Premier Yitzhak Shamir called on the Soviet Union Sunday to “give us our two million brethren who no longer want to live there.” He stressed that “We have no fight with the government or the people of the USSR.”
Shamir spoke at a mass meeting of solidarity with Soviet Jewry here, also attended by Vice Premier and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, leading Soviet Jewry activists who have immigrated to Israel and representatives of Israeli political parties.
Natan Shcharansky, one of the most famous of the activists, urged President Reagan to link all U.S.-Soviet negotiations with the issue of free emigration for Soviet Jews.
Meanwhile, President Chaim Herzog and1 Shamir received Chanukah greetings from six leading Soviet refuseniks. Their typewritten message, brought here by Robert Loup, a former United Jewish Appeal national chairman, drew an analogy between the struggle of the Maccabees and that of Jews in the Soviet Union.
The message was signed by Alexander Lerner, Maria and Vladimir Slepak, Lev and Tatiana Upshitzer and Yuli Kushrovsky. It said they were praying that “God will give us renewed strength to continue and that the Chanukah lights will illuminate the way for those of us who have problems in fulfilling our dream to go to Israel and to return home.”
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.
