In an effort to prevent the isolation of Soviet Jews from the West, legislation was introduced in Congress Thursday to establish a program called Radio Maccabee which would broadcast Russian-language programs to Jews in the USSR.
Sen. Paula Hawkins (R. Fla.) and Rep. Matthew Rinaldo (R. NJ) introduced concurrent bills in the Senate and House during the opening session of the 99th Congress to provide $3 million for setting up Radio Maccabee as a separate arm of Radio Liberty which broadcasts into the Soviet Union.
The special program would include items of general cultural, intellectual, political and religious interest to Soviet Jews as well as provide Hebrew education courses. It would particularly serve the needs of refuseniks and activists.
Hawkins and Rinaldo stressed, at a press conference Thursday, the increased harassment of Soviet Jews and the decrease in emigration which totaled less than 1,000 in 1984. “The plight of Soviet Jews has rarely been worse,” Hawkins said.
Hawkins said Soviet Jews are fighting to make their voices heard. “Their courage, their organization, and their contacts in the West have allowed them to retain some visibility despite overwhelming Soviet pressures,” the Senator said.
Hawkins stressed that the Soviet government knows that the Jewish activists need information to survive, “information flowing in from the West, flowing out with the news of their plight …. We are here to keep the lines of communication open with the Jews of the Soviet Union.”
PROGRAM ESSENTIAL AT THIS TIME
Rinaldo noted that Radio Maccabee is needed at a time when “Soviet authorities, in violation of the Helsinki accords, are interfering with both postal and telephone communications and seek increasingly to isolate their Jewish population from contact with the West.”
He stressed the news service would “supplement and not replace” Radio Liberty’s existing programs to the USSR. He said that presently Radio Liberty devotes a half hour a week to a program for Soviet Jews and, rather than take the time away from its existing programs, the new service is needed. He said it is hoped that Radio Maccabee could be on the air for up to six hours a day.
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