a high educational level91, they strive to make a career... "

Further, Professor Altshuler notes the following very interesting fact:
"One of the ways to lose or weaken ethnic identity was through marriages between representatives of two different nationalities. The prevalence of mixed marriages among Jews was one of the highest. This was the result of three main factors: a) Jews constituted a small minority of the population in all cities and regions residence; b) they were well acquainted with the language and culture of the surrounding majority, mainly Russian; c) the majority of Jews belonged to the stratum of the intelligentsia, among which interethnic marriages are more common. Using a generalization, we can say that approximately 60%-70. % of children born in the late eighties, only one parent was Jewish. Most children born to parents of mixed ethnic origin were registered in Soviet documents as non-Jews, which accelerated the process of decline in the Jewish population (in this case not as a result of the emigration process." .

Thus, based on Professor Altshuler’s data, two conclusions can be drawn:

Firstly, about the high degree of integration of Jews in Soviet society, and secondly, about the fact that, belonging to the stratum of the intelligentsia, Soviet Jews played an important role in the life of society and the country.

Thirdly, the Jews were in no way a caste of untouchables or outcasts, as adherents of the thesis about the persecution of Jews in the USSR are trying to present.

Further, Professor Altshuler writes:
"The results of the 1979 census in the Slavic republics (USSR) indicate that the Jewish population was the most educated among all ethnic groups in the USSR. In these republics, the number of years of education among Jews exceeded the number of years of education among the urban population of the main ethnic group in the republic by an average of 1.8-3.3 years. Among the Jewish population of the RSFSR in the late eighties (in 1989) there were 2.5 times more people with higher education than among the urban Armenian population, 3 times more than among Ukrainians, in 3.6 times more than among Belarusians, and 3.8 times more than among the Russian urban population. Education was one of the most important factors influencing the decision about what position a person will occupy at work, and in this area. Even more striking is the difference between Jews and representatives of other nationalities in the Slavic republics and, apparently, not only in them. In all Slavic republics, already at the end of the seventies there were 3.4-4.6 times more people among working Jews. higher education than among the urban population of the main nationality in these republics. Despite some restrictions on the admission of Jews to prestigious higher education institutions, in the eighties the proportion of people with higher education among Jews employed in the national economy increased, as evidenced by the results of the 1989 census regarding the RSFSR. At the end of the eighties, approximately two-thirds of Jewish breadwinners in the RSFSR had higher education, and in Moscow approximately three-quarters (725 per thousand). At the end of the eighties in the RSFSR, among working Jews there were 3.7 times more people with higher education than among the urban population as a whole (629 compared to 170).”
“From a sociological point of view,” writes Professor Altshuler, “Jews were the only national minority in the USSR, about which it can be said that its work activity has features characteristic of post-industrial society. While in the RSFSR in 1979, among all those employed in the national economy, 75.8% were employed in sectors of material production (among the urban population this figure was 73.3%), among Jews less than half worked in these sectors. While in the RSFSR, among all urban residents - breadwinners, 61.6% were engaged in physical labor, among Jews this figure was only 20.9%, and the majority (79.1%) were engaged primarily in mental labor. This phenomenon, although on a smaller scale, was also characteristic of the Jewish population of other republics of the Soviet Union. "
Professor Altshuller also concludes that:
“The economic situation of Jews before the collapse of the Soviet Union was generally better than that of other peoples.”
Searchers of anti-Semitism in the USSR diligently avoid all this data and appeal to history to support their theses.
In particular, the Jewish Encyclopedia writes: “During the last period of the war, Jews began to be ousted from leadership positions in all spheres of the country’s life, and the very possibility of appointing Jews to a number of positions in the party and state apparatus was excluded.”
To put it mildly, statements Jewish Encyclopedia suffer from unreasonableness.
This is what Joseph Tartakovsky writes about the position of Jews in the power structures of the USSR, “Jews in the Leadership of the USSR (1917-1991).”
Jews played a prominent role in the party's Central Committee until 1952. In total, 51 Jews were members of the Central Committee over the years.....
At almost every party congress, new Jewish members and candidates for membership in the Central Committee were included in the Central Committee. Thus, in 1919, two out of five Jews were elected to the Central Committee for the first time, in 1920 - 2 out of 5, in 1923 - 2 out of 8, in 1924 - 5 out of 12, in 1925 - 3 out of 12, in 1927 - 3 out of 13, in 1930 - 5 out of 17, in 1934 - 9 out of 24, in 1939 - 7 out of 14, in 1952 - 1 out of 5. Then 1-3 Jews were regularly included in the Central Committee, mainly to demonstrate the supposed absence of anti-Semitism in the country at the state level .
By time, the Central Committee included: up to 1 year - 2, from 1 to 3 years - 13, from 4 to 10 years - 21, from 11 to 20 years - 10, over 20 years - 5 people (B. L. Vannikov and S. A. Lozovsky - 21 years old, M. B. Mitin - 22 years old, V. E. Dymshits - 25 years old, L. M. Kaganovich - 34 years old).
In the Government of the USSR, Jews also played a prominent role until the 50s, although their number in the Government fluctuated greatly. Thus, in 1917-1922, in 1926-1930 and in 1950-85, only 1-2 Jews were part of the Government.
Subsequently, the appointment of Jews to the Government of the USSR was only episodic (L.Z. Mekhlis - 1940, I.M. Zaltsman - 1942, D.Ya. Reiser - 1950, V.E. Dymshits - 1959, L.M. Volodarsky - 1975).
By time, the Government included: up to 1 year - 4 people, from 1 to 3 years - 11 people, from 4 to 7 years - 10 people, 8 years - 1 person (L.D. Trotsky), 9 years - 1 person (M.M. Litvinov), 10 years - 2 people (L.Z. Mekhlis and L.M. Volodarsky), 11 years - 1 person (S.Z. Ginzburg), over 20 years - 2 people ( L.M. Kaganovich and V.E. Dymshits).
In total, the Government of the USSR included 32 Jews over the years.

