Heightened Worry In Russia
We Sell Quality Brand Name Closeouts at "AMAZING" Prices!
New Closeouts Arriving Daily. One Time Deals!
`GOOSE' from page 10
YOUR B LOW WHOLESALE DEPARTMENT STORE.
r
r
with 15.00
purchase
Valid through July 31, 2000
Coupons cannot be combined
with any other offer
Hunter's
Square
Shopping
Center
(248)
932-5110
"A
SOUTHFIELD
FARMINGTON HILLS
14 Mile Rd.
AMAZING
"F SAVINGS
Hunters Square
Shopping Center
Sherwood
Square
Shopping
Center
11 Mile Rd.
'PM 3>l el PoeLI D JO
L
Coupons cannot
be combined
with any other offer j
Valid through
July
31, 2000
J'
AMAZING
"r SAVINGS
Sherwood Square
Shopping Center
Lincoln 1-696
A
(248)
569-6699
vegetarian treat in West Bloomfield."
Bob Talbert, March
'99
just had to find out what so man y
people were raving about.
Danny Raskin, June '99
"
I
"
I 0 0
ENTIRE
/0 BILL
I
Lunch & Dinner
40 eng
Expires 12/31/2000 I
I.
1
VE ETARIAN
(248) 926-6711
6175 HAGGERTY • WEST BLOOMFIELD
TIE ONE ON
ONLY AT THE SHIRT BOX
The Shirt Box, Shirts and a Whole Lot More.
Always 20%-35% Off Retail
HOURS: Mon.-Sat. 9:30-6 • Thurs. till 7
7/14
2000
12
Courtyard Center • 32500 Northwestern Hwy. • Farmington Hills, MI 48334 • (248) 851-6770
ship" with top officials in President
Yeltsin's administration.
And in 1996, Goussinsky and six
other financiers banded together to
fund Yeltsin's victorious re-election
campaign when it appeared possible
that Communist leader Gennadi
Zyuganov might defeat him.
But if Goussinsky enjoyed a special
relationship with Yeltsin, it was also
very tumultuous.
The first attack on Goussinsky
came in December 1994, when presi-
dential security service agents raided
his offices and harassed his security
guards and other personnel.
The then head of the presidential
security service later said that
Goussinsky's nemesis, fellow oligarch
Boris Berezovsky, had asked him to
arrange Goussinsky's murder.
A Life Change
Fearing a possible arrest on charges
similar to those that recently landed
him in jail, Goussinsky left the coun-
try and spent seven months abroad.
Sources say that those months in
London changed his life.
"During his stay abroad, Vladimir
had a lot of free time to think about his
Jewishness and there he decided to
become active in the Jewish communi-
ty," says Yeygen,y-Satanovsky, a leader of
the Russian Jewish Congress, the Jewish
umbrella group founded in 1995.
When Goussinsky returned to
Moscow, he decided to become
involved in the Jewish community. He
was helped by Israel Singer, one of the
leaders of the World Jewish Congress,
and Pinchas Goldschmidt, the chief
rabbi of Moscow, who helped guide
Goussinsky through the Jewish world.
Satanovsky, himself a successful
businessman, strongly denies the
widespread accusation that
Goussinsky began bankrolling the
Jewish community to "buy" interna-
tional Jewish support to fight off
future embezzlement charges.
"Goose," he says, using
Goussinsky's nickname, "could have
bought his security much cheaper"
than the millions of dollars a year that
he donates to the RJC. "He is crazy
over Jewish things, Israeli patriotism
and all that. He really wants to help
Jews here to become proud and self-
respecting."
U.S. Support
American Jewish groups are also
behind Goussinsky.
"If he's using his Jewish identity as
a shield, why not?" asks Mark Levin,
executive director of NCSJ: Advocates
on behalf of Jews in Russia, Ukraine,
the Baltic States & Eurasia.
"This is someone who has not
hidden his Jewish identity. This is
someone who has made an impor-
tant contribution to Russian Jewish
identity."
In addition, adds Levin, the gov-
ernment used Goussinsky's Jewishness
against him in an advertisement that
mentioned his connection to Israel.
He has an Israeli passport and owns
25 percent of the Israeli newspaper
Mdariv.
Fifty-two members of the U.S.
Congress have also rallied behind him,
sending a letter to President Bill .
Clinton to press Russia to "formally
justify" Goussinsky's arrest.
Others, like Leonid Katsis, a Jewish
political analyst, point to Goussinsky's
links to the Soviet-era KGB.
More than 50 former KGB
employees work for his security ser-
vice, and the head of a KGB depart-
ment notorious for its surveillance of
Zionists and dissidents, Gen. Philip
Bobkov, is said to be Goussinsky's
chief security consultant.
Goussinskv has a simple reaction to
this criticism: "We'd be ready to hire
the devil himself if he could give us
security."
Even Goussinsky's critics agree that
he -has made valuable contributions to
the revival of Russian Jewish life by
turning Jewish philanthropy into a
respectable activity and demonstrating
that the Jewish community in Russia
can be self-supporting and financially
independent.
Goussinsky is also participating in
international Jewish philanthropy He
is one of 14 philanthropists who _have
pledged a total of $70 million to sup-
port Birthright Israel, the program
started by Jewish Renaissance Media
Chairman Michael Steinhardt that
builds Jewish identity by sending
young Jewish adults on free 10-day
trips to Israel.
Despite his problems, Goussinsky
appears ready to go down fighting if
need be. He showed that moxie last
month when, in the midst of the cam-
paign against him, he announced that
he would spend $40 million to pur-
chase 45 percent of Bezeq, Israel's tele-
phone company.
An American who knows him per-
sonally is Inna Itkina. A close acquain-
tance of Goussinsky in the 1970s now
living in San Francisco, she recalls that
he "was very active, and he always
came up with new ideas. He is a very
adventurous person." Ei