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stepping up the pressure on
the Kyiv government with
military actions that are
killing more civilians. Just
as troubling, the economic
sanctions slapped on Moscow
have done more damage
to the West with rising gas
prices in the United States,
as well as worries about the
supply of food and the flow
of natural gas in Europe, than
they have on the Russians.
Still, in a war where the
stakes are this high, the
Putin regime is willing to
play every card in its hand.
And one of those involves
pressuring Israel to avoid
further involvement in a
war, including the sending of
weapons to Kyiv, to which it
has already sent humanitarian
supplies to Ukraine and
accepted numerous refugees.
It may have been
predictable that in wartime,
Russia might revert to
policies that discourage
emigration. Still, Putin has
to know that an attack on the
Jewish Agency, whatever the
pretext, will elicit a furious
response from the Jewish
world.
Fury at this echo of a
sordid antisemitic past is
justified. Yet it would be wise
to avoid using this as a reason
for simply writing off the
progress that had been made
with respect to Jewish rights
and Russian-Israel relations.
USING DIPLOMACY
Should Putin actually allow
the shutting down of the
Jewish Agency, it will be clear
that both Israel and the Jews
will have no choice but to do
everything in their power to
help his enemies and to push
for his complete isolation and
ouster.
Until that happens, the correct
course of action is to allow
diplomacy on the part of Israel
and Jewish organizations to
be given time to work. Israel
need not cower before Russia
or pay any kind of ransom
to Putin. Instead, it must be
made clear to him that it is
in his interests to avoid being
labeled an antisemite.
Nor should the natural
sympathy for the Ukrainian
victims in this war, as well as
outrage at Russian aggression
leading to inappropriate
analogies to World War II
or even the worst excesses
of Stalinist antisemitism
blind us to the truth about
Ukraine.
Zelensky has done an
excellent job embodying his
country’s resistance; however,
as a recent New York Times
story about a shake-up in
his government made clear,
his government is not quite
the Jeffersonian democracy
that many of his country’s
supporters like to portray.
It is obsessed with “treason”
among the population, which
has so many Russian speakers
and people with ties to both
countries. It may also come as
a surprise to Western readers
to learn that even before
this war, Ukraine had the
largest security apparatus of
any country in Europe with
more than six times as many
personnel as Britain’s vaunted
MI5 agency.
That, coupled with its
well-earned reputation for
corruption and suppression of
press freedom, is a reminder
that in some respects (and
despite Zelensky’s PR
offensive), Ukraine has
more in common with
other troubled post-Soviet
republics than most Western
democracies.
No matter his Jewish
origins, Zelensky’s spouting
of Soviet-era propaganda
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