UKRAINE & RUSSIA JEWS IN MIDDLE AS UKRAINE PLAYS WEST OFF AGAINST RUSSIA –OBAMA AND U.S., NOW AS USUAL, REMAIN LARGELY UNINVOLVED

As We Go To Press:

Contents:

A Jewish Perspective on the Ukrainian Protests: Alina Dain, Algemeiner, Dec. 10, 2013 — In a country engulfed by anti-government protests, Ukrainian Jews find themselves facing the same existential choice as the rest of the country.

Ukrainian Jews Split on Dangers of Protest Movement: Sam Sokol, Jerusalem Post, Dec. 4, 2013 — Ukrainian Jews are split in their perceptions of the potential dangers towards their community due to recent massive anti-government protests around the country.

Issuing a Streetwise Challenge to Dictators: Garry Kasparov & David Keyes, Wall Street Journal, Nov. 13, 2013 — Before 1984, the address of the Soviet Embassy in Washington, D.C., was 1125 16th St. But that year Congress, in a move led by then Sen. Al D'Amato, took the unusual step of renaming the street after the heroic Soviet human-rights activist Andrei Sakharov.

Three Crises, One President, Many Bewildered Friends: Charles Krauthammer, The Columbian, Dec.17, 2013 — The first crisis, barely noticed here, is Ukraine's sudden turn away from Europe and back to the Russian embrace.

On Topic Links

Despite Calls for Neutrality in Ukraine Protests, Young Jews Are on the Front Lines: Sam Sokol, Jerusalem Post, Dec. 13, 2013

Winter Games, Caucasian Misery: Ekaterina Sokirianskaia, New York Times, Dec. 5, 2013

Russia vs. Europe: Bill Keller, New York Times, Dec. 15, 2013

Ukraine: On The Edge Of Empires: George Friedman, Forbes, Dec. 17, 2013

A JEWISH PERSPECTIVE ON THE UKRAINIAN PROTESTS

Alina Dain

Algemeiner, Dec. 10, 2013

In a country engulfed by anti-government protests, Ukrainian Jews find themselves facing the same existential choice as the rest of the country. The protests began during the last weekend of November, when Ukrainian police clashed with hundreds of protesters in Kiev’s Independence Square, known as “Maidan.” The crowd was protesting Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s decision to freeze plans to join a free trade agreement with the European Union just before the Vilnius Eastern Partnership Summit.

Instead, Yanukovych indicated an intention to join the Eurasian Customs Union, an economic union dreamed up by Russian President Vladimir Putin that is viewed as a precursor to a wider Eurasian Union of Eastern European countries and the Caucausus. The Ukrainian government also refused to honor the EU’s demand to free jailed former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko. On Dec. 8, protesters opposing the government’s push for closer ties with Russia toppled a statue of Vladimir Lenin in Kiev.

While thousands continued to come out over the past week to protest Yanukovych’s about-face regarding the EU trade agreement, the country faces the larger existential choice between what many criticize as a corrupt post-Soviet government and the possibility of a democratic European government. The country’s Jewish community—which comprises between 350,000 and 500,000 people, according to estimates by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee—is facing the same choice. “Ukraine is now caught between a rock and a hard place,” Sam Kliger, the American Jewish Committee’s (AJC) director of Russian Jewish community affairs, told JNS.org. “On the one hand they wanted to go West and to join the European Union; on the other hand they are pressured by Russia… to join the so-called customs union.”

Josef Zisels, chairman of the Association of Jewish Organizations and Communities (Vaad) of Ukraine, told JNS.org in an email interview translated from Russian, “In Ukraine all the major decisions are made by one person—the president,… [who] was apparently not planning to sign an agreement with the EU at all but simply mislead everyone domestically, as well as in the European Union and Russia, while trying to bargain for more assistance for his policies.”  On Nov. 30, police beat protesters with batons and sprayed tear gas at the gathered public. Over the past week, reports indicate that the Ukrainian government may have infiltrated protests through plain-clothed individuals who provoked violence from police by hurling stones and wielding chains. Dozens were detained or hurt, some severely, during the clashes.  

