Mikhail Kliachkin, a 30-year-old aeronautical engineer and one of several Jewish activists who arrived here Friday from Moscow, claimed that a million Soviet Jews want to leave Russia and said Israel must demand that the US government increase its pressure on the Kremlin in order that they may do so.
Kliachkin, who along with Gavriel Shapiro and other activists, were granted exit visas last week without paying the education head tax, said pressure must be increased on the Soviet authorities to rescind the tax. He claimed that the Russians were in a delicate position because of a serious shortage of bread, the Chinese threat and the need for trade with the US. This and Communist Party chief Leonid Brezhnev’s anticipated visit to Washington enables the Americans to exert more pressure. “This is an opportunity which may not knock twice,” Kliachkin said.
COMMUNISTS PLAN TO RENEW ISRAEL RELATIONS
Kliachkin stated that he did not think the Russians would set up gas chambers like the Nazis did, but he thought they were quite likely to deport masses of Jews to Siberia and Birobidjan. He favored publication of the names of Jews who have applied for exit visas as a means of pressuring the Russians.
Meir Wilner, head of Rakah, Israel’s pro-Moscow Communist Party, claimed today that the Communist countries, including Russia, were planning to renew relations with Israel but some changes in Israeli policy must occur first. Wilner, who just returned from a visit to Bulgaria and Czechoslovakia, said the question of renewing diplomatic relations with Israel was raised in his talks with Communist leaders.
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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.
