The reform process in the late 1980s aroused many hopes and a feeling of euphoria; at the same time, however, old problems that had previously been swept under the carpet such as manifestations of antisemitism cropped up one after the other. Opinions among the ruling elite differed about how to deal with these phenomena. We remained apprehensive about the potentially disastrous consequences for the Jewish movement if the new Thaw would end.

Richard Schifter, the U.S. Assistant Secretary of  State for Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs, understood the need to proceed cautiously in dealing with the Soviet Union: “…in order to achieve progress, I should present only issues of a purely humanitarian nature─issues that could be resolved without fundamental change in the Soviet system.” He thus noted that at his first meeting with his counterpart Adamishin on April 14, 1987: “The issues that I planned to raise in our dialogue included abuse of psychiatry, restrictions of freedom of expression and religion, and emigration.”[1] Whereas the cases of other national minorities (Armenian and German) were less urgent, the issue of Jewish emigration had acquired top priority in America. Many of the Jewish refuseniks were well known in the West and in Israel.[2]

In the course of discussions on general emigration issues, Schifter would usually bring in lists of specific refuseniks whose cases he wanted to be reviewed. At first Adamishin would send him with this list to OVIR, which refused to discuss with him cases of emigration to a third country, including Israel─only to the US. An appeal was made to Shevardnadze (via Adamishin) and the issue was settled. By September 1987, Schifter was able to report to Schultz:

First, the Soviet foreign ministry was prepared to discuss all emigration cases with us. Second, it was prepared to intercede with other Soviet authorities on emigration cases at our request. Third, changes in emigration regulations were likely. Fourth, the commission created in the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet to review denials of exit permits could be expected to overrule some denials by local offices. Fifth, what we called abuse of psychiatry had been ended. Finally, the criminal code provisions dealing with violations of the religious-control laws and with defamation of the Soviet Union were likely to be repealed and persons heretofore convicted under these laws were likely to be released from prison, but anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda would remain a crime.”[3]

 

In the following month, a significant number of refuseniks whose names appeared on the list that Schifter had presented to Soviet authorities two months earlier received exit visas.

Along with the upswing in perestroika processes, Gorbachev’s popularity in the West kept rising. Jamming of Voice of America broadcasts in Russian ceased in May 1987.[4] Exchanges of opinions at various levels and reciprocal visits by delegations occurred more frequently as did the number of international meetings and summits.

On the eve of the superpower summits, Jewish circles in the West provided Western leaders with up-to-date information about the situation of Soviet Jewry and specific requests about refuseniks. Acutely aware of the Western media’s heightened interest in their problems, activists inside the Soviet Union also intensified their activity on the eve of and during those visits. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Foreign Secretary Geoffrey Howe were scheduled to visit Moscow from March 27 to April 1, 1987. Hanna and Lev Elbert had begun a hunger strike on March 5. Lev had been released from prison about three years earlier but now his son Carmi was called up to the army. The Elberts conducted a hunger strike for 45 days until the regime backed down.[5] On March 7, the eve of International Women’s Day, one hundred refusenik women from various Soviet cities, including Mara Balashinskaia, Inna Uspenskaia, Elena Dubianskaia (from Moscow), Ida Taratuta, Galina Zelichenok (Leningrad), Karmela Rais (Vilnius), and Polina Paritskaia (Kharkov) started a three day hunger strike in order to draw attention to the situation of women refuseniks.[6] On March 8 another 200 women from seven cities joined them.[7] On March 19, the Moscow refusenik Leonid Yusefovich began a hunger strike in protest against the refusal to give his family an exit visa. He continued it for 42 days, until he received a promise from the authorities that his case would be reviewed.[8]

On March 23, eight Leningrad refuseniks held a demonstration across from the party’s municipal committee at Smolnyi. The participants, who held posters saying “Let my people go!” and “Let us go to Israel,” included Roald Zelichenok, Ida and Aba Taratuta, Boris Lokshin, Mikhail Beizer, Lea Shapiro, Inna Rozanskaia-Lobovikov, and Elena Keis-Kuna. Before the demonstration they sent a letter to Gorbachev. The effect of the new trends could be seen in the course of the demonstration: it lasted for an hour without interference, after which the demonstrators were invited to Smolnyi to meet with the director of OVIR Savitskii and three other party officials.[9]

On March 24, fifty Moscow refuseniks went to the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet with a petition signed by 120 activists and former prisoners of Zion calling for a review of the cases of Aleksei Magarik, Yosif Berenshtein, and Yulii Edelshtein.[10]