I don’t know whether to demonstrate the “supposed absence of anti-Semitism in the country at the state level”, representatives of Jews were part of the government throughout all the years of the existence of the Soviet state, but I want to note the following: Not all nationalities and nationalities of the Soviet Union had their representation in the government of the USSR .
Tartakovsky also erroneously states that:
“After the war, among the major military figures one can only mention Army General Ya.
In addition to Kreiser, there were other generals: Dragunsky, Krivoshein, Mehlis, Kolgpakchi Vannikov (after the war - head of the 1st Main Directorate under the Council of Ministers of the USSR (later - Minsredmash), led all work on the creation of thermonuclear weapons. Three times Hero of Socialist Labor (1942 , 1949, 1953)), general designer of tanks Kotin, chief surgeon of the Soviet Army Vishnevsky, A.D. Tsirlin (USSR State Prize laureate, 1946-61 - head of the military engineering department of the Higher VA named after K.E. Voroshilov (VAGSH USSR Armed Forces). Under his leadership, a new training program was developed. Doctor of Military Sciences), and L. Z. Kotlyar (Hero of the Soviet Union, head of the Military Engineering Academy named after V.V. Kuibyshev).
These are only those Jews from Colonel General and above. Not a single Jew became a marshal during the entire Soviet era, which can certainly be considered a manifestation of anti-Semitism in the USSR.
In addition, for adherents of the theory of anti-Semitism in the USSR, this number of Jewish senior government officials and military commanders is clearly not enough. There should have been at least half of them in the army and government in order to exclude accusations of anti-Semitism against the Soviet system.

