Fifteen hundred dignitaries–religious, civic and political leaders and entertainment stars–attended last night’s gala premiere at the Criterion Theatre of “Escape to the Sun,” the first film dealing with Soviet Jews seeking to emigrate. The Greater New York Conference on Soviet Jewry, under the auspices of the National Conference on Soviet Jewry, held a reception in the Monsanto Building after the movie. The chairman for the event was New York Conference chairman Stanley Lowell. Recent Soviet emigres Boris Koran and Michail (Misha) Neiburger were honored.
Producer-director Menahem Gold, who flew in from Israel for the premiere, expressed the hope in an interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the film would awaken world concern for Jews who wish to leave the Soviet Union. The crux of the story, he said, is endless waiting for visas, uncertainty clouding their daily activities and the barbaric and inhumane treatment behind prison bars, and tracking down of fugitives.
Associate producer Leon Charley, an American who returned from Israel two days ago, told of visiting an absorption center and meeting face to face with some who had managed to leave the Soviet Union. “The tales I heard would make strong men weep,” he told the JTA. He called “Escape to the Sun” a picture “which is basically truthful,” and which “deserves to be seen. It is cut from the pattern of anguished, tormented lives of Soviet Jews who cry out to America and the conscience of the world: Do not forget us.”
NEWS BRIEFS
The Keenest unanimously adopted a resolution yesterday demanding an end to the persecution of Jews in Iraq. The Keenest acted after Foreign Minister Abba Eban said Monday that Israel could best help Iraqi Jews by arousing world opinion to their plight.
A delegation of the Jewish Community Council of Greater Boston met with the West German Consul General Dr. Otto Burchard yesterday to protest West Germany’s release of the three Munich terrorists. The delegation was headed by Bert Rabbinic, vice president of the FCC. A statement issued later by Justin L. Wyner, president of the JCC, demanded that Bonn act through the UN to impose sanctions on Libya, the country that gave sanctuary to the freed terrorists and the hijackers.
It was announced in Rome that Italian Jewry will sponsor a Chair on the history of Italian Jews at Bar Ilan U. The Chair will bear the name of Rabbi Elio Toaff, Chief Rabbi of Rome.
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.
