Soviet Brochure Says Jews Are Responsible for Deterioration in East-west Relations

A brochure recently published in Moscow, Yad Sionizma (The Poison of Zionism), charges that “Zionists” — in effect, the Jews — are responsible for the deterioration that has taken place in East-West relations in the past few years. The “Zionists” are portrayed as able to torpedo detente through their “control” of the military-industrial complex in the West in general and the United States in particular.

“The pro-Zionist bourgeoisie in the West controls or holds entirely in its hands the 165 ‘death concerns’ … When blood flows, money flows too (the Zionists) say,” the brochure states.

It further claims that the “Zionists” also oppose any improvement in Soviet-U.S. relations and are against disarmament talks and trade links. The brochure adds that the “Zionists” control “over half” of all U.S. periodical publications and television programs as well as the film industry. Their alleged control of the U.S. media enables them to manipulate the “frame of mind” of the American people.

The brochure contends that the Mafia, with its multi-million dollar drug and extortion network is under the control of the “Zionists” and stresses the power of American Jewish millionaires whose aggregate capital “exceeds the U.S. gross national product.”

VITRIOLIC CRITIC OF ZIONISM

The 112-page brochure, published in 1983, is coauthored by Elena Dmitrievna Modrzhinskaya and Vladimir Federovich Lapsky. At the time of her death in 1982, Modrzhinskaya headed the Critique of Anticommunism Sector of the USSR Academy of Sciences Philosophy Institute. She was the author of some 200 published works, a large number of which was devoted to Zionism, of which she was one of the most vitriolic Soviet critics. Lapsky is not known to have made any previous contributions to the anti-Zionist drive.

One of the two prepublication readers named in the brochure is Vladimir Bolshakov, a regular contributor on foreign affairs to Pravda and a veteran of the anti-Zionist campaign.

Last January, Bolshakov published an article in Pravda entitled “Fascism and Zionism: The Roots of Kinship.” One element in the article was the charge that Zionists throughout the world owe their primary allegiance to Israel — a charge implying that world Jewry constitute a Nazi-like “fifth column.”

One of the many illustrations in the brochure is a Star of David at the center of a hugh spider’s web. The web embraces the Capitol building in Washington, the U.S. eagle emblem, the banking system, and a wad of one-hundred dollar bills.

The importance of this brochure is that the crude allegations which are typical of Soviet and anti-Zionist propaganda are presented more clearly and succinctly than in most other publications. Similar to other publications, the brochure omits any evidence to support its claims.