Rosh Hashanah in Kiev
RAAB, SELWYN
FEAR OF BEING FORGOTTEN Rosh Hashanah in Kiev BY SELWYNRAAB It was the evening rush hour in Kiev. On a main street hundreds of passersby clogged the sidewalks while long queues gathered in front...
...The most common reason given by Soviet authorities for denying an exit permit is that the applicant or a relative is a security risk...
...Since there is no time limit on how long a visa can be denied, refusniks face the prospect of a lifetime of waiting in vain...
...Acting as if he were seeking directions, this middle-aged man whom we shall call Yuri stopped in front of me, whispered my name and then added in German: "Follow behind me, but we must not talk...
...The door opened a crack, there was a smattering of Russian and we were inside...
...If you decide to leave you know that not only will you be considered a traitor but so will all of your close relatives," said one man...
...a new contributor, is a reporter for the New York Times...
...Possibly their worst fear is that they are being forgotten by the West...
...How can people in the United States or in the West understand or care about what is happening to us...
...Once fired, there was the threat of arrest for being a "social parasite...
...Was someone else trailed...
...After asking if I wanted to meet with him and other refusniks, he arranged a rendezvous for the next evening at a designated stop...
...It was the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, one of the most solemn of Jewish observances...
...It is not an easy decision, yet for most of us there is no other choice...
...Several of those present who had been waiting three or more years for visas said they rarely heard any more from groups or individuals in Western countries...
...There, we made the enormous descent into the spotless Kiev Metro, or subway, for a 20-min-ute ride in a packed train, away from the center of the city, across the Dnieper River...
...The number of Jewish emigres from Russia is expected to reach a record 50,000 this year...
...that their plight has become of little concern to anyone else...
...A woman said her consciousness as a Jew began as a teenager, especially when she walked her dog...
...I knew what it was from their anti-Semitic jokes...
...But who can I complain to...
...Because someone there might be a government informer, he advised me against distributing any Western books or magazines...
...But he knew about the Rosh Hashanah party the previous night...
...Furthermore, he advised me that by attending such meetings 1 might become involved in espionage charges because several of the people I had met possessed "state secrets...
...You can never be sure who can be trusted...
...Crates also served as chairs for most of the guests...
...The refusniks believe that Soviet officials in the Ukraine, a region with a chronic history of severe anti-Semitism, have been particularly harsh against Jews wanting to emigrate...
...Kiev, long a center of Jewish culture in the Ukraine, has about 200,000 Jews...
...At the party, several persons told of having been arrested last summer on unfounded charges of "hooliganism...
...On a main street hundreds of passersby clogged the sidewalks while long queues gathered in front of bus and trolley stops...
...More probably, he was a security or police agent...
...So far as is known, there was no commemorative meeting this year at Babi Yar...
...Even in the broadcasts on the BBC and the Voice of America we hear our government propaganda repeated that more Jews than ever before are being allowed out," a man said sadly...
...The second was of the Western Wall in Jerusalem that was part of the Second Temple, and the plaza in front of it where Jews come to pray...
...But even in the thick crowd a man whom 1 had never met recognized me...
...1 don't know many of these people," he said uneasily...
...This also gave them an opportunity to comfort each other over the mutual problems they faced for having applied for emigration visas...
...Many had brought different dishes of food or vodka or wine...
...Such reading material could be considered anti-Soviet propaganda, he warned...
...They were unaware that traditionally Rosh Hashanah was marked by prayer, not gay festivities...
...The first was of Ma-sada, the ancient Jewish fortress whose defenders are said to have committed suicide rather than allow themselves to be taken by the Romans following a long seige...
...Inside, however, the vestibules were shabbily spartan...
...When the table was cleared, a slide projector was brought out...
...Or was one of the refusniks at the dinner table an informer...
...Squeezed into the living room of the small, one-bedroom apartment were more than 30 people, mostly in their 20s or early 30s...
...During dinner, the stories that flowed were remarkably similar as these Russians who had grown up atheists or ignorant of Judaism and its customs told why they had changed in their late teens or early 20s...
...There is no doubt, however, that the Soviet government had been vigilantly watching a relative handful of refusniks innocently celebrate Rosh Hashanah...
...These people were accustomed to searches and arrests for possessing Zionist or anti-Soviet materials...