As for the share of Jews among middle managers, i.e. , chief engineers, chief doctors, etc., then a very interesting source here is the research of Dr. Vyacheslav Konstantinov.*
In his monograph, published in Jerusalem in 2007, Dr. Konstantinov provides the following data:
“In 1926, the share of Jews employed in the party and state apparatus was four times higher than among other groups of the country’s population” (Konstantinov p. 170).
Further, Konstantinov notes that the share of Jews in the party-state apparatus increased from 1926 to 1939.
Among middle-level managers, the share of Jews among all employees by 1939 was 9%, while among the rest of the city residents only the percentage of middle-level managers was only 3.5. From 1939 to 1948, the share of middle-level managers among Jews increased and reached 11.5%, and in 1959 the share of middle-level managers among Jews was 5 times higher than among all employees. (Konstantinov p. 173) In the 60s of the twentieth century, the share of Jews among middle managers increased and the author of the monograph concludes that for 30 years, from 1959 to 1989, the share of Jewish middle managers in the production sector has not changed , i.e. , remained very high.
As for scientific workers, the proportion of Jews among them was 6 times higher than among the entire employed population of the USSR.
These findings are confirmed by studies conducted in Israel.
According to the findings of Israeli researchers, in 1989, the percentage of people with higher education among the Jews of the USSR was 43.3%, while among other nationalities of the Soviet Union, this figure was 12.1%. In terms of the number of people with higher education, the Jews of the USSR in 1990 were second only to the Jews of the USA (53.1%) and Canada (47.8% in 1991). However, here we should take into account the immigration policy of these countries, which traditionally seek to host ready-made specialists. In this regard, it should be emphasized that such high indicators for both countries were largely ensured by Soviet emigrants. In general, the percentage of people with higher or secondary specialized education among Jews on the eve of the collapse of the USSR was 64.8% - the highest figure in the country (all other nationalities - 12.1% and 19.8%, respectively). http:// sites.google.com/site/jewstat/Home/fsuhebrew/hebeduc
In this regard, it is very interesting to compare the situation of Soviet Jews in the USSR on the eve of the collapse of the Soviet state and in Israel, where hundreds of thousands of Jews from the USSR emigrated in the early nineties.
In this regard, the data provided in his article “The Inverted Pyramid” is very interesting. http://www.isramir.com/content/view/577/169/: Dr. Boris Dubson is a disgraced Israeli economist.
In particular, Dubson writes:
“The Bolsheviks’ dream of the social “reforging” of Russian Jewry, which they unsuccessfully tried to implement in the former USSR for decades, was realized naturally in Israel in a matter of years. Aliyah of the 90s” (as immigration to Israel is called in Israel) took place in Israel proletarianization. The most popular profession was that of a worker, not an engineer and a teacher (as in the USSR. Author's note).
Further, Dr. Dubson cites equally eloquent statistical data to support his conclusion: “A significant part of the repatriates had to part with their previous professions of scientists, engineers, doctors, musicians, etc. Israel needed, first of all, manual workers and in this area repatriates had a wide choice: from workers and nannies to security guards and cleaners. A comparison of the two employment structures of repatriates - before arrival and now - clearly indicates that, figuratively speaking, “the pyramid turned upside down before arrival.” of repatriates worked as specialists and managers, in 2002 - 28%, the share of workers before arrival was 20.5%, in 2002 - 38%. The level of education of the repatriate working class is worthy of being included in the Guinness Book of Records: in 2002 27% skilled and unskilled workers - repatriates had 16+ years of education, another 36 and 32%, respectively - from 13 to 15 years. However, in the field of manual labor, repatriates are represented not only by workers. The majority of the 64 thousand repatriates included in the category of trade and service workers in 2002 are also primarily engaged in manual labor. About a third of housekeepers and security guards in Israel are “olim mi Russia”; they also make up a significant part of the staff in catering and hotels (in total, almost 19 thousand repatriates were employed in these two industries in 2002), as well as janitors, cleaners, etc. d. It is noteworthy that, on the one hand, the repatriates “overtook” the entire Jewish population in terms of the proportion of the working class, and, at the same time, the share of repatriates in the category of office workers is much less than the average. Let me remind you that, according to my estimate, no more than 25 thousand repatriates who came to Israel since the early 90s have retained their professional status as “academic” specialists. In 2003, the share of academics among repatriates who arrived since the early 90s was lower than in 1999. In the group of repatriates in 1990-1991, the number of workers with 16 years of education or more, employed in positions of specialists and managers , reached its maximum in 2001 - 54 thousand - and then began to decline, amounting to 49 thousand people in 2003. In the same year, 1998, the most successfully completed their studies at school were those who came to the country at the age of 17 years. and older, that is, studied in Israeli schools for no more than 2 years. Surely this group had a weaker knowledge of Hebrew than their peers who arrived several years earlier. And yet, almost 63% of them successfully passed the matriculation exams. Of the same boys and girls who arrived at the ages of 9 to 11 years, from 12 to 14 years and at the age of 15-16 years, respectively, 60, 51 and 53.5% received matriculation certificates. In the 1998-1999 school year, of the 38 thousand students in grades 9-12 who arrived from the former USSR after 1989, 8.4% dropped out of school, and for teenagers who arrived after 1995, this figure was 15%. The scale of school dropout among adolescent repatriates is higher than the average in the system Jewish education". (ibid.)
emphasize the important fact that such high indicators for both countries were largely ensured by Soviet emigrants. In general, the percentage of people with higher or secondary specialized education among Jews on the eve of the collapse of the USSR was 64.8% - the highest figure in the country. respectively). Such was the potential with which the Jews of the USSR moved for permanent residence to Israel. At the time of the beginning of the mass emigration of Soviet Jews to Israel, the percentage of people with higher education in this country was 15.9% and another 9.5% with specialized secondary education. In light of the facts presented by Dr. Dubson, the comparison is clearly not in favor of the Jewish state. It turns out that in the anti-Semitic USSR, Jews lived much better in many respects than later in Israel.

