Knesset Resolution Affirms Solidarity with Soviet Jews and Their Right to Emigrate

The desire of Soviet Jews to emigrate to Israel is in conformity with Soviet law and the International Convention of Human Rights, the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Security Committee stated yesterday at the conclusion of a debate on the subject. In a resolution, the committee declared: “The Knesset affirms its solidarity with the Jews of Soviet Russia in their struggle to live as Jews and to come to Israel.” The resolution asserted that “the anti-Jewish smear campaign waged with the help of all official media of communication is gaining momentum in the Soviet Union and anti-Semitic publications recently published there recall the most venomous vilification ever aimed against the Jewish people.” The resolution concluded: “The Jewish people will not be silent until the innocent Jews recently arrested in the Soviet Union shall have been released and every Jew wishing to come to Israel shall be permitted to leave.” It also warned that the Soviet campaign was engendering an “atmosphere of hate” that endangers Soviet Jewry and is causing “serious apprehension of a new edition of the show-trials of the Stalinist era.”