Ironic Asylum in East Berlin
HEILBRUNN, JACOB
THE EXODUS OF SOVIET JEWS-2 Ironic Asylum in East Berlin By Jacob Heilbrunn East Berlin "The Kristallnacht might come at any time" says a young Russian Jew. "I am waiting for it every day."...
...Renowned throughout Europe for its splendor and expense, the synagogue was supposed to demonstrate that Jews, having attained equality with Christians, no longer had to conceal their houses of worship in back alleys...
...He is one of perhaps a thousand Soviet Jews who have fled here—and there are new arrivals daily (a phenomenon that may end with the unification of the two Germanies...
...they are not religious and displayed a minimal interest in their heritage...
...Then, as one of the first acts of the new East German government, Prime Minister Lothar de Maizière acknowledged in April that East Germany, too, bore responsibility for the Holocaust...
...Maizière's reversal of the longstanding East German denial of any culpability for Nazi atrocities apparently was interpreted by Soviet Jews as yet another sign that they could safely seek refuge in East Germany—and might even be accorded special treatment...
...Thus pupils come from several countries, ranging from Ethiopia to Poland...
...When there is anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union, our President Gorbachev does nothing...
...By contrast, everyone was willing to speak of their reasons for fleeing the USSR...
...Third, they were able to travel to East Germany as tourists without waiting for exit visas...
...Towering over Oranienburgerstrasse, though, is the celebrated Liberale synagogue, blackened and gutted, which held up to 3,000 worshippers...
...Perhaps the Berlin synagogue can now serve as well as a tangible symbol of hope for those Jews fleeing the dark prospect of a Soviet Kristallnacht...
...Today the historic workers' quarter is well-known as arough section of East Berlin favored by so-called skinheads, young neo-Nazis...
...He grinned wryly...
...There are even a few Palestinians, Friedländer says, speaking in somewhat exalted tones of an ethnic melting pot...
...Communist Party members, high-ranking Army officers and prominent intellectuals belong to Pamyat...
...Perhaps their recent experience of Soviet anti-Semitism is more vivid to them than the older Nazi horrors...
...Because organizations like Pamyat are allowed to hold demonstrations with impunity, they believe that anti-Semitism is sanctioned by the State...
...After all, they were ostensibly fleeing Communism...
...Jacob Heilbrunn, a previous contributor to the NL, has also written for Commentary and the National Interest...
...The plaque on the synagogue further states that the facade remains as a warning against anti-Semitism...
...together we walked up two flights of stairs to a modest suite...
...Second, both in physical terms and psychologically they feel closer to home here...
...Although he is speaking in East Berlin, and is afraid to tell me his name, he does not fear a pogrom in Germany but rather in his native Soviet Union...
...The fact that the Soviet Jews do not stand out is therefore clearly an advantage...
...Reports of rising anti-Semitism in the USSR have of course been circulating in the West for some time...
...Her advice, she lamented, has been virtually ignored...
...Me too...
...One man asked me testily, "Why don't you live in Israel...
...But school director Friedländer left no doubt that many of her Jewish students have retained their Socialist habits...
...Otto von Bismarck, then Minister-President of Prussia, attended its dedication on September 5, 1866...
...According to Friedländer, only a few realize the difficulties they will face in a united Germany...
...The class I attended was led by the diminutive, energetic Herr Wehrer Schnure...
...Furthermore, because of episodes of drunkenness and brawling, some of their disgruntled neighbors have formed a committee with the mission of throwing them out of Ahrensfelder...
...Irene Runge, a sociologist at Humboldt University and the press spokesman for the Jewish Cultural Union, gave me the background to the exodus of Jews to East Berlin...
...In 1943, the synagogue suffered further damage...
...Classes are held in the evenings, because the instructors are volunteers who contribute their spare time...
...Jewish cemeteries in Moscow, Minsk and Tbilsi, among others, have been vandalized, and the Soviet leader has maintained a discreet distance from the problem...
...Since rents will shoot up following unification, she has urged that apartments be found as quickly as possible...
...The rest "want to cling to their illusions and fail to recognize that they have exchanged one problem for another...
...Yefim Kopman, from Riga, noted that for him living in the Soviet Union was doubly difficult: He was not only a Jew but also a Russian living in Latvia...
...In addition, the influx of Soviet Jews has infused Jewish life here with new meaning...
...The Soviet Jews I spoke with seemed baffled when I asked if they feared anti-Semitism in Germany...
...another student jokingly cried out as he walked by...
...Asked to describe specific anti-Semitic incidents they had experienced, some students told of discovering threatening letters in their mailboxes...
