Purely Commentary
The Russian Enigma—the Puzzling Inconsistencies
Russia is an enigma. The Kremlin, its leaders, its Novosti News
Agency which feeds so much material to American newspapers,
puzzle us.
Thousands of Jews have been granted visas to settle in Israel,
yet there are recurring reports that the doors will be shut again.
Distinguished Russians had supported the Zionist movement, yet
the great libertarian principles of Zionism now are being branded as
subversive. Suddenly, a movement that strives for the liberation of
oppressed Jews has become anathema!
The Russian attitude, in view of the flirtations with the Arabs in
the power struggle in the Middle East, are understandable. If Arabs
are to be appeased, Zionism must become a bogey, the means with
which to attack Jews who are building the Jewish State. Yet, the Com-
munists who often evince ability as statesmen are deluding them-
selves into believing that the world has taken the anti-Zionist nonsense
seriously.
Most puzzling is not only the USSR propaganda which often gives
the impression of fright—note the many condemnations of the Jewish
Defense League as if it were undermining the Soviets' existence—but
also the frequent friendly messages which are intended to give the
impression that there is a real paradise for Jews in Russia.
Never before has the Russian production of releases about Biro-
bidzhan been as extensive as now. Why the effort to prove that "an
autonomous Jewish state" is functioning in the Siberian north; why
the craving for publicity for a few Jewish singers; why the emphasis
on the predominance of Jewish scientists in the USSR, when large
numbers of Jews are pleading for visas to leave Russia?
Indeed, if Russia is such a paradise, why not seek the friendship
of Israel and of world Jewry instead of conducting a campaign
against both?
There have been some attacks on Russian installations in recent
months. Last week the Soviet Embassy in Washington again registered
a protest with the United States government, demanding that effective
measures be taken "to ensure normal conditions" for its representa-
tives. The protest stated:
"Most recently disgraceful incidents have taken place with fascist-
mongering Zionists from the Jewish Defense League breaking into the
premises of the New York missions of Intourist and Aeroflot wreaking
havoc there and threatening the staff of these institutions with physical
violence. On April 22 they exploded a bomb in the New York premises
of Amtorg, where Soviet citizens are employed, which inflicted serious
material damage.
"It is clear, therefore, that there is an organized campaign of terror
and violence against Soviet institutions and citizens in the United
States."
The Jewish Defense League has consistently denied that it had a
role in the cited incidents. But just because JDL qualified the denials
of vandalism with assertions that they approve of them does not make
the small group, which has no Zionist affiliations whatsoever, an
element to be transformed into a world power. But as long as Russia
links Zionism with fascism, the USSR tactics are presented in garbs
of diplomacy and statesmanship. It could well be that Amtorg, Intourist
and government missions manned by Russians could have been bombed
by displeased Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Latvians and others who are
dissatisfied with Communism. But the Jewish appeals have been in
behalf of Jews who wish to go to Israel and/or in behalf of Jews who
would have religious and cultural freedom in Russia. Why equate the
two? That's where the new USSR diplomacy puzzles—and fails!
Most typical of Russian examples of deluding the public—and
themselves!—is the Birobidzhan propaganda. Novosti continues to write
about Birobidzhan as the Autonomous Jewish Region. Twenty years
ago there were fewer than 15,000 Jews in that area of a total population
exceeding 170,000. With similar necromancy, the Jewish community of
some 250 in all of Alaska should be called a Jewish Autonomous Re-
gion. Yet the Russian information bureaus keep misleading the public
with news from Birobidzhan, as if there really were organized Jewish
life there.
True: there is a Yiddish newspaper there, the Birobidzhaner
Shtern. What a clever trick! After 41 years it is yet to, be established
whether this newspaper has any readers at all, whether more than a
handful now in Birobidzhan—in a population that has become thor-
oughly assimilated into the Soviet fold—read it, or whether it is a pub-
lication intended as propaganda for the outside world and among
Jews who can be deluded.
But the paper isn't even Yiddish! The language has been cor-
rupted, lovers of Yiddish will have difficulty recognizing it and its
true merits. Here is a sample from one of the issues of Birobidzhaner
Shtern to indicate the corruption and contamination:
tIbrIlnkr
',my/
nr 1970 lynx' ti 25 t371
31K ayalitrs
DX n ann*nli 11D ar,o ■
-yalx 1.17
a/ */ taylnyp .aurlirr
trix yvvir,” aytiptn, tyrx awn
—votrix 7 ,v)12tony1
uoyann ,oynta
.111141*nt vi rapt
- 0-nrirtut ,a-nonnkryarit 3714 3tt 3yny3 1311131.51X
.rat
.13710”181rittrybrito I/wormy/1mm
,337131,”0
Nehama Lifshitz, who was one of Russia's most popular folk sing-
ers and who found haven in Israel, expressed her sense of horror over
what she had witnessed and experienced in Birobidzhan in a series of
articles in the Yiddish Jewish Daily Forward. She described the area
as marked by a "cursed terror." To some with whom she had spoken
Yiddish was Chinese: one commented that Yiddish hadn't been heard
there in his time!