“Until today (Dec. 6) there is still no a clear plan of action on the part of opposition leaders. But the authorities make it clear that they are not ready to concede anything,” Christina Mertes, a 23-year-old activist from Kiev who is participating in the protests and requested that her real last name not be published, told JNS.org in an email interview translated from Russian and arranged by AJC. “It is clear that this police brutality could not have been authorized only at the local level. That is—the command to eliminate the Maidan [protests] came from the top,” she said. Mertes also points to President Yanukovych’s corrupt record, including convictions for robbery and assault as well as political corruption in his government. As the protests continue, the question of Ukraine’s association with the EU has receded into the background in favor of the larger issue of maintaining the government’s integrity. “It is obvious there is an ongoing game meant to return Ukraine to the Soviet era,” Mertes said.

According to Zisels, some Ukrainian Jews also participate in the ongoing protests, although it is difficult to estimate how many. Zisels himself, as well as friends and members of his family, are involved. “I believe, first, that the Jewish youth participate more often than older people, and, second, that as in other actions directed to democratize society, participation of Jews is disproportionately high,” he said.

Jewish communities in Eurasian Union countries face little of the state anti-Semitism that was prevalent during the Soviet era. But these countries’ political and economic instability, and the potential use of the “Jewish card” by authoritation regimes, especially in pre-election periods, is a major issue for Jewish communities. These countries are also underdeveloped economically and lack the legal framework that would allow their Jewish communities to solve problems related to heritage preservation, restitution of Jewish property, or the collection of funds for their activities. “These are issues that are quite successfully resolved in the Eastern European countries that have joined the EU in the last 20 years, ” Zisels said. Zisels believes that Ukrainian Jews need to ask themselves first and foremost what is best for Ukraine and all its citizens. Ukraine has the chance “to break the chain of tragedies in its history and become a stable European country,” and it would be “best in all respects for Ukraine to join the EU: for Ukraine as a whole, for its minorities, and in particular for Jews in Ukraine.”

Mertes believes, like many in the protesting opposition, that Russia is making unprecedented interferences in Ukrainian affairs. According to Kliger, Ukraine always had tight relations with Russia historically, economically, and politically that simply cannot be ignored. Neverhtheless, AJC supports “every democratic change that we can see in Ukraine. In that context we do believe that going with the West and the EU, Ukraine will continue its movement toward democracy, rule of law, transparency, less corruption and many other things that are characteristic of a democratic country,” Kliger said.

Some Ukranian Jews are concerned about potential anti-Semitic street incidents that could take place under the guise of the protests. Rabbi Moshe Azman, a local Chabad emissary, told Israel National News that he had cancelled several public events celebrating Hanukkah due to fears that “groups of hooligans” could target Jews.  On the other hand, Rabbi Jonathan Markovitch of the Federation of Jewish Communities in Kiev said his community has “been holding menorah lightings among the crowds of protesters,” the Jerusalem Post reported. AJC is also concerned with possible anti-Jewish manifestations in the protests by the Ukrainian political oppostion party Svaboda, which is viewed as an anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi group by various Jewish organizations. “That remains to be seen. So far we haven’t seen this,” Kliger told JNS.org.

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UKRAINIAN JEWS SPLIT ON DANGERS OF PROTEST MOVEMENT                                                           

Sam Sokol                                              

Jerusalem Post, Dec. 4, 2013

Ukrainian Jews are split in their perceptions of the potential dangers towards their community due to recent massive anti-government protests around the country. Following a rebuff of the European Union last week, hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians came out to protest against President Viktor Yanukovich’s turn towards Russia. On Friday, under pressure from Moscow, Yanukovich dropped plans to sign a free trade pact with Brussels that would have integrated the post-Soviet nation much more firmly into the western bloc. Russian President Vladimir Putin has been pushing Ukraine to join a Moscow-led customs union with Kazakhstan and Belarus, which he hopes to develop into a political and economic “Eurasian Union,” to match the might of the US and China.