Those who accuse the USSR of anti-Semitism scrupulously count all cases of anti-Semitism in the USSR. Well, here comparisons with Israel will also be very interesting.
Below are materials from the Israeli human rights movement Lamerhav.
The facts given here speak for themselves:
“The Israeli Child Welfare Council recorded more than 7,000 cases of violence against immigrant children in 1998-1999, with 80% of incidents between children occurring against a background of racism.”
In November 1998, the press reported that graffiti “Russian is our language” and “We survived Auschwitz, we will survive the school” appeared in the prosperous Makif Gimel school. It turned out that a certain class teacher forbade high school students from speaking Russian on school grounds. The children reacted and wrote graffiti. Since many of the students specialized in mass media, they managed to interest leading newspapers, national radio and TV in the incident. And then the school director made another pedagogical mistake and Rachel Tirosh called the police. This is not the first time the Russian language has been banned in Beersheba. Two months earlier, the head of the intensive care department of the Beersheva Hospital in Soroka, Professor Groman, forbade Russian-speaking staff to communicate with each other in Russian and even hung up posters with corresponding content. The Association for Supervision of the Quality of Power briefly described this attitude in one word - racism." http://www.russiandenver.50megs.com/panthers/panrus.htm

There are thousands of such stories. In 1995, Israeli Labor Minister Ora Namir publicly made openly racist attacks on the Russian community in Israel.
In any normal country, after such “speeches,” the minister would not only lose his post, but would also be brought to trial. But Mrs. Namir remained at her post and did not even think about apologizing.
A few years later, Israeli soldier Jan Shapshovich was killed in Ashkelon and his brother was seriously wounded. The only fault of the brothers was that they spoke Russian to each other. The killers got off with symbolic sentences and this was the only case when a trial of racists took place.
Racism in Israeli society has deep roots.
Here is what the Israeli dissident writer Israel Shamir writes about this:
“In the early fifties, at the top of the Ministry of Health, a monstrous conspiracy of doctors arose - to kill one hundred thousand “inferior” Jewish children. This conspiracy successfully achieved its goal. Who were the conspirators - associates of Dr. Mengele, Nazis, anti-Semites? No, leading Israeli Ashkenazi doctors, that is, of Russian-Polish origin, one hundred thousand Jewish children from the “racially alien” Moroccan community were subjected to radiation sickness. A new one came forward with this terrible accusation. documentary"Ringworm" by two young Israeli-Moroccan directors David Belhassen and Asher Khemias, premiered at the Tel Aviv Film Festival in October 2003, and was broadcast on Israeli television a few days ago, writes Israel Shamir http://www.israelshamir.net/ ru/ruart67.htm
Therefore, before looking for anti-Semites in the USSR and Russia, the Zionists should look for them first of all in Israel. If they wish, they can easily find their own racists.

Defenders of Jews also like to appeal to history.
Well, let's turn to history. Here we will find a lot interesting facts about Soviet anti-Semitism and the Zionists’ love for the Jewish people.
The first country to tell the world about the mass murder of Jews by the Nazis was the USSR. People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union V.M. Molotov, in his statement in November 1941, told the whole world about the murder of Jews at Babi Yar.
How did the Zionists react to this news?
Here is what Israel Shamir writes about this: “The pro-Zionist press obeyed the instructions of its leaders, and even when on March 16, 1942, the first evidence of the mass extermination of Jews, after Babyn Yar and other places, appeared in the press - on the basis of a letter from the Soviet People's Commissar Molotov. another day, March 17, 1942, an official refutation had already appeared in the Jewish newspapers of Palestine: talk about one hundred thousand killed Jews was fiction and exaggeration. Molotov wrote about 52 thousand Jews killed in Kyiv: the Zionist newspaper Davar reprinted his words with a caveat: according to our data, the majority of those killed in Kiev were not Jews at all. Other newspapers also did not accept Molotov’s data and gave their own data: only one thousand Jews died in Kyiv, BC quotes dozens of Zionist newspapers, and all of them have the same idea - there was no mass extermination. is being conducted, this is all fiction. “There is no need to inflate rumors,” the Hatzofe newspaper wrote the next day, “the people of Israel have so many troubles and there is no need to add fictitious ones.” warrax.net/82/israel.html
While the Red Army was fighting Nazism, “in 1942, in the midst of the destruction of European Jewry, when hundreds of thousands of Jews were expelled, tortured, burned in crematorium ovens, gassed, buried in mass graves, the leadership of the Freedom Fighters organization Israel (LEHI) decided to send its representatives to Turkey, to Ankara, to establish contact with the German embassy.

Their task was to convey a message to Romel, whose troops fought against Montgomery, that LEHI was ready to assist Nazi Germany in its war against the Allies, provided that after the occupation of the Middle East, a Jewish racial state would arise there and a large part of the Jewish population would live in it peace,” writes Mikhail Magid, an Israeli publicist.