On the day of Thatcher’s arrival, Vladimir and Maria Slepak, long-time refuseniks and former prisoners of Zion, began a hunger strike to mark seventeen years of their refusal, while thirty Moscow refuseniks held a demonstration in the center of Moscow. The police did not interfere nor did they interfere when the demonstrators assembled again on the next day. On the last day of the visit, April 1, Thatcher and Howe invited the refuseniks Inna and Yosif Begun and the wife of Professor Aleksandr Yoffe, Rosa Yoffe, to breakfast. An invitation was also sent to Ida Nudel but it “got stuck” in the mail and didn’t arrive.[11]

French Prime Minister Jacques Chirac arrived in Moscow on an official visit on May 16, 1987. In the course of governmental meetings, he handed Soviet authorities a list of refuseniks with a request to expedite their emigration. On the first day of his visit, Chirac held a meeting in the embassy with fifteen leading refuseniks, including Ida Nudel, Vladimir Slepak, Viktor Brailovskii, and Yulii Edelshtein.[12]

On December 1, 1987, Australian Prime Minister Robert Hawke arrived in Moscow for an official visit. On the next day he met with a large group of refuseniks in the embassy building, informing them about his meetings with Gorbachev and Shevardnadze. The correspondents at the meeting interviewed the refuseniks. Thanks to the influence of the refuseniks’ long-time friend Isi Liebler, the Australian embassy always welcomed the refuseniks warmly and respectfully.

At the third Reagan-Gorbachev summit, scheduled to take place from December 7 to 10, 1987 inWashington, a treaty on the reduction of medium and short range missiles was to be signed. As usual, the refuseniks intensified their activity in advance of and during the summit, conducting various protest acts, some of which were harshly repelled by the police and KGB.

An initiative group for conducting a series of demonstrations timed for the summit meeting held a press conference on November 4 at the apartment of Yulia Ratner. On November 23, in a letter to the CPSU Central Committee, one hundred individuals who had received refusals on grounds of secrecy described their vain attempts at dialogue with the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet and the CPSU Central Committee. The refuseniks declared their intention to start a hunger strike on December 6 and to continue it throughout the duration of the summit.[13] On December 6, thirteen Leningrad families demonstrated at the Palace Square. On the same day a large number of refuseniks demonstrated in Moscow at Smolensk Square opposite the towering foreign ministry building. Some 120 refuseniks made it to the square; a few dozen were detained on the way, and many others were prevented from leaving their apartments. In order to obstruct that demonstration on the day before the summit, the regime filled Smolensk Square with an official demonstration for peace. Foreign correspondents were not allowed to film the scene and Peter Arnett, the correspondent for a US cable channel, was detained─the photo of his detention was seen worldwide─and brought to the police station on a charge of hooliganism. He was held for four hours and released only after the intervention of the American consul. The Soviet weekly news show Vremia broadcast fragments of the refusenik demonstration, portraying them as opponents of the summit meeting and of peaceful co-existence.[14]

From November 23 to 25, 1987, a group of refuseniks held a symposium dealing with the issue of refusal on grounds of secrecy in the USSR. While understanding that it would jolt the Soviet authorities on the eve of such an important summit, the initiators decided that the circumstances were ripe for public discussion of this delicate topic. The ideologist and one of the initiators of the symposium was Emil (Milan) Mendzheritskii. According to him, initial discussion of the idea began at the end of 1986 among a small circle that included himself, his wife Tsilia Raitburd, Vladimir Prestin, and Pavel Abramovich.

Although the regime tried to dissuade the group from holding the symposium, they ultimately did not interfere with it. One of the symposium’s conclusions, noted Mendzheritskii, was that the maximum cooling off period should not exceed five years because over that period of time even the most secret technology becomes general knowledge. Vladimir Prestin received an exit visa on the eve of the symposium and almost all the other participants received visas immediately afterwards.

The refuseniks’ activity received broad coverage in the Western press, and, of course, it was reported to Gorbachev on the eve of his visit to the U.S. In an interview to NBC correspondent Tom Brokaw, Gorbachev spoke brusquely about emigration from the Soviet Union, terming it a “brain drain.” He also declared that refuseniks who had had access to state or military secrets could not leave the USSR.[15]

Gorbachev’s attitude toward emigration and to human rights as a whole was contradictory. Despite the positive processes that he had initiated in the country, including in the area of emigration, there was a sense that, while yielding under Western pressure in some matters, he was continuing to maneuver among the various groups in the top Soviet leadership.

