Candidly speaking: Israel and Putin’s Russia

For over 30 years, my principal public occupation in the global Jewish arena was to promote the struggle for liberation of Soviet Jewry.

 

This brought me into direct contact with Soviet ministers, officials and apparatchiks, enabling me to appreciate firsthand the obsessive anti-Semitism underlying the Kremlin’s policy toward Israel and the Jews.

 

This contrasts starkly with current Russian President Vladimir Putin’s positive attitude to Jews in general, despite the fact that he was a former officer of the Soviet secret police agency, the KGB, a body notorious for its anti-Semitism. This is even more extraordinary taking into account the fact that Putin today exploits nationalism as a major element to rally public support. And Russian nationalism, from the time of the czars and heavily reinforced by the Soviets, operated in tandem with a feral anti-Semitism.

 

There are no rational explanations for Putin’s extraordinary attitude toward Jews, which some have gone as far as to describe as being motivated by philo-Semitism. Some say he was influenced as a youngster by his Jewish German teacher, Mina Yuditskaya, now living in Israel and whom Putin invited for a social chat to the King David Hotel during his last visit.

 

He may also be highly sophisticated and pragmatic, and having seen the outcome of Soviet anti-Semitism, may have come to a realization that Jewish support would represent an asset at many levels.

 

Putin has ruthlessly suppressed violent anti-Semitism. He has gone out of his way to attend Jewish functions, such as the opening of a Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center in Moscow, to which he contributed $50 million of state funds and even symbolically personally donated a month’s salary.

 

He also attended Hanukka celebrations and conveyed warm messages of praise and goodwill to Jews on the advent of the Jewish New Year – utterly unprecedented, especially from a nationalist Russian leader.

 

It is also astonishing that, despite his strategic involvement and alliance with the Syrians and Iranians, Putin has determinedly kept the channels to Israel open, making a point to personally visit Israel. In fact, in June 2012, Israel was the first country he visited after his election. He frequently speaks warmly about the Jewish state, expressing pride that it contains the largest diaspora of former Russian citizens. At the Western Wall, accompanied by Russian Chief Rabbi Berel Lazar, he donned a kippa, which undoubtedly made his Bolshevik predecessors turn in their graves. He also seemed quite indifferent to the rage this created among his Arab allies.

 

Read More: Candidly speaking: Israel and Putin’s Russia – A tenuous relationship – Opinion – Jerusalem Post