Some local Jews have been worrying that the presence of Svoboda, one of the leading opposition factions and a significant presence in the street protests, may portend an ugly turn for the Ukraine. Oleg Tyahnybok, the leader of Svoboda, which has been called an anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi party by the World Jewish Congress and other Jewish organizations, is one of the four “emerging leaders” of the protests, according to The Financial Times. According to FT, while many in the capital Kiev do not agree with Svoboda’s strident ultra-nationalism, the “highly disciplined party is providing important organizational support for the current protests” and opposition activists will tolerate the party if it assists in their goal of forcing Yanukovich to step down.

Not all protesters have tolerated Svoboda, however, with university students pushing a local party chief from a podium at a rally of some 20,000 in the western city of Lviv. Svoboda protesters “took the Kyiv administration building,” Tyahnybok told protesters according to Radio Free Europe. Party leader Oleg Tyagnibok has previously made the accusation that “Ukraine is being controlled by a Russian-Jewish mafia,” Irena Cantorovich, a scholar at Tel Aviv University’s Moshe Kantor Database for the Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism, said earlier this year. Rabbi Moshe Azman, a local Chabad emissary and one of several men claiming the title of Chief Rabbi, told Israeli news website Arutz Sheva that he had cancelled several public events for the commemoration of hanukka due to fears of violence by protesters. After lighting the Menorah in the capital’s Central Synagogue, Azman “announced the cancellation of all the events and performances.” He told Arutz Sheva this was due to fears that “groups of hooligans” would act against Jewish targets under the cover of the protests. Azman specifically cited Svoboda as a factor that could drive the protests out of hand, however, not everybody agreed with him.

Rabbi Jonathan Markovitch, of the Federation of Jewish Communities in Kiev who is also a Chabad hasid, told the Post that there is no connection between the protests and the Jewish community, and that his community has continued to hold public events in connections with the holiday. “We have been holding menorah lightings among the crowds of protesters…We are following developments in Ukraine closely and remain in continual contact with our representatives on the ground and with local Jewish communities,” American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee spokesman Michael Geller told the Post on Monday. “Our FSU Director Ofer Glanz has made it clear that we stand ready to provide needy members of the community with extra food, medicine or other forms of relief should the situation require it.”

A pig’s head was left on the doorstep of a synagogue being built in Sevastopol earlier this month, the Ukrainian city’s Jewish community said. Several days ago it was reported that a Ukrainian website had uploaded a video game in which players can kill Jews and other “enemies” of the Ukraine.

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ISSUING A STREETWISE CHALLENGE TO DICTATORS

Garry Kasparov & David Keyes

Wall Street Journal, Nov. 13, 2013

Before 1984, the address of the Soviet Embassy in Washington, D.C., was 1125 16th St. But that year Congress, in a move led by then Sen. Al D'Amato, took the unusual step of renaming the street after the heroic Soviet human-rights activist Andrei Sakharov. The new address of the Soviet Embassy: No. 1 Andrei Sakharov Plaza. Every time the Soviets entered or left their embassy, they were reminded of the human cost of their tyranny. This simple but inspired congressional measure helped put human rights at the center of the U.S.-Soviet relationship. Following the symbolic move, in late 1986, the Soviets allowed Sakharov and his wife to return to Moscow from years of exile. As voices of dissent grew stronger, Soviet tyranny grew weaker. Today, the Soviet Union is gone, but autocracy in Russia is not. And neither is the need to remind the world of the brave dissidents who risk everything for freedom.

Consider life in Russia today under Vladimir Putin. Symbolic protests, such as singing something other than a hymn in church, can land you in Siberian prison, as happened to members of the female punk-rock band Pussy Riot. In 2012, hundreds were arrested for protesting fraud in Russian elections. Freedom of speech is limited, as the government controls all national TV networks. At least 19 journalists have been killed since Mr. Putin's ascent to power in 2000, with no accountability for the perpetrators. Discrimination against gays and lesbians is enshrined in law and restrictions on nongovernmental organizations have increased dramatically.