And the future President of Israel, Chaim Weizmann, at a time when the Soviet Army was saving millions of Jews from mass extermination in Nazi death camps, declared on the offer to ransom Jews in German concentration camps: “All these Jews are not worth one Palestinian cow.”
Weizmann called the Holocaust “the pruning of dry branches.”
And even earlier, in 1937, Weizmann stated the following: “I ask the question: Are you able to resettle 6 million Jews in Palestine? I answer: No. From the tragic abyss I want to save only 2 million young people... And the old ones must disappear. .. They are dust, economic and spiritual dust in a cruel world... Only a young branch will live." (Rabbi M. Schonfeld “Victims of the Holocaust are accused. Documents and evidence of Jewish war criminals.” (New York, 1977).
History knows other evidence of the Zionists' care for the Jews.
Rezo (later Israel) Kasztner, the leader of the Zionists in Hungary, helped the Zionists deport Hungarian Jews to death camps, and Kasztner was not alone.
But the accusations of the defenders of Jews are addressed not to Kastner, Yitzhak Shamir, Chaim Weizman, but to Stalin and, in his person, to the Soviet government.
Anti-Semitism is attributed to Stalin, citing the “Doctors' Plot” and the story of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee (JAC).
I will not go into the details of these stories and the falsifications associated with them, for example, about the alleged involvement of Soviet intelligence services in the death of Mikhoels - this is the topic of a separate article. I will only note that in the “doctors’ case”, Jews made up only a part of those who were repressed.
And regarding the JAC, I would like to note the following. As you know, Solomon Mikhoels, chairman of the JAC, advocated the creation of Jewish autonomy in Crimea.
In this regard, it would be interesting to know the following:
How would the Israeli authorities react to the creation of Arab autonomy in places where Arabs live compactly in Israel, or the American authorities, to the idea of ​​​​creating a Jewish state in Florida or Chicago?
The statements of the Jewish encyclopedia about Stalin's plans to deport all Jews from European Russia to Siberia and Kazakhstan have not yet been documented.
Another accusation against Stalin is the persecution of Jews for their sympathies towards Israel. Immediately after the formation of the State of Israel, its leaders went over to the side of the United States, the main enemy of the USSR in the Cold War. In the USA, the most democratic country in the world, at that time there was a fierce persecution of not only communists, but also everyone suspected of sympathizing with the USSR.
Isn’t it true that against this background it seems completely incomprehensible why Stalin did not favor Jews who sympathized with the hostile state?!
And further. I remember well how in the mid-nineties, almost every tourist from the countries of the former USSR was looked at as potential mafiosi and prostitutes.
How can one not recall Krylov’s fable: “Why should godmothers work hard, isn’t it better to turn into godfathers for yourself?”
But let's return to Stalin.
The Jewish Encyclopedia accuses him of anti-Semitism, while forgetting a number of eloquent facts.
Throughout his life, Stalin consistently opposed anti-Semitism, calling it “an extreme form of racial chauvinism and the most dangerous relic of cannibalism.”
It was Stalin, being the People's Commissar for National Affairs, who did not support the demands of the Yevsektsiya to close the Hebrew theater "Habima" in Moscow.
During the era of Stalin, anti-Semitism was a serious crime and was severely punished by law.
But it's not only that.
The main thing is that Stalin is the actual creator of the state of Israel, which can safely be called Stalin’s illegitimate brainchild. After all, only thanks to the diplomatic pressure of the USSR on Great Britain, only thanks to the massive supply of Soviet weapons to the Jewish enclave in Palestine through Czechoslovakia and the massive training of military specialists in military camps deployed by Stalin throughout Eastern Europe, the Jewish state was created and survived the first Arab-Israeli war. .
In exchange for military and diplomatic support, the Soviet government saw the young Jewish state as its reliable ally in the Eastern Mediterranean.
But the Israeli government, led by Ben-Gurion, grossly violated all agreements with the USSR and defected to the Americans. I wonder how the USSR should have perceived such actions of its ally after this? To summarize all of the above: the facts presented in this publication do not fit well into both the concept of state anti-Semitism in the USSR and unofficial one. And if we compare the level of education and other social aspects by which we can judge where the Jews have reached great success, in the USSR, or Israel, I think that this comparison will largely not be in favor of Israel. In any case, in the Soviet Union, engineers and teachers, not to mention professors, regardless of nationality, did not work as janitors. That is why to me personally, the situation when some emigrant-former professor from Moscow, boasting of his merits in the country of origin, begins to talk about anti-Semitism in the former USSR, it seems very comical to me.

The Soviet Union has always prided itself on being a multinational country. Friendship between peoples was cultivated, and nationalism was condemned. Unless an exception was made in relation to Jews - history has left us with many examples of anti-Semitism in the USSR. This policy was never directly declared, but in reality the Jews had a hard time.

