Traveling Among Jews in the USSR

...In any event, the net effect of the Davies testimony and the Gwertzman story, as President Nixon paves the way for his journey to Moscow, has been to give many people the impression that things are really not so bad for Jews in the Soviet Union today Well, they are...

...On the other hand, Bernard Gwertzman, being an experienced reporter, accurately focused on the only "hard news" in Davies' appearance before the House subcommittee Clearly it was intended, as Gwertzman said, "to counter the impression that three million Soviet Jews were undergoing unusual ordeals " What is puzzling, given his considerable first-hand knowledge and in the light of his own dispatches from Moscow, is why Gwertzman did not place this in meaningful perspective It may be argued that a reporter's task is merely to record But surely, as Timesmen like Max Frankel and A IN Rosenthal taught us long ago, this is inadequate to the journalism of the '70s...

...intense fear 2. a) a person or thing that causes intense fear b) the quality of causing dread, terribleness—still exists During close to three weeks in the Soviet Union, which happened to span the major Jewish holidays of Yom Kippur, Succoth and Simchat Torah, I had occasion to witness some of its many faces Consider the following notes Kiev, capital of the Ukraine, the USSR's third largest city, Jewish population 200-250 thousand, has one synagogue seating approximately 600 Located in the rundown, working-class Podol District, it is entered from a large courtyard at the side of the building Yom Kippur morning the courtyard, like the synagogue itself, was filled to overflowing Walking into the crowd my wife and I received only a few frozen nods in response to the traditional holiday greeting...

...Small delegations from 14 of the Soviet Union's largest cities were on hand for the occasion One didn't make it The delegates from Kharkov, two men and a woman, were removed from the coach they were traveling in halfway through their journey Ordered to return home, they protested, were jaded, and released 24 hours later on condition that they go back to Kharkov The delegates from Odessa were taken into custody as they were entering Kiev Around noon, the police decided they could continue the trip if they wanted to do so badly enough to walk the rest of the way Police cars were assigned to crawl along fore and aft...

...Within minutes an official of the synagogue approached us When we twice refused his invitation to come m, he leaned over and whispered into my ear in Yiddish 'It is forbidden to stand here " I shrugged He disappeared, only to return with a second official...

...Simchat Torah night roughly 4,000 Leningraders danced and sang in the courtyard and street fronting the synagogue, closed off for the holiday by the police A young man asked what we thought of the celebration We said it was very nice "I don't like it," he responded "You think all these people are Jews7 Half of them are agents " He seemed morose and we moved away Ten minutes later, the festivities almost ended, we started to leave With another man who had begun speaking to us At the corner, three young men looking like East Village denizens staging a mugging darted out of the crowd in our direction "Criminal police, come with us," said a tall disheveled blond, flashing an identification card I asked what was wrong "Criminal police, he answered, showing the identification card again "Ask no questions " A policeman in uniform whom we had seen in front of our hotel, on Nevsky Prospekt and elsewhere without thinking anything of it, approached the criminal agents and seemed to be saying to no avail that my wife and I should be left alone He accompanied us to a room in the basement of a nearby apartment house, reached through a pitch-black entry tunnel We were told to stand against the wall The uniformed officer behind the desk said nothing The Russian picked up with us, in his early 30s, was pushed forward and ordered to empty his pockets Apparently unsatisfied, the tall agent searched him thoroughly, uncovering a Star of David on a thin chain He asked curt questions Why was the Russian talking with us7 What was he doing at the synagogue7 The Russian protested his treatment Fifteen minutes had passed when the familiar policeman leaned across the desk and whispered into the officer's ear He glanced at us and said something in a low voice to the tall agent, who turned around and said my wife and I could go Leading us out of the dark tunnel he assumed a courteous manner I ventured to ask what the problem was He started to say something about citizens not being allowed to have dollars, but didn't make much sense We heard no more of the Russian Our experience was not unique Nor is Assistant Secretary Davies unaware of the perils facing Soviet Jews The full text of his statement, in fact, presents a more balanced picture of the situation than one might gather from the Tunes story Having read it, I suppose it could most accurately be described as even-handed, in the sense attached to that adjective after William Scranton used it three years ago upon his return from a Middle-East fact-finding mission for President Nixon...

...The people separated to create a path, staring stone-faced as we were led to the door Inside, my wife was placed beside a trusted old matron in the large U-shaped balcony reserved for women, I was escorted to the vacant end of a halt-empty row at the very front of an otherwise packed auditorium I searched in vain for a face (other than my wife's) younger than 60, male or female Later in the service, as the cantor concluded an overly dramatic rendition of a prayer for the state, a woman in her 80s??seated almost directly above him, her crumpled face framed in a white babushka??let out a cry of protest (It translates badly from the Yiddish as "Not on my back1") Other women began grumbling, prompting the sexton to admonish, "Wives, did you come to beg the Almighty for a good year or to make noise...

...SOME FACES OF TERROR Traveling Among Jews in the USSR BY MYRON KOLATCH Jew Of greater significance, the gas chamber and political assassination seemed to have been selected as the sole yardsticks for measuring oppression, as it other less immediately final methods might not ultimately be equally insidious And to this strangely naive view Davies added the suggestion that, after all, Jewish and non-Jewish dissidents receive equal punishment under Soviet law, it is deplorable that Jews are deprived of the institutions they need to preserve their cultural and religious identity, but we ought not to become overly exercised about a situation that actually shows signs of improvement No one can say precisely how many Soviet Jews feel themselves threatened today, or how many more would emigrate if they were free to do so in accordance with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Rational discussion of their plight is made difficult, too, by a tendency to speak of it in absolute terms The reality, of course, is that there have been changes for the better and worse over relatively brief periods of time, and conditions vary from place to place at the same time But terror, assuming the word retains its primary dictionary meanings...

