A student of Soviet affairs who has visited the USSR ten times in recent years, declared here that the younger generation of Soviet Jews are becoming increasingly and openly defiant of a regime that labels them Jews but does not permit them to lead Jewish lives. Dr. Allen Pollack, a professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh, spoke at a meeting of 400 young people sponsored by the Hillel Foundation at the University of Toronto. He likened the temper of Soviet Jewish youth to the Black Power movement among Negroes in the United States.
“One sign of the movement is a strong identification with Israel,” he said. “Artifacts from Israel are the hottest items in the Soviet black market.” During last June’s Six-Day War, Jews walked the streets muttering “mir,” “mir,” Dr. Pollack said. “In Russian this means ‘peace’ but in Yiddish it means ‘we.'”
Dr. Pollack said that the forced identification of Jews as such in Russia without corresponding cultural rights has made the present generation of young Soviet Jews “the most Jewish generation.” He said “theirs is a negative reaction: ‘You tell me I am a Jew. All right, I am a Jew and I’m proud of it. I don’t know what it means but I’m going to find out.'”
Dr. Pollack said he didn’t think the Soviet Government is dedicated to anti-Semitism or that the Jews in the USSR face physical extinction. “The Soviet Union is sensitive to world opinion,” he said, “and can be pressured to live up to its own laws with regard to minorities.”
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.
