Colin ShindlerThe call for the establishment of a national Conference on Soviet Jewry would be a welcome development in co-ordinating future activities and would satisfy many of the complaints now being made. Until a few months ago, there were four definable groups within the campaign. The “old guard” centred very much on the Board’s Soviet Jewry … Read more
Despite the fact that eight Moscow activists were arrested on Monday following a demonstration, Soviet Jews bravely and defiantly went ahead with their celebrations of the Festival of Purim. Some went to the Moscow Central Synagogue for the traditional reading of the story of Esther while others met in private homes. The most poignant gathering … Read more
The Soviet propaganda against the Brussels conference which began weeks ago, went into top gear this week. In almost a carbon copy of the Soviet attack on the first Brussels conference in 1971, “house Jews” were brought out to condemn the event. A Tass dispatch quoted from numerous letters from Soviet Jews, attacking the conference. … Read more
The Soviet rejection of the trade bill came as no surprise to most Jewish activists in the .ISSR. The situation had deteriorated greatly in the last few months, with harassment intensified and an ever-growing list of exit visa applications rejected. But they are nevertheless maintaining an optimistic front. Speaking at a meeting of Moscow Jews … Read more
SAKHAROV SPEAKS. Edited and with a foreword by Harrison E. Salisbury. 245 pages. (Collins and Harvill Press £3.00. This collection of Andrei Sakharov’s writings is a product of a great deal of work between the Academician himself and the well-known American journalist, Harrison Salisbury. Nearly half the book is taken up with Sakharov’s famous essay, … Read more
“SOVIET ethics are based on Marxism — like it or not.” This in a sense symbolised Don Monteith’s recent article on the Jewish problem. Yet one cannot take such• a polarised attitude to such a complex problem. Most quotes in the article came from Soviet propaganda sources which have been dissected countless times in the … Read more
Yuli Tartakovsky , a 27 year old Kiev engineer who had applied to leave the Soviet Union for Israel, may now be conscripted to the Red Army although he was previously exempted on the express orders of Soviet Defence Minister Marshal Grecho. the officer who had originally informed Tartakovsky of the exemption told his mother … Read more
THE GULAG ARCHIPELAGO 1918 – 1956. by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. 660 pages. (Collins & Havill Press). £3. A leading dissident authoress, Lydia Chukovskaya, was recently expelled from the Soviet writers’ union. At the end of a two-hour meeting to condemn her works, she was allowed to speak and told the literary bureaucrats that Russian literature … Read more
As President Nixon left the Soviet Union last week, many of the Jews arrested for the duration of his visit released from prison. They had held at Spulthovka, some 93 miles south of Moscow, far from Nixon’s itinerary. Among those released in the initial batch were Vladimir Slepak and the organisers of the abortive international … Read more
President Nixon’s visit to the Soviet Union has been proceeded by unprecedented preventive measures to silence and control active Jews who wish to emigrate to Israel. The KGB fears apparently that Jewish activists should be controlled during the presence of the many foreign journalists who are covering the Nixon visit. nearly 50 people have been … Read more