...Nevertheless, with the 30th Yahtzeit falling on Yom Kippur day, the turnout was unprecedented For close to an hour, as a local party leader, a district council member, a female factory worker, a general, etc , took to the microphone to laud the heroic sacrifices of Russians and Ukrainians without ever once mentioning the Jewish slaughter, everyone listened compliantly Everyone, that is, except a number of tense young people standing impatiently off to one side of the functionary-laden portable rostrum Adherents of what has loosely come to be known as the Jewish Liberation Movement, they had attempted since the summer to hold a separate commemorative ceremony at Babi Yar, each time they approached the area, the KGB was waiting for them A week before the official event, the secret police called in the movement's known leaders for talks They wanted a promise that no trouble would be stirred in the large crowd that was expected The promise was refused Two hours of sharp exchanges produced a compromise In return for their cooperation the dissidents would be formally allowed to hold their own ceremony immediately afterward...

...Thx atmosphere among Jews in Moscow is markedly different At the 1,500-seat Arkhi-pova Street synagogue panic does not set in when an outsider arrives Travelers from other countries are common in the capital and the problems they present are coped with in relaxed fashion The pensioners who make up the bulk of the congregation, which fills about 40 per cent of the sanctuary, inquire about life in America and Israel, black anti-Semitism, and Bobby Fischer The women particularly complain bitterly about the absence of Jewish schools, the men sigh that "there is no Jewish life...

...To the delight of their friends, the Odessa delegates arrived just in time for the second ceremony It was dark now, most of the people had dispersed Eight wreaths were brought forward, each bearing a different quotation from the Prophets in Hebrew lettering (mostly referring to the ingathering of the Israelites), plus such inscriptions as "From the Jews of Leningrad,' "From the Jews of Moscow " Officials at the scene, unable to read the sayings of the Prophets and no doubt fearful of being compromised, tore them away in the course of a brief altercation But Kaddish, the mourner's prayer, was said, and Yizkoi, a service of remembrance, was recited The old people of the synagogue had dutifully participated in what was a nonevent, the young people, who said they never set foot in the Kiev synagogue because they consider it a trap run by informers and agents, had somehow mounted a deeply religious memorial...

...To beg for a good year," chorused some of the women in weak response The old woman would not be cowed, this time shouting something I could not quite make out Visibly upset, the sexton shouted back, "It's not nice Be quiet There are people from the free world here " "Let them hear," she answered defiantly More typical was the resigned attitude of a man who had been sitting among the synagogue leaders He was right behind me as I went out to get some fresh air An intellectual of sorts, better dressed than most, he conceded that it was not really possible to live a "Jewish life" in Kiev, and observed "When there were many synagogues, and schools for the children, and kosher meat, there was much trouble for the Jews Now there is only one synagogue and there is little trouble " He did not seem aware of the next logical step Many younger people are, however, and rather ironically they do not want to be around when that step is taken They range in age from 18-50, often call themselves cultural Jews, and have been the object of much of the regime's terror Their militancy, even as it gives encouragement to others, has separated them from their tired, frightened elders We were to see the division manifest itself later that afternoon at Babi Yar Yom Kippur this year also marked the 30th anniversary of the Nazi slaughter of 34,000 Kiev Jews in that ravine on the outskirts of the city By 6pm well over 3,000 people had gathered in a sloping meadow across from the ravine, where a marker promises a monument will one day be erected to those murdered at Babi Yar Years earlier Jews had begun to gather there spontaneously, in accordance with their tradition of remembering the dead, by 1968, the government coopted the proceedings...

...recurrent plaint But relaxation??attributed in part to the presence of foreign embassies and journalists—has not eliminated intimidation In Kiev, engineers or scientists or teachers applying for emigration to Israel are lowered to the bottom rungs of their profession, in Moscow they generally are fired and then harassed One family, existing by selling off its possessions because the husband and wife had been dismissed from their prestigious jobs, was visited recently by a policeman He had been sent to find out why no one in the household was working Playing the game, the wife explained their predicament On his way out, the policeman turned from the door and said, "You know, it is not so bad to fall so low when you aim so high " Not many encounters involving attempts to leave for Israel, though, have that kind of conclusion The experience of a senior mathematician is illustrative The director of the institute where he works convened a meeting of its 600 members one evening to discuss the matter of supplying a character reference to emigration authorities He opened the session by praising Soviet society, stressing its opposition to discrimination, and demanding that a colleague believed to be loyal tell why he had suddenly turned traitor The mathematician rose to explain that his desire to go to Israel was based on personal, not ideological, considerations His parents had emigrated to Palestine three decades ago, his aged mother was close to death and he merely wanted to be with her In the ensuing discussion from the floor a coworker accused him of being a Zionist, a second questioned whether he really had a mother in Israel, a third cautioned that he would be an asset to Zionist imperialist designs, a fourth said those who fail to appreciate the Soviet system should not be allowed to leave, a fifth declared he should simply let his mother die The ordeal began at 6 p in and did not end until midnight...

...Similar stories can be heard in Lenmgrad, where the hijacking trials have spread acute fear in the Jewish population Yet the justifiably proud city is something of an enigma Students afraid of university expulsion and activists under close surveillance stay away from the tightly controlled 2,500-seat synagogue on Lermontov-sky Street, one of the most beautiful in Europe But young working men and women do come, and older people eagerly engage foreigners in conversation...