A Briton who was at the Moscow Youth Festival charged today that even before the Israeli youth delegation arrived at the international fete Soviet authorities were making attempts to discredit it. He also reported that he had met Russian Jews who described discriminatory activities by the Communist Party against them.
In a letter to the Manchester Guardian signed only “K,” the writer said that the kidnapping of Israeli diplomat Eliahu Chazan by Soviet secret police was only part of the plan to discredit the Israeli delegation.
He reported that a member of Komsomol, the Communist youth movement, told him that at preparatory meetings in Moscow representatives of the Communist Central Committee attempted to convince Komsomol members that while part of the Israeli delegation was “favorable” to the USSR the other portion was not. The “anti-Soviet” delegates were said to be traveling via Istanbul to receive instructions there from an American intelligence agent.
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.
