Israel Appeals to Moscow for Equal Religious Rights for Jews

Israel today appealed here to the Soviet Union to reverse its current practices in regard to discriminations against Soviet Jewry, and extend to the Soviet Jews full freedom for the practice of their religion. The appeal was voiced by Dr. Joel Barromi, Israel’s observer in the Human Rights Subcommission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities which is now meeting here.

Dr. Barromi took the floor to discuss the major draft Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Religious Intolerance introduced by Sir Arcot Krishnaswami of India, a member of the 14-man group. A similar draft on the same subject which was introduced yesterday by the United States representative Morris B. Abram, had been with drawn by Mr. Abram in the interest of saving the subcommission’s time. Mr. Abram accepted the Krishnaswami draft instead of his own.

Prior to Dr. Barromi’s intervention, an impassioned plea for adoption of a document banning all religious discriminations was voiced by Jean Marcel Bouquin of France who said that such an instrument was necessary since the world is aware of “pogroms, the horrible deeds of the Nazi regime, and even of the Dreyfus case in my own country.”

V.N. Titov, the alternate representative of the Soviet Union, also delivered a long address on the issue, insisting that atheism, which he called a doctrine adopted by “tens of millions of the most progressive people in the world,” must be protected against oppression by religious elements.

“It is obvious,” Dr. Barromi told the subcommission, that consideration of a UN document banning religious bias “is of utmost importance for the Jewish people and the State of Israel. Religious intolerance has shed too long its somber and threatening shadows on Jewish life. Throughout the ages, it has claimed countless Jewish victims, and caused untold suffering and indignities.”

ENDORSES PROVISIONS OF DRAFT DECLARATION BEFORE U.N. BODY

Dr. Barromi went into details of the Krishnaswami draft, endorsing many of its provisions. He stopped particularly on clauses in the draft which declare: “Every person and every group has the right to worship, either alone or together with others, in public or in private, and to maintain houses of worship in accordance with the prescription of their belief.”

He emphasized the need for legal protection for religious practitioners to maintain their own “congregational institutions, ritual objects, language of worship and sacred books.” He noted that the draft declaration would permit religious believers the right to make pilgrimage to “sites held in veneration, whether inside the country or outside his own country.”

Dr. Barromi noted further that the Krishnaswami proposal would grant to every person “the right to observe the dietary practices prescribed by his religion or belief” and “where the state controls the means of production and distribution, it shall make such objects and materials “necessary for the observance of prescribed ritual or practices, including dietary practices” available to religious practitioners.

He emphasized also that religious groups must have the right to learn and teach their religious beliefs and traditions, and to associate for religious purposes inside the country or with international bodies. Stressing that his aim was to be “constructive.” Dr. Barromi appealed to all members of the subcommission to join the effort to draft a United Nations document forbidding religious bias “in the spirit of international good will.”

He did not name the Soviet Union once in his address but he underscored the fact that the Jewish people suffer severe discriminations in a certain country that is extremely progressive “especially in scientific and technological development.”