Soviet dictator Nikita S. Khrushchev may be even more anti-Semitic than Stalin according to an extensive study of minority problems in the Soviet Union published today by the Senate Internal Security Committee. The study was prepared by the legislative reference service of the U.S. Library of Congress.
The report detailed an anti-Semitic trend in the Soviet Union and said it was doubtful If this trend will be reversed If pronouncements and actions of Khrushchev are any index.
According to the U.S. study, Khrushchev has “a long record of anti-Semitism.” The report recalled that as Prime Minister in the Ukraine, after World War II, he issued orders banning Jews from important local offices. He was the first Prime Minister of a republic to close Jewish theaters, schools, and publishing houses. He tolerated an anti-Semitic outbreak in Kiev adequately grave to warrant investigation by Moscow.
The report said anti-Semitic practices have gained ground in Russia since the mid-30’s. Recent biased expressions by Khrushchev are quoted. A summary is made of anti-Semitic singling out of Jews in some cases and censoring of references to Jews in others. Jews were eliminated from the nationalities mentioned as receiving decorations and honors in a new issue of “The National Traditions of the Peoples of the Soviet Union.”
“De-judaization…destruction of national consciousness and complete assimilation has been the ultimate aim of the Soviet Government in its policies toward Soviet Jewry,” said the report. The study showed that the outbreak of anti-Semitism in the period 1948-1953 further reduced remnants of Jewish cultural life. Deportations and executions were described.
A question was raised about the future of Soviet Jewry. The report cited a consensus that Moscow has gone far in denationalizing but not assimilating the remnants of Soviet Jewry. “Organized Jewish communal life no longer exists in its vital form. Nor have guarantees of collective rights, or in fact individual rights, been respected.” Jews “have been spurned by the Soviet Government and looked upon as ‘foreign’ and ‘suspect,” the report established.
“For the immediate future, it is difficult to foresee any great measure of relief from Soviet discrimination and abuse of power and it is equally difficult to foresee any perceptible narrowing of the gap between promise and fulfillment In Moscow’s treatment of its non-Russian peoples.”
The report was drawn from many sources. It dealt with minorities in the Soviet empire which was termed the “prison house of nations and races.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
