Conference taveng::bagels

    Moscow, under pressure from the Arab States, has reneged on an agreement
    to authorzie direct flights between Moscow and Tel Aviv.  El Al and 
    Aeroflot had agreeded to commence direct flights pending approval by 
    their respective governments.  According to NPR the direct flights 
    would have greatly increased the number of Soviet Jews emigrating 
    to Israel.
    
    

    Re .0:
    
    Ironic, isn't it, that Stalinists can be categorized as members
    of the "right wing"?
    
    Mark

    Jay Leno told the following during his monologue on the Tonight show
    other night-
    
    "The John Birch Society is now after Gorbachev, they think he is too
    soft on Communism."
    
    	-Barry-
    

    On Arab pressure to stop Soviet Aliya:
    
    Despite the appearance of Soviet cave-in to Arab demands to stop Aliya,
    it is rumored that Arab delegation was given a cool reception and
    was told: "We do with our Jews as we please." For a change, Soviet
    anti-semitism can be smiled about on the occasion :-)
    
    Alex

    	I think it's quite revealing that the claims of mass settlement
    on the Territories have been debunked. However, Arab countries are
    as upset as before, since they don't want any more Jews in Haifa
    either.
    
    
    DG

    CNN TV (?) News two nights ago claimed that Israel was
    imposing official censorship on information regarding
    the influx of Soviet immigrants to Isreal. The
    story said the Israeli government claims censorship
    is required in this case due to security threats
    (and alleged incidents) against such immigration flows.
    
    The news story then explained that the USA's State
    Department is beginning to advise the Israeli government
    that USA developmemt loans (or loan guarantees) to
    Israel will be discontinued unless Israel gives assurances
    that such development loans will not be used to finance
    construction (or expansion) of residences/settlements in
    the Occupied Territories.
    
    The story was unclear as to whether the Israeli government
    merely withholds (does not divulge) its own statistics on
    the current Soviet influx, or actively prohibits publication
    or disclosure of such information by private parties or publishers.
    What type of censorship, if any, is involved here?
    Can anyone clarify please?
    
    I saw the previous reply by DG, which seems to say that a related
    rumor has been "debunked" or shown false. Is this already
    discussed elsewhere in BAGELS? Perhaps I missed it.
    
    		thanks
    		John

    US Sec. of Defense Dick Cheney addressed the UJA (United Jewish
    Appeal) in Washington yesterday (March 13). Perhaps it
    was the "youth leadership" convention of the UJA.
    
    Cheney's talk spanned a wide area. He remphasized the USA's
    commitment to the security of Israel, and said the moderation
    of military tensions between USA and USSR would not diminish
    the USA's support of Israel. He mentioned that surplus
    USA tanks now being delivered to Egypt are being matched
    by Egypt's destruction/scrapping of equivalent or obsolete
    Soviet-supplied tanks.
    
    During a concluding Q & A session, Cheney was asked if,
    in view of the lapse of agreement between ElAl and Aeroflot
    for transport of Soviet emigres to Israel, the USAF would be
    supplying USAF military aircraft to carry the USSR --> Israel
    traffic. (It may have been a trick question, or a serious one.)
    Cheney replied that he hadn't considered "that one" (possibility)
    and wondered how warmly the Soviets would welcome the arrival of
    dozens of large USAF military aircraft to such population centers
    as Moscow.
    
    The UJA host concluded the meeting by displaying a thick new
    UJA policy document regarding Jerusalem, and presented Cheney
    a framed painting of Masadah (sp?). For a moment it appeared
    the host would present Cheney his own personalized copy of the
    Jerusalem document. Cheney replied that he had visited Masadah
    and he'd mount the painting in a place of honor in his office.
    
    		thanks
    		John
    

from today's (Saturday's) NY times, a personal account entitled "We Russian 
Jews fear for our lives" by Irina Ginzburg, a novelist.


"Well, the moment that I have thought about all the time and expected to come 
has come. The Jews are in danger! Life has become fearful as never before.
Remember our House of Writers? Where your Ronald Reagan met with the Soviet 
intelligentsia, where they serve food so well, where it's so beautiful and 
comfortable, where we in a happy group, sat at an overflowing table - we  
drank, joked and then photographed this wonderful evening? This is the building 
where the best people of Moscow gather - where, according to stories, the 
beloved heroine of Lev Tolstoy, Natasha Rostova, danced at a ball.