During the summit the refuseniks carried on an even fiercer struggle. The authorities tried to persuade them to halt their protests and detained them on the road to demonstrations. Those who nevertheless managed to break through the police encirclement and to raise their posters on various occasions would be immediately picked up by the police and transported in waiting buses to the police station. Many refuseniks conducted hunger strikes and sent protest letters to Soviet official organs and to Jewish organizations in the West. Press conferences were held at the apartment of Igor and Izolda Tufeld.

The refuseniks’ desperate actions inside the Soviet Union aroused human rights and Jewish organizations in the West to conduct their own protests. Western media reports about the “battle front” were brought back to the USSR by the “voices” (BBC, Voice of America, etc.).

The refuseniks were encouraged by a large meeting at Beit Eliahu stadium in Tel Aviv, on December 6, 1987, with the participation of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir and President Haim Herzog. Around ten thousand people gathered to express their complete support for the refuseniks’ struggle for free emigration. Shamir reached me by telephone and my conversation with him and Tania Edelshtein [who was already in Israel] was broadcast to the entire stadium. Shamir declared that no force could halt the reunification of Soviet Jews with their brethren in Israel. Choking with emotion, I said something in the same spirit.

U.S. Jewish organizations mobilized totally on the eve of the summit. Whereas the previous summits had been held in Reykjavik and Vienna, this one was to take place in Washington, on home ground, and they intended to demonstrate the full strength of Jewish protest to the Soviet leadership. Although they faced the difficult task of not appearing as opponents of superpower détente, American Jews handled it excellently. On December 6, a demonstration of 250 thousand people was held in Washington; Natan Shcharansky played a significant role in the preparation and mobilization of the event, the likes of which American Jewry had never seen before on a frosty December day. The summit opened the next day and, as Schifter testifies, after the formal greetings, Reagan asked Gorbachev whether he had heard about the demonstration. Gorbachev replied that he had and expressed a desire to move on to a discussion of arms reduction but Reagan persisted. For five minutes he spoke about the American people’s enormous interest in free emigration from the Soviet Union. Gorbachev attempted to switch the conversation to arms control, but Reagan continued to emphasize the importance of solving emigration problems for Soviet-American relations. Only after the Soviet leader sensed the Reagan administration’s serious concern about a satisfactory solution to emigration problems did the discussion turn to arms limitation.

 

The Moscow Summit: May─June 1988

The following summit, which took place in Moscow from May 29 to June 2, 1988, made an even greater impression on the Soviet leadership and society. The summit was very effective. The treaty on the limitation of medium and short range missiles was signed, and regional conflicts, including Afghanistan, were discussed. The public at large, however, was impressed not so much by those serious achievements as by the American president’s agenda and manner. Reagan possessed enormous charm and conviviality. He strolled along the historic Arbat, held press conferences for Soviet and foreign journalists, and met with students and Soviet cultural figures, all of which was widely covered in the Soviet press.

The refuseniks, of course, utilized the visit to increase pressure on the regime. Those who regularly would organize demonstrations every Thursday announced that during the summit they would demonstrate daily. Various groups carried out acts of protest near the Lenin Library, across from OVIR, the Foreign Ministry, and even on Red Square. I remember the posters: “KGB and OVIR─it’s time for destalinization,” and “Refusal is sabotage against détente.” The women carried out a long hunger strike under the slogan “For peace without refusals.” Western correspondents followed events on the spot and were not hindered this time.

A significant event during the summit, unthinkable in earlier times, was an official reception at the American ambassador’s residence at Spasso House for Jewish activists, dissidents, and religious figures. The format of the meeting called for the ambassador’s greeting, remarks by representatives of the Jewish, dissident, and religious movements, and a response by Reagan. Two weeks before the meeting I was asked by the U.S. embassy to speak on behalf of the Jewish national movement. I had to present the three-minute text in advance so that it could be included in the brochure at the completion of the summit. I was, understandably, very excited and felt a colossal responsibility─in three minutes how could I convey the essence of our conflict with the Soviet regime and our overwhelming desire to leave that country in a clear, accessible form? The work on the text was difficult. The exhausting schedule on the eve of the summit left practically no time, but in those rare moments when the work went well, I was enveloped by an unforgettable feeling. That is probably what happens when a person suddenly begins to feel the breath of history.