Old Guard

Among the leadership of the Bolshevik party, which was able to take power in 1917, there were many Jews. Disadvantaged in Russian Empire the people gave birth to a whole galaxy of revolutionaries who joined the party and were able to participate in the construction of a new political regime. And after the revolution, the abolition of the Pale of Settlement opened the way for a large Jewish population to cities and universities, to factories and public institutions - and, of course, up the party ladder.

If the struggle for power after the revolution had followed a different scenario, then perhaps no anti-Semitism would have appeared in the country. The leader of the state, for example, could be Leon Trotsky - aka Leiba Bronstein. But along with other opponents of Stalin, he was ousted from the leadership of the party. In those years, a joke was even born: “What is the difference between Moses and Stalin? Moses led the Jews out of Egypt, and Stalin led the Jews out of the Politburo.”

The repressed old guard included not only Jews: let’s say, in addition to Trotsky, a prominent oppositionist was Evgeniy Preobrazhensky, the son of a Russian archpriest. And some of the Jews found themselves on the other side of the barricades: the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, Maxim Litvinov, also known as Meer-Genoch Wallach, remained a supporter of Stalin.

Therefore, Stalin did not use the “Jewish” argument directly - he fought against his opponents, and not against other people. But anti-Semitic notes were used when necessary. During the dispersal of a Trotskyist demonstration in 1927, the crowd shouted “Beat the opposition Jews!”

Israeli question

After World War II, thanks to the support of the international community, Jews managed to recreate their own country - Israel. The Soviet Union initially supported this process, hoping for strong friendly relations with the new state in the Middle East - it supported the Jewish population of Palestine during the so-called War of Independence and did not oppose contacts of its Jewish diaspora with foreign countries.

The Cold War set its priorities: Israel preferred long-term cooperation with the West, and the USSR, in turn, took the opposite side of the conflict. Since then, for many years in the Arab-Israeli conflicts, Moscow has taken the side of the Arab states, branding “Israeli aggression” in the press, propaganda and diplomatic speeches.

During Israel's Six-Day War with the Arab coalition, many Soviet Jews in important public positions were pressured to openly condemn the policies of the Israeli state. Once in Moscow they even convened an entire press conference, at which several dozen scientists, representatives of the arts and military of Jewish origin officially stated a similar position.

The Soviet press sometimes asserted that Israel is an outpost and springboard of international imperialism in the Middle East, in which the local Jewish bourgeoisie exploits the working Jewish masses. Zionism, a political movement calling for the unification of the Jewish people, was declared the main enemy. Unfortunately, in pursuit of propaganda, publicists could cross the line and criticize Zionism so much that their creations hardly differed from anti-Semitic literature.

"Rootless cosmopolitans"

Cosmopolitans are those who put the interests of the world and all humanity above the interests of the nation and state. Since the deterioration of relations with Israel, cosmopolitans in the USSR were more often called representatives of a certain nationality, because, from the point of view of the Soviet authorities, the Jewish population in the USSR could put the interests of “world Zionism” (as well as the “world bourgeoisie” and “world imperialism”) above their Soviet citizenship.

As part of the campaign to combat cosmopolitanism, scientists, architects, and writers were criticized and even dismissed from their jobs, accused of “kowtowing to the West” and capitalist values. Many of them (though not all) were Jews. The Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, created during the war, was closed, and its members were arrested as American spies. Many Jewish cultural associations were also liquidated.

Despite the fact that the campaign ended with the death of Stalin, prejudice against Jews remained at the level of state policy until perestroika. Ekaterina Furtseva, Minister of Culture under Khrushchev and Brezhnev, publicly stated that the percentage of Jewish students should not exceed the percentage of Jewish miners.

Formally, again, no anti-Semitism policy was pursued. But there were significant restrictions: with the same admissions to universities, as well as for work in law enforcement agencies, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or the highest party apparatus. The reasons were not only suspicions of Jewish sympathy for Israel and the West, but also in general the desire not to lose sight of the ideological state of society - the intelligentsia of Jewish origin had long been distinguished by free-thinking.

KGB head Yuri Andropov and Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko in 1968 even proposed allowing Jews to leave for Israel. In their opinion, this would improve the reputation of the USSR in the West, release dissatisfied Jewish activists abroad, and at the same time use some of them for intelligence purposes.

As a result, hundreds of thousands of Soviet Jews emigrated over twenty years. There were some difficulties - not everyone was given an exit visa. This did not ease anti-Jewish restrictions in the Soviet Union. inner life, although, perhaps, it really did rid the country of at least some potentially dissatisfied citizens. Among whom were many talented people - scientists and cultural figures who were never able to realize themselves in their native country.

