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Jewish General Who Led Cossack Offensive Against the Nazis Killed in Battle

February 4, 1942
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The revelation that the Soviet General, Lev Dovator, famous commander of the Cossack troops who defeated the Germans at Rostov and caused their retreat along the entire Soviet front, was a Jew, is made today in the Red Star, official organ of the Soviet army.

Reporting that Gen Dovator “died the death of a hero,” the Soviet army newspaper emphasizes the fact that under the Czarist regime the Cossacks were used to carry out pogroms against Jews, while under the Soviet regime they are led by a Jewish general and dealt smashing blows at the enemy. This, the Red Star says, is the sign of the great changes that have taken place in Soviet Russia. Gen Dovator was made a hero of the Soviet Union three weeks before he was killed on the front in the January battles.

The Soviet press today reports from Biro-Bidjan that collective farming in the Jewish autonomous region there is to be considerably extended in connection with war emergency measures taken by the Soviet administration. The Jewish collective farms in Biro-Bidjan are clearing 5,000 acres of new fertile land from the taiga, the Siberian forest, and 10,000 acres of fallow land will be brought under cultivation, the report says.

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