An expert on the subject of Soviet Jewry has branded as “misinformation” statements made by Rabbi Isaac L. Hechtman of Montreal about the circumstances of the Soviet Jewish community. Dr. Moshe Decter of New York, who heads an organization known as Jewish Minorities Research, said that statements made by Rabbi Hechtman, executive director of the Vaad Hair, Jewish Community Council of Montreal, “can only confuse and mislead the Jewish community and the general public, and can lead to a neutralization and paralysis of action and protest–which are the only known way of moving the Soviet authorities even slightly.”
Dr. Decter, scholar and author on the subject of Eastern European Jewry was replying to statements Rabbi Hechtman made to the press in Montreal following his return last month from Moscow where he visited Rabbi Yehuda Leib Levin a short time after Rabbi Levin’s 75th birthday celebration. Rabbi Hechtman has claimed he was misquoted but subsequently reiterated at least some of those assertions at a public meeting in Montreal.
A prime source of his information, Rabbi Hechtman said, was Michail Kundicof, who he identified as chief adviser on religious affairs to the Soviet Council of Ministers. Dr. Decter said that in the Government hierarchy there is “no such position or title, but there is a Ministry for the Affairs of Religious cults.”
Rabbi Hechtman has denied that he said Mr. Kundicof told him that the Soviet Government would print 40,000 to 50,000 additional copies of Jewish prayer books and Hebrew calendars. The rabbi had said that 10,000 calendars had been sold out in a day. On this point, Dr. Decter said “it is preposterous to contemplate any promise of additional prayer books when the recent edition of 10,000 is far from exhausted.” Moreover, says Dr. Decter, “no one on the outside really knows how many calendars are in circulation.”
Rabbi Hechtman denied that he said he had seen 20,000 Jews outside the Moscow synagogue on Purim, claiming he was not in the city at the time. He did not however deny saying that he had been given information that 20,000 were present. And, says Dr. Decter, a creditable American on-the-scene observer reported there were no more than 30 Jews singing and dancing outside the synagogue.
Dr. Decter challenged the rabbi to verify his assertion that the Soviet Government has made sufficient flour available to Jewish bakeries for the production of Passover matzoh, noting that the rabbi’s figure on matzoh baked in Moscow–90 tons– coincided with information circulated by Novosti, the Soviet news and propaganda agency.
JTA reported Rabbi Hechtman as saying that there were 80 to 100 Jewish weddings and a like number of Bar Mitzvahs held annually in Moscow. The rabbi affirms his statement about weddings but denies that he said anything about Bar Mitzvahs “since (they) do not take place in Moscow.” A total of four such events in any week, says Dr. Decter is about as many “as is found in many substantial synagogues.” He quotes Rabbi Levin of Moscow as having said that there were no such events in the synagogue because “our young people aren’t interested.”
Citing Rabbi Hechtman’s statement that there are three mohalim in Moscow, Dr. Decter said that there may “indeed be such trained people there, but circumcisions are prohibited. Why does Rabbi Hechtman imply that the mohalim are permitted to perform their functions?” Disputing Rabbi Hechtman’s statement that there are seven or eight students in the Moscow yeshiva, Dr. Decter pointed out that Rabbi Arthur Schneider of New York would not, if this were the case, have taken recent action to have one Russian boy he given permission to study in Budapest for the Russian rabbinate.
The rabbi disputed the report that he had said Jews abroad must help their Soviet brethren by meeting the Communist regime halfway and avoiding public protests and violent demonstrations against it. But on March 29, he told a Montreal public meeting that “a dialogue with communism should start right away” and assailed Jewish “politicians and diplomats” as “bankrupt” for “continuous denunciation of the Soviet Union.”
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.