Nehama wrote about Birobidzhan as a horrible punishment for the
Russian Jews who went there. She wrote about her experience there
2 Friday, May 14, 1971
—
THE DETROIT JEWISH HEWS
Soviet Union's Self-Indictment: the Myths About
Autonomous Region, Expose of the Siberian Tragedies,
Exaggerations About Jewish Theaters and Folk Glories
with pain — "pain infected with
fear, pain in the despair that I felt
in the curse that is called Birobid-
zhan."
Some 50 to 80 people came to
her concert. It was a gloomy event,
some felt nostalgia; in the main
there was the defeatism of despair.
Nehama, too, pointed to the form
the language assumed—as will be
noted in the reproduction here of
the distortions, the assurance that
anything sounding like Hebrew or
spelt Hebraically.
What desolation is recorded by
Nehama Lifshitz! And what treach-
ery in despoiling the idea of an
independent state!
yvlyr-ro a",x nzsa
.(ObtiV) .lyzrkp 13 4,1 to 1 1 .1
13,ittnor 310 1yt7tr3, 73 -31yontz 1y1
,t,royottnct 'yin) ut$;1 3 Ma n 7 .N
1313 / 1 11 Irrrly-r/yror '1 TX
vw ,tr,te 37 371'10 3, 7
o'1% .zynTnz 30337k3 Dtt
-
-13711,31K
byrx 3r70373 riitayiu
,s7n1ty...,152y mow nynn vywo
7yontr, TN ,D1y,p1371 137 totin
ito,rinlytnIN
ny1
3XPrIttD„ UPTI
•ro,rrnyn 37V'137 ','n
.5P '71137 My310 3trtt1
yvatillt
-3ynkira rrt non uyinriynnix
-3711,,x atmvn i, 13314337 73 , 73 1914ri
- 31s711,(D ,ynx1mo3tp31 K torrits
.-mappy irt 13C DISO IC 3DX/3 ri
p ,t2 , 7rs lyttPUtP3rb
m3731D 3t.13y11Cb
.11, 1114
Note also the reference to
Israel — the fantastic spelling,
the charge of militarism against
Abba Eban, the treatment of
the Middle East situation as if
the Jewish state were in the
process of instigating a new
war. And as far away as Biro-
bidzhan the Shtern knew all
about an Arab students' demon-
stration against Eban in New
York, with emphasis on that
point!
Nehama Lifshitz relates haw only
when she was left alone with some
Jews who retained memories of a
heritage and of a Jewish past did
they burst into tears.
Left alone with one Jewish work-
ingman, she finally got this out of
him, as he said "with a sad smile":
"It has been much worse. Even
now it is okh-un-vey (bitter!). But
where does one go in his old age?"
Nehama Lifshitz, now a free
woman able to reminisce and to
relate her experiences, told,- in an-
other article in
the Forward,
about one of her
concerts during
which she sang—
together with her
audience — the
melody of Kol
Nidre, without
words. She recalls
that P. Novik, the
editor of the New
Nehama
York Yiddish
Communist daily, the Freiheit, was
in the audience, and that he re-
ported her—informed is the term
used—to the secret police. That's
a serious charge and a sad blot on
the Novik record.
* * *
The Soviet method of mocking
Jewish sensibilities has been in-
herent in the approach to the Biro-
bidzhan fiasco.
Our barber, who hailed from
Prague, in a talkative mood rem-
inisced about events more than
three decades ago.
"The Russian radio broadcasts
were blasting away, into our Czech
homes," he recalled "That's when
they were propagating Birobidzhan
and telling us about the glories of
a new Jewish country. Already
then they were fighting the Zionist
idea and here is the khokhma they
were feeding us with:
"The broadcaster told us: `Gloibt
nit in a Mashiakh der toiter ! Mir
giben aikh Mashiakh der roiter !'
It means: 'Don't have faith in a
dead Messiah ! We offer you a red
Messiah !' And the deluded gave
comfort to the destroyers of a true
Messiah !"
There were, at that time Jews
in philanthropic ranks in this coun-
try who fell for the tripe coated
by autonomous region propaganda
offers. Is there any one so blind as
to fall for these distortions now?
And do the Kremlin and Moscow
zeally believe their own fairy tales?
* * *
Meanwhile, the Birobidzhan prop-
aganda keeps pouring in—all about
the great achievements, about he-
roes and heroines, and the only
certain Jewish angle is the word
Jewish in the title of a mythical
autonomous territory.
