Chief Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, exiled from Moscow, calls on Russia’s Jewish community to “leave while they can” before being blamed for the war in Ukraine.
“If we look at Russian history, it quickly becomes clear that they blame the Jewish community when the political system was in jeopardy,” Goldschmidt told British newspaper The Guardian. “Both under the Tsars and under Stalin, the government sought to direct the anger and discontent of the Russian population towards the Jewish community.”
According to Goldschmidt, anti-Semitism is on the rise in Russia as the country appears to be moving towards a new kind of Soviet Union. “The Iron Curtain is getting lower and lower, which is why I think Russian Jews would do well to leave.”
Under pressure
Goldschmidt resigned as chief rabbi of Russia in July after refusing to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “Religious leaders were pressured to justify the invasion and I refused,” he continued. There are about 165,000 Jews in Russia out of a population of 145 million Russians.
In 1926, there were an estimated 2,672,000 Jews in what was then the Soviet Union, 59% of them in the Ukraine. So in a hundred years thousands of Jews have left. Mainly towards Europe and the USA, but lately also increasingly towards Israel.
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Source: BNR
Sharon Rock is an author and journalist who writes for 24 News Globe. She has a passion for learning about different cultures and understanding the complexities of the world. With a talent for explaining complex global issues in an accessible and engaging way, Sharon has become a respected voice in the field of world news journalism.