I can picture the surrealistic scene in my memory: the normally congested Ring road circling Moscow was empty as Soviet buses transported us to the residence of the American ambassador under Soviet police escort. Large round tables seating ten people were set up in the roomy hall─someone from the American delegation and representatives of the refuseniks, dissidents and one of the Christian confessions at each table. My wife and I sat at a table at which George Schultz presided. One side of the hall was given over to journalists with their photo and video cameras. First Sergei Kovalev, one of the editors of Chronicle of Current Events, who had been imprisoned earlier for seven years, spoke on behalf of the democratic dissidents. He said that the prisons still contained many political prisoners who had had the courage to state openly those truths that today are publicly acknowledged by the government leaders: that society has inherited a ruined economy, the information system is permeated by lies, and there is an absence of positive ideals. Yet the very same bodies that formerly carried out repressions are supposed to enact reforms. Noting that the course of change is unstable and hopes are shaky, Kovalev said that the situation could be reversed, which would be a tragic outcome.

I said that the current leadership willingly condemns the former “deviations,” but as soon as the Jewish movement activists try to revive valuable elements from the past that had been destroyed, they come up against a refusal. “Thus, while condemning the evil deeds that had been committed earlier, the regime preserves its results.” I said that under the guise of glasnost, large editions of antisemitic material were being published, pogromist organizations were developing furiously, that more Jews were let out during the Brezhnev period of stagnation than under Gorbachev’s more liberal regime, and that over 80 percent of those refused on grounds of secrecy had lost access to so-called secret information over ten years ago. At the same time, in statements directed at the West, the regime states that the maximum period of refusal for reasons of secrecy generally does not exceed five years. “If Mr. Gorbachev wants to demonstrate new thinking in deeds, not words, he should not restrict the freedom of movement of my people or its cultural and religious development. All people on earth are passengers on one cosmic spaceship wandering in the universe. Your hand, Mr. President, is placed on the helm of that ship, and we hope, we are confident, that it will be firm.”

The last speaker was Father Gleb Yakunin, who had spent five years in prison and five in exile. He spoke about Christian prisoners and moral degradation and the growth of alcoholism, drug use, and crime in the atheistic Soviet state. “The chain reaction of trampling upon human rights is no less dangerous than the nuclear reaction of a hydrogen bomb,” he said.

We were all in a state of euphoria from this unreal circumstance. As we left, the correspondents pounced on us. I don’t remember how many interviews I gave that day, but I had the feeling that as a result either we would receive permission to leave or I would sit in prison for a long time if perestroika would be reversed.

Soon after the summit, at the suggestion of the Democratic Congressman Steny Hoyer, there was a meeting in the Supreme Soviet between Soviet and American legislators. For a discussion of emigration issues Hoyer invited several activist refuseniks, including myself and Vladimir Kislik, and also the heads of the Moscow and all-Union OVIR. I sat across from Rudolf Kuznetsov, head of the Moscow OVIR, and Hoyer let us speak in turn. It was a real duel; our views were strikingly different. We again gave several interviews after the meeting.

The fall of 1988 remains in my memory as a time of transition to a practically open form of activity and of a real conveyor belt of meetings. One delegation or another would arrive almost every day, and I was the address for practically all of them despite the fact that we had set up a rather broad group for briefing foreigners. At the same time, I also had to deal with movement matters, prepare new projects, and part with friends who were leaving. It was difficult and painful. More and more veteran refuseniks left, but I remained and the end was not in sight….

The nineteenth (and last) all-Union CPSU party conference took place a month after the Moscow summit. It adopted a decision about reforming the Soviet political system that affected the CPSU’s monopolistic position. Elections henceforth offered alternate candidates. The soviets (councils) were reformed from top to bottom in line with parliamentary principles, changing from executive organs of the CPSU into organs of state authority. A new higher legislative body was established─the USSR Congress of Peoples’ Deputies─as were congresses at the republic level.[16] On October 1, 1988 at an extraordinary session of the USSR Supreme Soviet, Gorbachev, in addition to his position as General-Secretary of the CPSU, was elected chairman of the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet, thus replacing A. Gromyko. On December 1, 1988, the Supreme Soviet under his chairmanship adopted the law “On elections of peoples’ deputies of the USSR.” In January 1989 the first truly free nomination of candidates for peoples’ deputies began. The opening session of the congress from May 25 to June 9 was the high point of perestroika.

 

AntisemiticGroups

As perestroika gained momentum, all kinds of antisemitic filth floated to the surface. Sometimes it was independent activity that was rooted in the preceding decades of state and everyday antisemitism. More frequently, however, the antisemitic organizations were backed by opponents of perestroika in the power and party organs that wanted to demonstrate to the supporters of liberalization what they could realistically expect to receive as a result of democratic reforms. Whereas up until perestroika, public antisemitism had existed under the guise of anti-Zionist publications, now recently formed nationalist groups took the lead. Among them was the Pamiat society, which had arisen at the end of the 1970s in order to protect and preserve historic Russian monuments. In the 1990s, Pamiat turned into an organization that aspired to the role of chief ideologist of the renascent Russian nationalism. It selected as its chief enemy─what else but the Jews, whom the organization blamed for all the misfortunes of Russia and the USSR. It seemed evident that Pamiat received informational and management support from the KGB, which provided it with its archives of well-prepared information.