In the process of propagandizing,
the USSR's Novosti Press Agency
sends us interesting material about
great Jewish artists. There is, in
one instance, the story about Kle-
mentina Shermel, introduced as
the Jewish singer, as "a powerful,
throaty mezzo soprano," who "has
long been popular with Soviet audi-
ences for her renderings of Rus-
sian and Western classics and her
interpretations of modern Jewish
songs and Jewish folk ballads."
Klementina Shermel is described
as a member of a family that was
exacuated during World War II to
the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk,
as having studied
under Prof. A.
Mikhailov in the
Ukraine a n d at
the Moscow Cdn-
servatory; t ha t
she recently be-
gan to sing Jew-
ish songs and
t h a t since 1966
her Jewish reci-
tals have been
tremendous sue- Kiementina
cesses. A feature article about her
by the Soviet Embassy in Washing-
ton tells about her having included
Yiddish songs in her repertoire,
that she sings the aria of Rachel
from Halevy's "The Cardinal's
Daughter" and that war songs are
prominent in her selections. Then
the release states:
"One (of the war songs) is a
lullaby about Babi Yar where the
Nazis massacred thousands of Kiev
Jews, another is about children
who will never see the sun again,
a third is about a cobbler, who,
though killed defending his home,
will live on forever in the memory
of his children. Kiementina is cur-
rently rehearsing a new program.
She is also planning to record her
Jewish song recitals. She tours ex-
tensively in the USSR and has per-
formed in the Soviet Far East, in
Central Asia, in the Ukraine, Bye-
lorussia and in Baltic cities. And
she sings on television as well. She
has hardly a moment for her
hobby, which is needle work, and
complains that she has completely
ditched the circus and the ballet,
which she calls her lifelong pas-
sions."
Very well: but what does it
prove? what did Nehama Lifshitz's
popularity prove if not that there
are many. Jews in the USSR who
crave a Jewish song, who are long-
ing for their heritage but they have
no way of acquiring it and cherish-
ing it! All we know is that the
right to have one's heritage is
suppressed!
By Philip
Slomovitz
And if the USSR boasts about
the Jewish geniuses, the eminent
singers, the noted scholars, why
not grant them the right to express
themselves, to benefit from their
legacies? And if they choose to
embrace their legacies in their
ancient homeland, why not let
them go there?
We are not even so sure about
Klementina and her audiences. We
now know about Nefiama's. Time
will instruct us about Kiementina
Shermel.
* *
The USSR Embassy and Novosti
this week introduced us to another
Jewish family, the Yash.bins of
Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania,
and Gomel in Byelorussia. There
is a suggestion
of pride in Abram
Yashbin who is
93 and who trav-
els between these
two cities to visit
his 10 children,
20 grandchildren
and seven great-
grandchildren but
he spends most
of his time with
Yashbin
his son Leib be-
cause "he is attracted by the
magnificent Vilnius synagogue
choir."
The secret leaks out when the
delineator of this portrait of a
Soviet Jewish family tells us about
Abram Yashbin: "Every day he
leaves the house about 4 p.m. (as
if he were off to work) and heads
for the synagogue. He returns
home at nine or ten in the eve-
ning."
A funny sort of synagogue
service, isn't it? Does he converse
there with the spirits? Who is at
the Vilnius synagogue from 4 p.m.
until 9 p.m.? Even the most Ortho-
dox, the most Hasidic, does not
provide such a congregation. Which
creates doubts, and Novosti is yet
to prove its contentions in such
stories.
We are told about the Yashbins
that Leib and Mira Yashbin's sons
Isaac, Felix and Yakov are work-
ers, that Isaac's daughter Zina is
a senior in the Vilnius Conserva-
tory of Music and she plays in the
orchestra of the Jewish Folk
Theater. Perhaps the Jewish in
this folk theater is as Jewish as
the term in the Birobidzhan auton-
omous region.
The point is that if the Russian
authorities through embassy and
news agency are so anxious to
prove glories of some individual
Jews, why not provide them for
all other Jews who assert their
rights to live as Jews in Russia
or else to be permitted to emigrate
to Israel?
There was an old joke in Rus-
sia where Jews individually had
good Russian friends who, in
turn, did not hesitate to condone
pogroms. The comparison then
was made between Reb Yisrael
and Am Yisrael. • It happens so
often: Reb Yisrael, the Jew as
an individual is honored; Am
Yisrael, the People Israel is an
object for discrimination, attack,
pogrom.
So, it's not illogical to ask
Kremlin, Embassy, Novosti: if
you boast so much about the sci-
entists and artists, why not make
it a consistent act and stop curb-
ing Jewish rights ! And why not
adhere to an established interna-
tional code that when a person
desires to change his domicile he
has a right to leave the place of
his birth?
It is the Russian inconsistency
that condemns the USSR, and the
inconsistencies stem from their
own literature. Every piece of
Novosti literature is a self-indict-
ment.