...No one will know what happens to us...
...For each the decision to seek a visa was wrenching...
...Was I followed to the party...
...Amtd the grim conversation, Rosh Hashanah was celebrated with the now almost universally known Eastern European Jewish delicacy, gefilte fish, and with ample glasses of vodka...
...I was on vacation, traveling in Russia...
...Dinner plates were set on a makeshift table, lengthened by boards propped on wooden crates...
...The next day I was visited in my hotel by a well-dressed Russian who introduced himself as the head of the Kiev branch of Intourist, the official government tourist agency...
...None had any religious education, which is virtually impossible to obtain in the Soviet Union...
...One man described how everyone in the section of the plant where he worked had gotten a salary increase except him...
...Thus conversations froze with each knock on the door...
...The other children would point to me and sing a song, 'A Dog is a Yid and a Yid is a Dog,'" she recalled...
...From the outside, the apartment building looked fresh, sturdy and modern...
...Unlike Moscow and Leningrad, there is no foreign press here, we get few visitors or tourists...
...most of the others in the apartment had never heard of either...
...One man explained the significance of both places...
...All of them said they were refusniks...
...Moreover, similar penalties and har-assments often were inflicted on the entire family...
...But there are more Jews applying every day, so the percentage of those who want to leave and are not allowed to is also rising...
...Although technically the Rosh Hashanah party was not a violation of Soviet law, they knew that banding together to toast the Jewish New Year could, in Kiev, be twisted into an illicit underground activity...
...The songs at the dinner table were in Russian, except for one rendition of "Mein Yid-dishe Mama," sung by a woman who knew Yiddish...
...When the door opened and another re-fusnik entered, not the police or KGB, the conversation and gaiety resumed...
...Yes, the total may be up...
...A guest had two slides that had been smuggled into the country...
...One man, who served as the unofficial leader of the evening, said neighbors had told him that his apartment had been entered twice recently by plainclothes policemen...
...The exact size of the Jewish population in Russia is uncertain, but it is believed to be over 2 million...
...Before 1 left New York, a friend familiar with the emigration problems of Russian Jews had asked me to contact Yuri in the Ukrainian capital...
...Groping for some way to express their Jewish-ness on a holy day, they decided to celebrate together...
...Long before the party ended, Yuri departed...
...On my first night in Kiev I telephoned Yuri...
...Now, following him as discreetly as possible, 1 boarded a trolley for a brief ride to Kiev University...
...My friend in New York, without news about him for many months, was concerned for his safety...
...Yet despite the merry atmosphere, an undercurrent of tension could be felt...
...He refused to show any Intourist credentials and declined to spell his name in English, a language he spoke fluently...
...Other persons reported that they had been cautioned privately by officials to advise refusniks against demonstrating or appearing on September 29 at Babi Yar, the valley at the outskirts of the city where on that date in 1941 the Nazis slaughtered more than 70,000 Jews...
...I didn't need a reason," he said...
...Emerging from the subway trip, I again followed-at a decent 20 paces-for still another trolley ride...
...I'm afraid they are either bugging my flat or hiding things they can later find and use against me," he said...
...There is no way of knowing...
...We are isolated here," a woman said...
...His fears were to prove justified...
...Selwyn Raab...
...The consensus among refusniks, they noted forlornly, was that if a person was denied a visa for more than three years, the hope of emigrating was virtually nil...
...The apartment was sparsely furnished...
...They realized there was little hope of being allowed to leave, and the mere act of applying meant almost certain punishment-losing one's job, apartment and other amenities, such as a telephone...
...While Jews elsewhere would be attending services in synagogues, none of those present knew how to pray in Hebrew...
...Finding the right apartment, Yuri knocked...
...He was a "refusnik," a Jew who had been refused permission to emigrate by the Soviet government...
...Finally, some five minutes later, we both alighted and entered one of the identical-looking housing complexes that dominate the outlying landscape of the city...
...the elevator groaned and lurched...
...Indeed, the gathering in Kiev was more like the usual New Year's Eve party than a religious observance...
...The authorities," he warned, were concerned about my meeting in an apartment with "people who are not good citizens . . . who are provocateurs...
...As it carried us upstairs, Yuri, who spoke in German and crippled English, said he was uncertain who would be at the "gathering...
Vol. 62 • November 1979 • No. 21