What person can best remind the world of Mr. Putin's brutality? Sergei Magnitsky. This brave lawyer, who was 37 at the time, took on the Kremlin in 2007 by uncovering widespread financial corruption. He paid with his life. Magnitsky was working as a tax lawyer for William Browder, the CEO of Hermitage Capital Management, the largest foreign investor in Russia. In 2007, Mr. Browder's firm was raided by Russian authorities and accused of tax evasion. Magnitsky's subsequent investigation into the case revealed that it was, in fact, the Russian government that had stolen $230 million in tax revenue. For exposing this crime, Magnitsky was arrested in November 2008 and imprisoned without trial. Despite a series of health problems, he was denied medical treatment for nearly a year and died on Nov. 16, 2009, from neglect and abuse by prison authorities. Like Sakharov before him, Magnitsky deserves to be, if not a household name, then a street name.

Taking a page from Congress's ploy in 1984, the New York-based nonprofit Advancing Human Rights has launched Dissident Squared, a global initiative to rename the streets in front of the embassies of dictatorships and authoritarian states after political prisoners. The aim is to remind repressive states that the world has not forgotten about their brutality. The streets directly outside Russian embassies, for instance, would be renamed "Magnitsky Plaza." Dissident Squared is also targeting the embassies of Iran, China and Syria. The street in front of Iranian embassies should be renamed " Tavakoli Plaza," after the imprisoned student leader Majid Tavakoli. The young Iranian activist gave a brave speech in 2009 calling for greater freedoms. He was promptly arrested and has spent the past four years in prison, with no end in sight. Last month, Iran's foreign minister denied knowing who Mr. Tavakoli was, and thousands of Iranians took to social media to enlighten him. Following this online backlash, Mr. Tavakoli was released on furlough for a few days. But when the attention died down, he was quietly re-imprisoned. The street in front of Chinese embassies should be renamed "Liu Xiaobo Plaza," in honor of the imprisoned Chinese dissident and 2010 Nobel Peace Prize winner. In 2008, Mr. Liu was the lead author of Charter 08, a manifesto signed by more than 300 Chinese intellectuals and activists calling for free speech and multiparty elections. In 2009, he was arrested and sentenced to 11 years in prison. It is a brazen regime that would keep a Nobel Peace Prize winner behind bars. The street in front of Syrian embassies should be renamed "Darwish Plaza," after the jailed Syrian lawyer and free-speech advocate Mazen Darwish. As head of the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression, he was for many years instrumental in covering protests and later uprisings against the dictatorial Bashar Assad regime. In February 2012, shortly after calling for the release of political prisoners, Mr. Darwish was jailed by Syrian authorities.

Dictators try so hard to silence critics like Messrs. Tavakoli, Liu and Darwish, just as Sergei Magnitsky was silenced, because they know that every time someone points out the brutality and corruption of their rule, it exposes the regime's weakness and fundamental illegitimacy. It chips away at the facade of power. Governments that want to support such heroic protests might take a cue from Andrei Sakharov. His widow, Yelena Bonner, cited his credo in a 2009 speech for the Oslo Freedom Forum: "In the end, the moral choice turns out to be also the most pragmatic choice." Freedom-loving nations should make the moral choice of confronting autocrats, honoring dissidents and making respect for human rights a core element of any bilateral relationship. In the end, this is also the pragmatic choice. For as we saw with the collapse of the Soviet Union, regimes that jail and murder dissidents are destined to fall when we have the courage to hold up a mirror to their brutality.

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THREE CRISES, ONE PRESIDENT, MANY BEWILDERED FRIENDS

Charles Krauthammer 

The Columbian, Dec. 17, 2013

The first crisis, barely noticed here, is Ukraine's sudden turn away from Europe and back to the Russian embrace. After years of negotiations for a major trading agreement with the European Union, Ukraine succumbed to characteristically blunt and brutal economic threats from Russia and abruptly walked away. Ukraine is instead considering joining the Moscow-centered Customs Union with Russia's fellow dictatorships Belarus and Kazakhstan. This is no trivial matter. Ukraine is not just the largest European country, it's the linchpin for Vladimir Putin's dream of a renewed imperial Russia, hegemonic in its neighborhood and rolling back the quarter-century advancement of the "Europe whole and free" bequeathed by America's victory in the Cold War.

