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Thursday, Aprili|l985 - THE BUUSTrN --^ll
From Page .4
This has, of course, been a new cause for anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union, the anti-Semitism ofjealousy. , . : . It has also been a new cause of anti-Semitism that stems from a sort of exasperation with the Jews for leaving the country in which, despite anti-Semitism, so many of them Appear to do so much beiicr than your average gentile. ;       [ ^
This is a natural enough question, .with such a'disproportion-ately high numberi)f Jews in the arts andsciences^ those traditional escape professions of Soviet life that make life^fojr tbpse who are an them just that much more livable.      - - '
Given rthai we are
',Hhereby'theescat>ade'knbwnast^^^ what should be^dohe-
,} ^boui^the tw,o million or so of our brethren who will definitely go on living in the USSR? Write them off? When. 8 first raised the question in 1972 during a return visit - to Jsrael — following-up the lives of former Soviet Jews who 1 had accompanied out to Israel from Moscow the previous year I seemed'tp be a voice crying in the.^Hdemess: "What about
- During 1984; the O.S: Goven|| mem counted a total of more than 650inteitnatibnafcterrG>r ist Tincidents,^ an increase jibme 30 percent oyer the I983p|l figure.ojf about 500.   .'f jcss' ~
all those >yho ar« going to renikin iii the USSRT^Ahd also "Are you sure ^evc^ JSpvict Jew 5^ plac^
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u«.i«««a ni«^,nr^,c      z^.^-^       del^griiont^^that^pafSi^sedi^
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arrogated toitseltthe rightto violate.the basic huma? righ^of . f^^;^ in:c^v.m^}o^^^o^ the fiUlems of emigration, and even the basic human right of merely travehng
abroad and returning or not returning at will (in fact; creating!
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} absorbing Soviet Jews' int)^ Ismeli society even tKough the tsiael : papers.were teeming witli news and features'about them.. ^ ~ I was Uil&ing fact and reatity^then and I am talking fact andj;
reality today toW 13 years laten 7 . . -
- Today, of course; there Jiaye been a num^r of studies con-f:
firming the notion that it hash*t been a total sjiccess with ever3|
Soviet Jewish emigrant to Jme emigrated.' - .
.  In Israel in the early 197ds, I met many new.ex-Soviet olim:
'who really never should have left„tlie Soviet Union but who
-instead should have been aided and abetted Crcuoi abroad in^ j
maintaining their Jewish'ciilture and religidn. And there really
were those who wanted to go biackr^^ring they had made a bigj:
mistake.- <•   - ' \"   ~' < -   ^ ^
' Much as the land of their birth left much to be desired as a
human habitat, they^had adapted to it, and they simply didn*t^^
transplant easily.
They seemed to me so much more Soviet than they were Jewish, though this is not to say that they-would not have thrived in Jewish community life if that had been offeredthem-in the Soviet Union.
In short; some Soviet J$ws should have emigrated, and somel should not have.
All were denied' free choice. All were denied their basic human rights, so how could it really have turned outany^ differently?
Isn't thatthe way life is, even when onedoes have free choice? How mAch more ambivalent, then,*^when it is denied.
' The question is, what do wedoabout it now,'in 1985, at the! start of what could well be, for better orsWorse, (andFrn not sure which, a new period of warmer relations with the Soviet Union?-
Let us recognize the world lost interest in Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union when the media tired of it as a subject quite>some time ago.^nd the politicians found they had other fish to fry. Just last month in Ottawa I spoke to^ media source| of mine, a well-known Ottawa correspondent, and Jhe confirmed this in no Uncertain terms.. ^, ^
He saw an irony in the specta^ejjf thejjarliamentacy cqjn« mittce on Soviet Jews in theiiouse of Commons going over to Russia, meeting> a iew^ Refuseniks, coming back to Canada shaking their headsjin pious regrets and promptly forgetting about them at the nextsocial encounter.with Soviet diplomats^
Let us look to what now does interest our politicians — human rights — and Iet% now ride with that.
On May 7, a six-week international meeting of experts on human rights (government experts, that is) is due to convene in Ottawa as part of the GSCEprocess ^Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, otherwise known as the Helsinki Final Act.
That scheduled Ottawa meeting on human rights is a Canadian governmentinitiative. Yes, theCanadiangovernmentsug-gested it and is going to host it.
in Ottawa recently I attended a preliminary all-day conference designed to let the Canadian government delegation have input from non-governmental organizations.
During a recess, I tried to interest Alan; Rose of Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC) in the idea of linking Jewish emigration to the question of human rights in the Soviet Union generally. I had written to him last year proposing the idea tbo. But to no avail. CJC has a fixed positionanda vested interest in going on doing things in the same old way.
But here in the Conference of Canadian Jews, the alternative voice for Canadian Jews, we have a chance to embark in new directions.
And I strongly urge that we move in the direction I am proposing, that is, to a concern for human rights in the Soviet Union and fit the questions of Jewish cultural and religious life in the USSR tfwi/the question of the right of Soviet Jews to travel to Israel and return if they so wish, into that new mold.
Let us now attack the Soviet authorities fortheir violation of the human right of everyone to learn about their own cuhure and religion, and for their violation of the human right of everyone to travel abroad^ nevermind eniigrating—^t travel abroad, and of JeWs in particularto travel to Israel, because of Israel's particular significance to the pursuit of Jewish culture, and to return home, and to e if they wish, just as
you and I are able to do; :
In short, forget about Soviet Jewish emigrationp^r se and insist, instead, on the right of Soviet Jews to travel to Israel as tourists, and to return or remain there at their own discretion.
N E W YORK Bsirbara B. Friedman of New York has been liamed chairman of the Jewish Braille Institute's(JBI) project to publish large-print Hebrew and English editions of the Five Books of Moses for free distribution to severly visually-impaired persons.
A total of 2,000 copies of
each edition of the Torah will be printed. :
Friedman also announced the launching of a nationwide campaign seeking sponsors for the historic project — the first in the annals of the Jewish people. J BI, founded in 1931, is at 110 East 30th Street, New York, NY I00I6.
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