...Perhaps most important is the East German's general hatred of A usländer, or foreigners...
...To be sure, they appear to be confining themselves to assaulting Hausbesetzer, or squatters, the young radicals who occupy abandoned buildings...
...But its imposing proportions, said the anti-Semitic Prussian historian Heinrich von Treitschke, made clear the "power of the Jews," andit soon became a favorite target of anti-Semites...
...it was hit by an Allied bomb...
...But a small sign at Dunckerstrasse 11 announced that I had found the Sprachschule Deutsch als Fremdsprache (School for German as a Foreign Language...
...others mentioned the Star of David being painted on the walls of their houses...
...With its deserted streets, trash piled high on sidewalks, crumbling buildings, and abandoned stores, it seemed an unlikely setting for teaching Soviet Jews...
...Today the Liberale is surrounded by scaffolding and is being reconstructed...
...Nevertheless, East German neo-Nazis have established a central headquarters in East Berlin...
...Indeed, a walk to Oranienburgerstrasse, just five minutes removed from Unter den Linden, reveals a more vigorous Jewish revival than one might have expected...
...This enclave affords them little opportunity to learn German and integrate themselves into the society...
...Meanwhile, it was pointed out to me, he has publicly praised the patriotism of a number of anti-Semitic writers, including Victor Astaf'ev—who has called for firing Jews from any position connected with Russian culture...
...Silence...
...Early last February, she said, the Union sent an open letter to the East German Round Table urging that Soviet Jews be permitted asylum here, and it was read on television...
...Six of the 10 were in their 20s, theother four in their 40s and 50s...
...The Jewish Congregation of Berlin has its offices and library there, and the Jewish Cultural Union will be moving into the same building...
...The Berlin Police Department immediately called in the Fire Department to extinguish the flames: The synagogue, it appeared, enjoyed a protected status as a historic monument...
...It would be difficult to disagree...
...But it is not difficult to find pro-Nazi slogans scrawled on walls—and the grave of Bertolt Brecht (not a Jew) was defaced with the epithet "Jewish pig...
...Despite the students' unwillingness toconfront the irony of Soviet Jews emigrating to East Berlin, various factors that played a role in their choice emerged as we talked...
...A young former Muscovite said rhetorically, "You have heard of Sons of the Fatherland and Pamyat, right...
...It is difficult to know how much credence one should place in the newcomers' contention that they preferred to go to a familiar society...
...The terror it inspires, however, first became starkly apparent to me during a visit to a school I had been told about devoted largely to helping Soviet refugees learn German, located in Prenzlauerberg...
...Director Vera SchmidtFriedländer, a retired professor of German literature, explains that while the school was founded expressly for Soviet Jews, she refuses to turn away any applicants...
...Around thecorner, in Tucholskystrasse, asynagogue has been opened by Addas Israel, an Orthodox Jewish organization...
...Yet their hostility tends to be directed at visibly recognizable foreigners: Arabs, Asians, Africans, gypsies...
...Soon afterward they started to come...
...Venturing into the courtyard, I met a Russian teenager...
...It consisted of a Hungarian and 10 Soviet Jews from such disparate cities as Riga, Leningrad, Moscow, and Odessa...
...The influential writer Valentin Rasputin, who was elected to the Congress of People's Deputies from the Soviet Writer's Union, and whom Gorbachev recently appointed to his Presidential Council, is a member...
...All refused to concede any irony in their decision to emigrate to East Berlin, and appeared to resent my raising the issue...
...As the austere plaque on the Liberale synagogue notes, during the Kristallnacht on November 9, 1938, the Nazis set the synagogue on fire...
...A second Leningrader said the reason he fled the Soviet Union was a common one: "Fear of the future —normal Jewish fear...
...Most of the Soviet Jews who have emigrated to East Berlin are housed in two large complexes in Ahrensf elder, an hour outside the city...
...No fees are charged either...
...To begin with, Israel simply appears to hold little attraction for them...
...They are convinced the State will procure jobs and permanent housing for them, she said, and find it incomprehensible that the school is essentially a private, philanthropic venture...
...This meant that he had a "Russian-Jewish problem...
...In the past months, several new religious and cultural organizations have been founded by East German Jews...
...An engaging Leningrader declared, "When anti-Semites desecrated Jewish graves in France, President Mitterrand immediately went to show his outrage and express his sympathy to the Jews...
...On the Jewish New Year 5700 (1939), the Nazis, after painting the synagogue's golden dome black to deter bombing attacks, began to use it as a storage area for the Wehrmacht...
Vol. 73 • September 1990 • No. 12