The U.S. response? Almost imperceptible. As with Iran's ruthlessly crushed Green Revolution of 2009, the hundreds of thousands of protesters who've turned out to reverse this betrayal of Ukrainian independence have found no voice in Washington. Can't this administration even rhetorically support those seeking a democratic future, as we did during Ukraine's Orange Revolution of 2004? Why not outbid Putin? We're talking about a $10 billion to $15 billion package from Western economies with more than $30 trillion in GDP to alter the strategic balance between a free Europe and an aggressively authoritarian Russia — and prevent a barely solvent Russian kleptocracy living off oil, gas and vodka from blackmailing its way to regional hegemony.

The second crisis is the Middle East — the collapse of confidence of U.S. allies as America romances Iran. The Gulf Arabs are stunned at their double abandonment. In the nuclear negotiations with Iran, the U.S. has overthrown seven years of Security Council resolutions prohibiting uranium enrichment and effectively recognized Iran as a threshold nuclear state. This follows our near-abandonment of the Syrian revolution and defacto recognition of the Assad regime. Better diplomacy than war, say Obama's apologists, an adolescent response implying that all diplomacy is the same, as if a diplomacy of capitulation is no different from a diplomacy of pressure. What to do? Apply pressure. Congress should immediately pass punishing new sanctions to be implemented exactly six months hence — when the current interim accord is supposed to end — if the Iranians have not lived up to the agreement and refuse to negotiate a final deal that fully liquidates their nuclear weapons program.

The third crisis is unfolding over the East China Sea, where, in open challenge to Obama's "pivot to Asia," China has brazenly declared a huge expansion of its airspace into waters claimed by Japan and South Korea. Obama's first response — sending B-52s through that airspace without acknowledging the Chinese — was quick and firm. Japan and South Korea followed suit. But when Japan then told its civilian carriers not to comply with Chinese demands for identification, the State Department (and FAA) told U.S. air carriers to submit. Again leaving our friends stunned. They need an ally, not an intermediary. Here is the U.S. again going over the heads of allies to accommodate a common adversary. We should be declaring the Chinese claim null and void, ordering our commercial airlines to join Japan in acting accordingly, and supplying them with joint military escorts if necessary. This would not be an exercise in belligerence but a demonstration that if other countries unilaterally overturn the status quo, they will meet a firm, united, multilateral response from the West. Led by us. From in front. No one's asking for a JFK-like commitment to "bear any burden" to "assure the … success of liberty." Or a Reaganesque tearing down of walls. Or even a Clintonian assertion of America as the indispensable nation. America's allies are seeking simply a reconsideration of the policy of retreat that marks this administration's response to red-line challenges all over the world — and leaves them naked.

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Despite Calls for Neutrality in Ukraine Protests, Young Jews Are on the Front Lines: Sam Sokol, Jerusalem Post, Dec. 13, 2013 — Despite calls by Jewish leaders to remain neutral, young Jews have been on the front lines of protests against Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich.

Winter Games, Caucasian Misery: Ekaterina Sokirianskaia, New York Times, Dec. 5, 2013—The Black Sea resort of Sochi, with its breathtaking views of the nearby Caucasus Mountains, was once a favorite holiday destination of Communist Party bosses in the Soviet era.

Russia vs. Europe: Bill Keller, New York Times, Dec. 15, 2013 — The world needs Nelson Mandelas. Instead, it gets Vladimir Putins.

Ukraine: On The Edge Of Empires: George Friedman, Forbes, Dec. 17, 2013— The name “Ukraine” literally translates as “on the edge.” It is a country on the edge of other countries, sometimes part of one, sometimes part of another and more frequently divided.

On Topic Links

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