Beigin Calls on Soviet Leaders to Release Jews to Go to Israel

Reacting to the opening of the 24th Communist Party Congress in Moscow today, Menachem Beigin and American Zionist leaders addressed a rally tonight during which they called for the release of Soviet Jews to go to Israel. The rally, sponsored by the Zionist Organization of America and the United Zionists Revisionists of America, was hold at the Hunter College Assembly Hall. “The rulers of the Kremlin should always be reminded of the wrongs they have done to us, whether as fear-stricken executioners or as willing perpetrators,” declared Beigin, member of the Israel Parliament, former Cabinet minister and now leader of the opposition Gahal. “We in the free world will not desist until justice is done and the return to Zion of our suffering and fighting brethren in the Soviet Union is assured,” Beigin added. He was the principal speaker at the rally which was attended by some 2000 persons. In remarks prepared for delivery. Beigin pointed out that “the young reawakened Jew in Soviet Russia is ready for self-sacrifice for his people and for the historic homeland.” He added that there has arisen in Soviet Russia “a movement of Jewish national renaissance the like of which the Jewish people have not known since the days of the Maccabees.”

Herman L. Weisman, president of the ZOA declared that “It is high time that the Communist regime redeems the pledge made to Soviet Jewry in the year of the 23rd Communist Party Congress.” He added “in 1966, Premier (Alexsei) Kosygin gave formal assurance that no Jew desiring to go to Israel would be forcibly prevented from doing so. This covenant to the Soviet Jews has so far been dishonored,” said Weisman. Continuing, he said, “Compared with the thousands upon thousands of Soviet Jews who have been waiting for years and years for exit visas to Israel, exposing themselves to abuse, imprisonment and even death, the recent increase in the number of Jews permitted to emigrate is not a fulfillment of Kosygin’s specific pledge but an exacerbation of its violation.” In introducing Beigin, Prof. Howard L. Adelson, president of the United Zionists Revisionists of America, said “As the Communists meet in Moscow to plot against Jewry, we meet in New York to work for their redemption.”