Continuing the theme, a story about

As you know, the majority of American Jews traditionally support Democrats. However, during the latest presidential elections in the United States, this support took truly radical forms. Many American Jewish organizations and media outlets have portrayed Republican candidate Donald Trump as a candidate supported by anti-Semitic organizations and a threat to Jews. The attacks of liberal-minded American Jews against the Donald Trump administration continue to this day, despite the fact that it has already become obvious that the new president is very far from anti-Semitism and, in particular, actively supports Israel. However, in parallel Lately The new US administration has begun to come under attack from anti-Semites who accuse it of neglecting US interests in order to defend the interests of Israel.

One example of this phenomenon is the targeted anti-Semitic campaign that is being waged in last days in American in social networks against Jerad Kushner, the son-in-law of US President Donald Trump, who was appointed by him as an adviser on Arab-Israeli relations. Jerad Kushner is Jewish, and his family is known for its support of Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank, to use Arabic terminology). The mentioned anti-Semitic campaign on the Internet reached a very impressive scale - more than 300 thousand responses. This was reported by the Anti-Defamation League, an influential non-governmental Jewish American organization that was created more than a hundred years ago (in 1913) with the declared goal of fighting anti-Semitism. According to her report, this anti-Semitic campaign on social networks was started by activists of the so-called “alt-right” in connection with the dismissal of the famous “alt-right” activist Stephen Bannon from the US National Security Council, which was signed by President Donald Trump on April 5.

However, no less, if not a greater impetus for the development of this campaign was the American missile attack against the Syrian government army air force base. Afterwards, the initiators of the campaign published posts on Twitter with slogans in the style of “Resign Kushner” and “Kushner’s War,” linking US intervention in the civil war in Syria with the influence of this Jewish adviser to the president, who, in their opinion, defends the interests of Israel .

Within days, the campaign gained momentum and became a mass anti-Semitic attack accusing the Donald Trump administration of trying to start a war in Syria to serve Israeli interests at the expense of American interests. Donald Trump has been accused of abandoning his original "America First" slogan and adopting an "Israel First" policy because he is under the influence of the manipulative Jerad Kushner and his other Jewish advisers.

The campaign has developed and continues to develop rapidly. If the first hint of it appeared already on April 6, that is, on the very day when the US Navy attacked the air base of the Syrian government army in response to a chemical attack in the province of Idlib, which killed 87 people, then within 24 hours there were 130 responses with accusations against Jerad Kushner. Many of them contained anti-Semitic remarks. Then neo-Nazi Internet sites and well-known anti-Semitic activists, such as David Ernest Duke (an American publicist known for his racist and anti-Semitic views, formerly headed one of the branches of the Ku Klux Klan), joined this campaign. They added new conspiracy theories to the campaign, which attracted more than 300,000 responses by April 10 (the day the Anti-Defamation League released its data).

“What began as a few anti-Semitic posts calling for Kushner to resign because he espouses ‘Jewish supremacist’ views quickly escalated into widespread attacks using anti-Semitic hate speech,” said the chairman of the Anti-Defamation League. Jonathan Greenblatt, “This shows how quickly hateful discourse can spread across social media, and it reminds us how much work needs to be done to combat hate.”

In search of historical parallels to the aforementioned anti-Semitic campaign directed against American intervention in the civil war in Syria, one can recall the American isolationists of the early years of World War II, who insisted that only Jews who wanted to pit America and Germany against each other were interested in the US entry into the war. for the sake of defending the interests of their ethnic group (that is, for the sake of protecting their fellow tribesmen in Europe from the Nazis) and to the detriment of the national interests of the United States. The rumors circulating in the country (they were reported in particular by the Israeli media citing American sources) according to which President Donald Trump was convinced to carry out a missile attack on the Syrian Air Force base by his daughter Ivanka, who converted to Judaism for in order to marry Jerad Kushner.

08:36 pm - Antisemitism in the USSR

Very interesting information about state anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union:

"Anti-Jewish purge", or rather, purification from the high percentage of Jewish dominance in the administrative, administrative and scientific structures began in the late 40s.
Led to it, according to historian G.V. Kostyrchenko, who cannot be suspected of anti-Semitism, “nepotism, nepotism and fraternity in nomenklatura structures.” As we will soon see, not only in them. G.V. Kostyrchenko continues:

“In ministries, organizations, and numerous offices, there was, of course, “Jewish” nepotism. This so-called Jewish dominance... was essentially a kind of manifestation of the group solidarity of the national minority.”

Considering that the post-war Jewish population of the country was a little more than 1%, let’s consider how it was distributed in different spheres of science, culture, etc.

In the management of Moscow theaters - 42%,
in the directorate of art exhibitions and panoramas – 40%,
in Mosgorestrad – 39%,
in the All-Russian Theater Society - 30%,
in the All-Union Touring and Concert Association - 38%.

Of the 87 directors, chief directors and chief administrators of circuses, 44 are Jews, 38 are Russians, 4 are Ukrainians, etc.