And now in this house, in this room, the cries of those who want to  start a 
pogrom have been heard. In January, a gang of intruders burst into a meeting of 
writers. They yelled, "Yids. get out to your Israel!" and "The pogrom will come 
in a few months!". The killing was called for on May 5 - the birth date of Karl 
Marx, the Jew and Communist.
The rabid fascists screamed this out - not afraid of laws, the courts or any 
consequences. Those who aren't able to leave will be killed.

You can't imagine what is happening in Moscow - panic, terror, fear. People are 
talking about one thing only: how and where to go, to hide when they come to 
kill you.

Many Jews have already moved to the homes of Russian friends and acquaintances.
But will this save them? Many are already sitting on their suitcases waiting 
for visas, tickets, invitations. My mother-in-law has already given in her 
papers to go to Israel. But they say you have to wait 6 months - oh, it's so 
long.

In the countryside there is hunger and ruin. Recently classes were cancelled 
for a whole day. All the teachers were sent to buy soup, shoes and food with 
ration coupons. We never had much fruit and vegetables, but this year they have 
disappeared completely. A kilogram of cucumber costs 18-20 rubles in the 
collective farm market. I stand in a long line for ornages and ask, "Who is 
last?". A man turns to me and says "Get out of here. This is not your country! 
You don't belong here!"

People are full of anger. All of Moscow is dirty and dark. They say that in 
Leningrad it is still worse: there everything is sold with ration coupons.
But this is not the most awful part - the worst is the fear of the pogroms!
The Writer's Union apartment house near us is already being guarded by 
militiamen hired from a cooperative. We are as yet without protection. It is 
terrible to live. With each day it becomes worse. On TV, Radio and in the 
newspapers there is endless repetition of the words "pogrom", "bloodletting", 
"civil war". The Russians demand the death of the Jews, demand that they be 
forbidden to occupy any leadership posts, to defend their dissertations: they 
demand that they leave the Soviet Union immediately.

This is announced all across the country - pogroms, the slaughter of the Jews, 
called for May 5. Every Russian who wants to enter Pamyat, the anti-Semitic 
Russian nationalist group, must give the organization four full adresses of 
Jewish families to use when the time is ripe.
My husband sits and writes. I am typng out reminiscences about my life. Our son 
is sleeping. Time marches on. I am afraid that the Russian Jew-haters won't 
wait. They are getting impatient. I am afraid they will kill us - in the midst 
of the rugs, pictures and antique furniture, among the books, records and 
music. Our boy - for now - sleeps undisturbed. But the Russians are thinking
how to kill us. This may sound like hysteria to you. But what kind of hysteria
is it if all Jews - those who never wanted to leave and those who are now
waiting to leave -  feel this way? This is how it is. We are in despair.

    

    re .8
    
    Indeed the "All-Union Pogrom" was scheduled for May 5th for many months
    now. Did anything happen? Not much if anything is heard in US. We are
    still trying to brown-nose Gorbachev.
    
    Incidentally, May 5th was chosen not because of Karl Marx, may his name
    drift into obscurity, but in honour St. George "the Carrier of Victory",
    who is the saint protector of Russia.
    
    Alex

        
>> Did anything happen? 

I too am interested in news.  I worried about this all weekend and kept tuning
in the news to check out my fears, but saw nothing.  I suppose this is good
news, since they surely wouldn't bother to have an item stating that there was
NOT a pogrom today in the Soviet Union...

Please - if anyone has an update, let us know.

Thanks,

Waky

    Where do you get this horrible action of the oppressive Soviet regime
    is chosen to be executed on the day of the St. George?
      I realize it may be true, and that may be to cause hatred between
    Christians and Jews, but wonder why you  say that.
      
    The media seems to be ignoring this, at least from what I've send,
    that's not much, true.
    Andrew

    I meant seen and not send.

    re .11
    
 >   Where do you get this horrible action of the oppressive Soviet regime
 >   is chosen to be executed on the day of the St. George?
    
    Do I sense some sarcasm in your reply? Or don't you really know any better?
    Do you have doubts that the Soviet regime is oppressive? Or don't you
    know that other than playing the "three monkeys" this action is not
    being organized by the Soviets? Do you think Christians and Jews live
    in harmony in the SU?
    
    Alex
    
    PS After seeing that your last sentence does not make any sense (even
    after replacing "send" w/ "seen"), I realize that you might simply have
    trouble expressing yourself. In that case, my apology in advance.

    I'm still waiting to hear if anything really happened May 5; so far,
    little has been reported.
    
