State Department Feels Congressional Resolution on Soviet Jews Appropriate

The State Department believes that a Congressional resolution on the denial of Soviet Jews’ rights “would be appropriate,” but “claims that Soviet Jews as a community are living in a state of terror seem to be overdrawn,” a Department official said today.

The latter remark by Richard T. Davies, Deputy Assistant Secretary for European Affairs, before the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s European subcommittee raised the only serious difference of opinion today between a witness and the subcommittee chairman, Rep. Benjamin J. Rosenthal (D., N.Y.). The House unit is considering pending legislation expressing concern over the USSR’s treatment of its Jewish citizens.

Rosenthal was also astonished at Davies’ endorsement of a Soviet Jewry bill sponsored by Rep. Frank Annunzio (D., Ill.) as “an excellent vehicle through which to convey the concern of the Congress over this issue.” Rosenthal noted that the Annunzio bill was the only one among the approximately 200 introduced so far which does not specifically mention emigration. Davies replied that the State Department’s “suggested modifications” include reference to emigration.

Rosenthal stated: “We intend to produce a resolution before the end of this session of Congress (because) we must view these deprivations not as citizens of one country viewing the abhorred behavior of another government but as the denial of human rights, (which) must be condemned wherever and whenever it occurs.”

Sol Polansky, a Foreign Service officer testifying with Davies, backed Davies’ denial of a Soviet Jewish “state of terror” but admitted that “Jews do feel they are being discriminated against.” Polansky also said he was “not at all persuaded” that there were enough Yiddish-speaking Soviet Jews to make Yiddish broadcasting over the Voice of America “worthwhile.” Asked afterwards by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency correspondent to comment on a report in Pravda, the Soviet Communist Party newspaper, that 300,000 Soviet Jews consider Yiddish their first language. Polansky said he was unaware of the report.

Other witnesses today included Rep. James H. Scheuer (D., N.Y.), Rep. John Buchanan (R., Ala.) F. Lee Bailey, the lawyer, representing the League for Repatriation of Russian Jewry; Rabbi Zev Segal of the Essex County (N.J.) Conference on Soviet Jewry, and Bertram Zweibon, national vice chairman of the Jewish Defense League. Zweibon said: “Violence is always bad but sometimes necessary. The League favors that which keeps the plight of Soviet Jews before the world. Even violence.”