In military production:
plant directors - 15%,
chief engineers - 29.8%,
heads of design bureaus and research institutes – 25%.

TASS – 23%.
And, for example, in the radiotelegraph department of Ukraine - 49%.

In Odessa, at the end of 1949, among the teachers there were 38.7% Russians, 33% Jews, 24.5% Ukrainians.

In the Union of Soviet Composers there are 435 Russians, 239 Jews, 89 Armenians, etc. And at the Odessa State Conservatory, out of 263 students, 93 are Russian, 40 are Ukrainian, and 117 are Jewish.
The Moscow State Philharmonic has 312 full-time employees, 111 are Jews.
Of the 33 executives organizing concerts, 17 are Russian, 14 are Jewish.
In 1942, out of 12 leaders of the Bolshoi Theater, 10 were Jews, 1 was Russian.

In the Leningrad Pushkin House (USSR Academy of Sciences), 80% of Jews are on the academic council.

The situation is no better in physics.
The number of Jewish youth (in%) who graduated from the physics department of Moscow State University, in relation to Russians:

1938 – 46
1939 – 50
1940 – 58
1941 – 74
1942 – 98

As of October 1, 1948, Jewish physics researchers in the USSR Academy of Sciences - 24.8%, heads of physics departments in universities - 12.4%, teachers of departments in universities - 12%, graduate students in physics in universities and research institutes - 16.7 %.

From a memorandum of Agitprop of the Central Committee M.A. Suslov "On the selection and placement of personnel in the USSR Academy of Sciences":

"...In a number of institutes of the Academy of Sciences, there is a biased selection of personnel based on nationality, which leads to the formation of closed nationalist groups among scientific workers, bound by mutual responsibility. For example, at the Institute of Physical Problems, among the heads of laboratories, only 20% are Russian...

In the department of theoretical physics, headed by academician. Landau, all leading scientists are Jews, non-partisan. Academician Landau selects his employees and graduate students not on business, but on national grounds. Graduate students of non-Jewish nationality, as a rule, leave him “as underachievers.” There are no Russians in the seminar on theoretical physics led by Landau. Among the leading scientific staff of the Laboratory of Technical Applications, half are Jews...
The calculation group, headed by Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences Maiman N.S., is half staffed by people of Jewish nationality...

About 80% of the management of the laboratory of the Institute of Physical Chemistry, where work is carried out on special topics, is Jewish. All the theorists of the institute (Meiman, Levich, Volkenstein, Todes, Olevsky) are Jews. Head design department, scientific secretary, head. supply, head distribution of imported reagents are also Jews.
Former director of the institute, academician. Frumkin and his deputy Dubovitsky created mutual responsibility and nepotism; graduate students and doctoral students are selected solely on the basis of nationality. During the period from 1943 to 1949, under the leadership of Frumkin, Roginsky and Rebinder, 42 people prepared doctoral and candidate dissertations, of which 37 were Jews.

At the Physics Institute named after P.N. Lebedev, out of 19 heads of laboratories, 26% are Russian, 53% are Jewish. In the optical laboratory, led by academician. G.S. Lnandsberg, among the senior research staff there are 33% Russians, 67% Jews. At the Institute of Economics, out of 20 doctors of science, only 7 are Russian, etc.

In some branches of science, monopoly groups of scientists have formed, which are holding back the development of new scientific directions and are a serious obstacle to the advancement and growth of young scientific personnel.
So, for example, among theoretical physicists and physical chemists a monopoly group has formed: Landau, Leontovich, Frumkin, Frenkel, Ginzburg, Lifshitz, Grinberg, Frank, Kompaneets, Neumann and others. All theoretical departments of physical and physical-chemical institutes are staffed by supporters of this group, representatives of Jewish nationality.
For example, to the school of Acad. Landau includes 11 doctors of science; they are all Jews and non-party members... Landau’s supporters in all cases act as a united front against scientists who do not belong to their circle.”
Etc. and so on.

In the institutes of the USSR Academy of Sciences, the largest percentage among heads. departments of economics and law – 58.4%,
by department chemical sciences – 33%,
physics and mathematics – 27.5%,
technical – 25%.

On October 28, 1948, the number of teachers in philosophy departments was 22.2%,
political economy – 21.1%,
history of the USSR - 13%,
Marxism-Leninism – 19.8%.
Total 19.9% ​​in departments social sciences. In large cities – 26.3%.

As we can see from these figures, the post-war situation was completely abnormal. Restrictions, therefore, were a forced measure... In any country, a balance is maintained between the majority and the minority. Because of the war, it was disrupted in the USSR and, having begun to be restored in the early 50s, was never fully restored...

Characteristics of men