    Blaming the Soviet government for anti-Semitism seems a bit like
    blaming the American government for the muggers in Central Park.  By
    distant indirection, government actions did not prevent the problem. 
    But Pamyat is a faction opposed to the Gorbachev regime.  With all of
    the economic and social problems over there, conservative forces are
    dragging out the old scapegoats.  And the government is not
    particularly interested in doing much about it, which is still not
    quite the same as instigating it.

    re .14
    
>    Blaming the Soviet government for anti-Semitism seems a bit like
>    blaming the American government for the muggers in Central Park.
    
    It is certainly true that the Soviet government is not openly anti-semitic,
    and that no direct public anti-semitic action can be attributed to the
    government. It is also true that anti-semitism existed long before the
    Soviets took power 70 years ago. However, let me give you a couple of
    examples, so that you can re-evaluate your statement.
    
    1. The Soviet government produced the policies by which no Jew can be
       admitted to the SU's better universities (of course a token Jew is
       always available).
    
    2. The Soviet gov-t until very recently jailed anyone studying Hebrew
       for anti-Soviet activity. Those who were jailed are still in jail.
    
    3. Any Jew applying for an exit visa is viewed as a traitor.
    
    4. The efforts of Jewish soldiers who fought in WWII have not been
       acknowledged despite the fact that Jews have been awarded the title
       of "The Hero of the SU" in numbers third only to Russians and
       Ukrainians, and in support of the popular belief that "Jews were
       hiding in Central Asia".
    
    5. Many of Stalin's purges were directed primarily against the Jews
       (recall "the doctors").
    
    6. A Jew practicing Judaism is committing a professional suicide.
       and so the number of open synagogues is monotonically decreasing.
    
    7. Being accused of Zionism is probably a worse offense than
       practicing Judaism.
    
    8. The number of openly anti-semitic books (OK, it's glasnost) is ever
       increasing. But why are they being published by the government printing
       houses?
    
    In this country, if someone is being discriminated against on the
    ethnic grounds or is receiving regular death threats, a government
    agency would surely get involved. In the Soviet Union, a Jew would be
    laughed at under the same circumstances.
    
    Gorbachev is and will be using anti-semitism (along with all other
    methods he can think of) to distract the populace from the real
    problems that are facing the country. Your analogy is flawed.
    
    Alex

    I am NEVER sarcastic when I write in Bagels. I have learned much here
    and hope to continue doing so.  It is difficult for me  to express
    myself here because of the differences in belief and culture which
    cause me often wonder just how people will take what I say. 
    
    The Sov. Union from what I understand is an athiest regime.  In the
    Soviet Union it is a crime to pratices Christianity. Many people 
    today, in this age of Soviet renewal , live in  concentration camps
    because of thier religion.  I know also it is considered a mental
    illness to believe in God, and many people are also in Psychiatric
    hospitals because of this belief.  
    
    The day I wrote my former note I saw on the TV a news report which did 
    seem to support your statements. It was of a Police official who wanted
    to attack Jews because  of the 'They killed Christ' reason.  A true
    Christian will to thier own sins for the reason of Christ's
    death. It was a Jewish woman and Family from which he came, for these
    reasons I don't buy the attack of the Jews there.  True it is for many 
    centuries there have been attacks on Jews for this reason, it is wrong.
    But it is rooted in history, has and will continue to be an official
    dogma of  organizations to attack G*ds people until likely the end of
    time.
    
    It seemed to me a convienient excuse for the Athiest power to mobilize
    violence. But not the real reason, I think. That is the spread of
    Atheism.

    Re .16:
    
    Not that I mean to take this note down Rathole Alley but......
    
    It might very well be that most Christians in the latter half of
    the 20th century reject the notion of the Jews as "Christ Killers"
    and instead, according to current Christian doctrine, or at least
    what I discern to be a trend, put the blame for his death on their
    own human failings. I can't buy the doctrine but if it means Jews
    are no longer targeted as "Christ Killers", great, all the better.
    
    However, that really doesn't address the issue IMHO. If people can
    change their attitudes towards a more positive direction, what's
    to say they can't turn back to the old, not-so-positive ways, given
    the right leadership, in the right place, and at the right time. I
    strongly believe that there is still enough anti-semitic material
    in the Christian Bible (aka "New Testament") to fuel a return to
    those days given the right conditions as I mentioned.
    