Soon organizations similar in spirit to Pamiat began to multiply in other Russian cities: “The Universal Anti-Zionist and Anti-Masonic Front ‘Pamiat,’” “The Orthodox National-Patriotic Front ‘Pamiat,’” “The Union of the Russian People,” “Fatherland,” “Orthodox Rus,” “The Black Hundreds,” and so forth. Whether monarchic, Russian Orthodox, or just patriotic, they were united by a “holy” faith in the presence of a Yid;-Zionist-Masonic conspiracy (or cynical utilization of antisemitism for channeling popular anger or for uniting representatives of the country’s titular nations on this basis) directed against the USSR and all mankind.

A large number of antisemitic leaflets, brochures, and placards made a rapid appearance and were sold openly at underground passages, kiosks, and metro stations. Lists were disseminated containing the names of famous figures with Jewish roots in Russian culture or, in particular, those who had served in the punitive organs, with a description of their malicious activity. New editions of Soviet and tsarist-period works such as the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and anti-Zionist works of numerous authors began circulating. All this filth, which hitherto had been hidden under the veil of political correctness, burst out and was prominently displayed at every corner. Pamiat members held open debates in schools and clubs, published various information sheets, and organized noisy demonstrations.

On May 6, 1987, about 400 Pamiat members held their first unsanctioned demonstration in the center of Moscow “against the oppression of the Russian people.” The oppressors, naturally, were the Jews. Although the demonstrators did not have a permit, no one bothered them. On the contrary, after the demonstration they succeeded in being received by Boris Yeltsin, the head of the Moscow municipal committee of the party and candidate Politburo member, On May 20, Pamiat held another demonstration in Moscow.[17] Yet in November, the KGB had dispersed a refusenik demonstration against antisemitism next to the foreign ministry building. The Pamiat actions were a blatant example of public incitement and fell directly under the statute of fomenting discord among national groups, but there was a feeling that they had the backing of the KGB and the highest leadership.

The Jews were in shock at the totally illogical but harsh assertions that blamed the Jews for everything─the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in April 1986, the huge casualties during an earthquake in Armenia, and of course the empty shelves in the stores. I once participated in a debate with a Pamiat representative in some club, which was attended by around forty people. I asked the representative: “What’s the connection with the earthquake?” Without batting an eye, my opponent replied that the official in the construction ministry─he named a patently Jewish name─who was responsible for supplying Armenia with construction material deliberately saw to it that low-quality material was delivered. He, therefore, was responsible for the victims of the earthquake. The people in the hall nodded in approval.

The Zionist movement was understandably repulsed by such activity; ultimately, however, we would always say that antisemitism was inherent in Russian Orthodoxy, the Russian national ideas, and the Russian state. It had been that way under the tsar and remained that way in the USSR. It should be noted that neither the patriotic activity of the Black Hundreds in 1905 nor the national-patriotic activity of Pamiat in the 1980s-1990s saved Russia. On the contrary, that activity facilitated the disintegration of the state because the Russian national patriotism frightened not only the Jews but also the representatives of other peoples in the USSR, thus reinforcing other nationalist movements. Pamiat’s dyed-in-the-wool antisemitism not only stimulated a rise in pro-emigration feelings but also oriented those Jews toward Israel. Thus all the antisemitic grimacing and contortions evoked, along with the repulsion, a sense of the justice of our cause.

The legalist wing of our movement, which was concerned about the fate of those Jews who would not emigrate, regarded this activity differently. When the situation became threatening, we worked together. On June 30, 1987 a group of leading Jewish activists turned to Mikhail Gorbachev with a protest against Pamiat’s antisemitic actions, but they received no response. The activists then planned a protest demonstration, which they tried to hold on September 14, 1987. The demonstration was dispersed but in the planning process a group of activists unconnected with refusal was formed. It played an important role in the further development of the legalist direction.

Antisemitism raised its head in an even more ugly form than mere propaganda. On September 11, a 73-year old Jew, Naum Nemchenko, was murdered in Leningrad. The police viewed the motive for the murder as robbery, but the refuseniks thought otherwise.[18] Eleven gravestones were destroyed on July 30 at the Jewish cemetery in the city of Gorky.[19] On November 21 and 22, acts of vandalism were committed against a synagogue in Rostov.[20]