A meeting on the plight of Soviet Jewry, which attracted many leaders in Italian culture and the arts, was told today that, despite some concessions by Soviet authorities, the position of Soviet Jews remained precarious.
The evaluation was presented by Daniel Mayer, of Paris, president of the League of Human Rights and former French Cabinet Minister, Mr. Mayer noted Soviet Premier Kosygin’s public condemnation of anti-Semitism in Riga last July, which was featured in Pravda. He said one could also mention a proposed monument at Babi Yar, the ravine where the Nazis slaughtered many thousands of Jewish men, women and children in 1941, and the authorization for printing of 10,000 Jewish prayerbooks.
He called the concessions a kind of re-conquest of positions which the USSR had never admitted “to have been fallen.” He asserted that many circles in the Soviet Union remained dogmatically opposed to Jews. He cited in evidence the effort last year by the Soviet Union to bracket Zionism with Nazism at the United Nations.
Prof. Aldo Garoschi, of Turin University, recalled the repudiation by the Soviet Communist Party of T.T. Kichko’s “infamous” book, “Judaism Without Embelishment,” and some other improvements. However, he demanded that the Soviet Government should allow reunion of Jewish families by permitting Soviet Jews who wished to emigrate to do so. He also urged that the USSR repress continuing manifestations of anti-Semitism, A resolution expressing the sense of the speeches and proposals was adopted, and addressed to the Soviet Government.
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