    I'm not in a position to rewrite the Christian Bible to make it
    less anti-semitic and I don't think Christianity as a movement is
    inclined to do so either because an effort like that might undermine
    some key doctrines which could bring into question the whole essence
    of Christianity (something the Church would never sanction). The
    best we can hope for is that Christians as individuals will reject
    the anti-semitic passages and not get swept up into yet another
    diatribe against the Jews.
    
    For what it's worth,
    
    Mark

    re .17
    
    Yes, I agree.
    
    
    I am afraid the Athiest Communists will set weak people against Jews
    in the name of Christianity.
    It is then possible  to target the Christians for like treatment.
    
    Andrew.

re .16, .17

See note 772 in PEAR::SOAPBOX - an antisemite is going full force on 
how wonderful Farakkhan is.  He doesn't even deny being an antisemite.

    What's Farakkhan?
    

    Louis Farakkhan is the current leader of the Nation of Islam, which
    used to be known in some circles as the Black Muslims.  However none of
    its' members have ever seen Mecca or are true Muslims.
    
    You might recall the flap during the '88 presidential campaign in
    connection to Jesse Jackson and Farakkhan.  Farakkhan has referred to
    Judaism as a "gutter religion".
    
    Re: .19
    
    I don't give SOAPBOX or antisemites the time of day.
    
    --David

From the front page of this weeks Jerusalem Post Int'l -

RUSSIAN BANDITS TORTURE SOVIET JEWISH FAMILY (reported by Walter Ruby)

MOSCOW - The umbrella organization of Soviet Jewry last week released a report 
confirming a gruesome crime against a Jewish family in the city of Kislovodsk 
in the northern Caucasus region of Russia.

According to the Vaad's report, bandits entered ther home of Zavla and Yael 
Izyayev on the night of April 18 and demanded money and diamonds.  When the 
family refused the demands, the bandits murdered Zavla Izyayev and savagely 
tortured Yael and her oldest son Roman, using knives, hot metal and gas.

Yael Izyayev survived the attack, but remains in serious condition in a 
Kislovodsk hospital with head wounds, severly damaged eyesight and burns over 
much of her body.  Roman was less severely injured and supplied most of the 
information on which the report is based.  The body of Zavla Izyayev was so 
badly mutilated, according to the report, that the police refused to show it to 
relatives.

The report said that the bandits spoke accentless Russian and wore facemasks.  
One criminal told the family:  "I have hated Jews since childhood.  We will 
get you all, and the entire country will support us."

Members of the extended Izyayev family, who are from the group known as 
"Mountain Jews", sent a letter to the Supreme Soviet in Moscow demaniding that 
they be allowed to leave for Israel immediately.  They noted that the police
in Kislovodsk had told them they could not guarantee the safety of Jews in the 
city.  The ability of the immediate family to leave quickly may be complicated 
by the fact that Rafael Izyayev, the youngest son of Zavla and Yael, is 
presently serving in the Soviet army.

Lyuba Bakst, a spokesman for the Vaad, said the organization carefully 
researched the Izyayev case before reaching the conclusion that it had in fact 
occurred as claimed by the relatives.  She noted that a representative of the 
Vaad had travelled to Kislovodsk, and that relatives of the family had come to 
Moscow to give testimony to Jewish leaders.

Meanwhile, the Vaad reported that in the city of Cherlabinsk in the Urals, 
several dozen Jews received letters over the past several weeks with the 
message:  "Jews get out!  Those who Hitler didn't kill, we will finish off."
The message was signed: "Russian patriots."

It was also reported over the weekend that the Jewish Agency's representative 
in Georgia is working to prepare that republic as a refuge to which Jews can 
flee in case a catastrophe occurs in the USSR.

re .22:

>It was also reported over the weekend that the Jewish Agency's representative 
>in Georgia is working to prepare that republic as a refuge to which Jews can 
>flee in case a catastrophe occurs in the USSR.

Can anybody explain why Georgia would be a refuge?
Is Georgia free from anti-Semitism?  Wasn't Stalin from Georgia?

Gerald,

I don't believe that Georgia is free from anti-Semitism but I have been told
by friends who have lived there that Georgians and Armenians (in that order)
are generally much friendlier toward Jews than other nationalities in the
USSR.

Gavriel

Re: .23

>Can anybody explain why Georgia would be a refuge?
>Is Georgia free from anti-Semitism?  Wasn't Stalin from Georgia?

Not to mention Jimmy Carter!

    Re .23 & .26:
    
    And Joseph Stalin was born in....let's see.....Plainski, Geogia,
    right?
    
    Who says Americans don't know their geography?
    
