A warning that the Soviet Union may use the recent UN resolution equating Zionism with racism to “declare war on Soviet Jews” was sounded by Kings County District Attorney Eugene Gold, chairman of the Greater New York Conference on Soviet Jewry. “The UN resolution was planned in the Kremlin as part of a global anti-Jewish conspiracy, and there is a strong likelihood, that the USSR will use that insidious document to justify its oppression of Jews–especially those who want to emigrate,” Gold said.
He made his comments at a news conference Sunday at the Park Avenue Synagogue in Manhattan where key Jewish leaders from throughout the Metropolitan area took part in day-long “Leadership Conference” sessions aimed at charting new strategies to assure the survival of Soviet Jews.
Gold issued a pledge that the GNYCSJ will conduct a massive effort to make the Bicentennial year a “year of freedom for Soviet Jews,” “We are at a crucial moment in the brief but eventful history of the Soviet Jewry movement, a moment when there is little doubt that the USSR threatens to further choke off Jewish emigration while waging an unceasing campaign to wipe out Jewish culture and religion within its borders,” Gold said. With regard to emigration, he noted that in January of this year, 1300 people left the USSR with Israeli visas. A similar number left in February. The number of people who emigrated for the first four months of 1076 relates to an annual level of less than 13,000. This means a decrease of almost 40 percent compared with 1974 when 20,000 emigrated. Two years ago, more than 33,000 were allowed to emigrate.
“In recent months, we have seen new trials and new incidents of outrage perpetrated against Soviet Jews whose only ‘crime’ is a desire to leave the USSR so that they can give expression to their Jewish culture and heritage in a climate of freedom,” Gold said.
The challenge to redouble “our efforts to gain freedom for a greater number of Soviet Jews becomes especially acute when we consider that for the USSR detente is not a policy but a tactic,” Gold declared. “Moreover, the growing evidence here among students of Soviet affairs that the USSR is slowly but surely making detente a one-way street underscores the need for bold new measures and effective programs to protect Jews fighting for emigration,” Gold said.
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