Premier Golda Meir suggested last night that the United States should withhold the sale of wheat to the Soviet Union as long as Russian Jews are not permitted to leave for Israel. Addressing the annual convention of the Public Council for Soviet Jewry at the Van Leer Institute, Mrs. Meir said “it is not inhumane for the Americans to condition the sale of grain on the Soviets’ allowing Jews to join their brothers.”
The sale of American wheat to the USSR to alleviate severe shortages caused by last year’s poor crop is a major aspect of the expanded U.S. -Soviet trade agreed to at last May’s summit meeting in Moscow. Bi-partisan resolutions awaiting action in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives this month would withhold most-favored-nation status and trade credits from the Soviet Union as long as that country continues to restrict emigration.
Mrs. Meir, in her address, also criticized international and Israeli scientists for not boycotting scientific conferences in Russia while Soviet authorities demand an exorbitant head tax from Jewish academicians seeking to leave.
KEEP UP WORLD PRESSURE
Prof. Yuval Neeman of Tel Aviv University estimated that there are about 370,000 Russian Jews with academic training. If the families of these professionals are counted, this means that about one-third of all Russian Jews are penalized by the education head tax, he said. Prof. Neeman added that the world scientific community must give Jewish scientists in Russia all the protection that international publicity can afford.
Avraham Harman, president of Hebrew University and president of the Public Council for Soviet Jewry, said that up to the Six-Day War only about 7000 Jews left Russia for Israel while since then 50.000 have come. He said this proved that the USSR responds to changes in circumstances. It is up to Israel and world Jewry to exploit Russia’s need for economic concessions from the West. Harmon stated.
Greville Janner, a visiting MP from Britain, told the meeting that direct action on behalf of Soviet Jews, such as telephone calls and radio broadcasts can have immediate results in Russia. Dr. Zeev Ravitsky, a Moscow chemist who recently arrived in Israel, urged the International Red Cross to visit Jewish political prisoners in the USSR. He also assailed the exploitation of Russian-Jewish immigration for partisan political purposes in Israel.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