    :-) :-)
    
    Mark

.25

I was simply repeating what I was told by friends who moved to Georgia from
the Ukraine after having applied for a emigration to the US.  This was because
the Georgians were willing to employ people in such status in as
professors in the university (and in the Ukraine they weren't).  Their comment
was that Georgia was far better than other places in the USSR that they
had lived.

Gavriel

It has been pointed out to me (and I should have noticed myself) that .25 to
which I replied earlier is in violation of corporate and confernce noting
policy.  A message has been sent to the author concerning etiquette.

Gavriel
with my moderator kippah on  8^{)

    re: .25 
    
    Sam, next time just mask your response like this b^%%^&*!  You have to
    cover up more than one character.
    
    --David

    b^%%^&*!
    

re: many way back/

From this week's Int'l J. Post:

PAMYET LEADER GETS TWO YAERS IN LABOR CAMP ON ANTISEMITISM CHANGE /by Walter 
Ruby

MOSCOW/ Shouting "Long live Russia!" 54-year-old Pamyat leader Konstantin 
Smirnov-Ostashvili was lead out of a Moscow courtroom last Friday after being 
sentenced to two years in a labor camp for inciting antisemitism.

Scores of his supporteers cried "shame" after the verdict was announced by 
Judge Andrei Muratov. they vowed to continue their fight against "the evil 
kike-Mason conspiracy threatening Russia and the world."

Ostashvili was the first person to be tried under Article 74 of the 
Constitution of the Russian Republic, which prohibits incitement to hatred on 
religious or racial grounds.

The 10-week trial was held as a consequence of disturbances at the Union of 
Writers building here last January, when the Pamyat leader and about 70 
supporters broke up a meeting of the "April" writers' group.  According to 
witnesses, Ostashvili used a bullhorn to shout threats at the writers such as 
"Kikes, get our of here and go to your Israel," and "Kike-Masons, your time is 
finished.  The KGB won't protect you, and neither will anyone else."

After a five-month investigation, a Moscow procurator pronounced the charges 
against Ostashvili and scheduled the trial.  the decision came after complaints 
from Jewish organizations that President Mikhail Gorbachev and his government 
were refusing to take action against escalating antisemitism.

The trial lasted much longer than planed because of delaying tactics employed 
by Ostashvili.  First he demanded a lawyer sympathetic to his ideas, even 
though the man had not practised in more than a decade and was not a member of 
the Moscow Lawyers' guild.

Later, Muratov called for a two-week dealy after the defendant collapsed in 
court and was rushed to the hospital.  But he angrily jerked Ostashvili back 
into court after learning he had been seen strolling around the city less than 
24 hours later.

A week after the resumption of the trial, Ostashvili dropped out of sight, 
complaining that the bias against him had made a fair trial impossible.

Muratov ordered his bail revoked, and a nationwide manhunt was launched.  The 
Pamyat leader was arrested in MOscow 2 1/2 weeks later, and was held in prison, 
being brought to the courtroom each day in a police van.

In an interview with THE JERUSALEM POST as week before the end of hte trial, 
Ostashvili claimed that the proceedings would boost support for his ideas among 
the Russian people.  He called denunciations of him by other Pamyat leaders a 
tactic to disguise the essential unity of the organization.

On Friday, Ostashvili stood in the dock smirking in amused indignation as 
Muratov found him guilty.  At that point, he began shouting: "I am ready to 
die for Russia!" and "The Zionists called us Russian pigs, and nothing is done 
to them.  This wouldn't have happened when Stalin was in power."

Prosecutor Andrei Makarov, who had endured months of sometimes obscene verbal 
abuse from Ostashvili, pronounded himself "very pleased" with the verdict.  
"Ostashvili was a sacrificial lamb offered to disguise the fact that many 
powerful poeple, including...[Russian Communist Party chief Ivan]Polashov hold 
similar views."  Makarov said.  "Nevertheless, the trial was useful because it 
showed that the first signs of fascism exist in this country, and there is a 
fertile soil for its growth."

Oshtashvili's supporters vowed to continue the struggle.  "We are hopeful that 
more Russian people will come to understand the truth" said Natalya Kuznetsova, 
in her 60's.  "They will ask themselves, as we did, 'Why is it that [Russian] 
people work night and day and have nothing?' It is because of hte Zionists.  
The kike-Masons made the Revolution and ran the camps in Siberia.  The Zionists
are responsible for the genocide of the Russian people.  Hitler himself was a
Jew.  His name was Shicklgruber."