Russian Jews: Their Background and Escape to Israel

Nadene Goldfoot
                                                                       

The world is made of 7 Continents:  
1. ASIA: 50 countries with 60% of world population
    17,212,000 sq miles large
2. AFRICA: 54 countries
3. NORTH AMERICA: 23 countries
4. SOUTH AMERICA: 12 countries
5. ANTARTICA
6. EUROPE: 51 countries,  3,930,000sq miles large 
7. AUSTRALIA: 14 countries, 0.3% of world population
                                                                     
                                                                   

Russia:  Lies in both Europe and Asia.  Russia is considered European.  The capitol is Moscow.  75% of the population is in Europe with 22% in Asia.  Anything west of the Ural mountains is considered European.  6,323,142 sq miles large.  (almost twice as large as Europe)
                                                           

Catherine was the name of 2 Russian Empresses.  Caherine I ruled from 1725 to 1727.  In May of 1727 she sxpelled all the Jews that were living in Little Russia.  This order was countermanded after her death.  Little Russia was an administrative body of the Russian Empire in the Hetmanate created for the first time by the ukase of Peter the Great on May 27, 1722 in place of the Little Russia Prikase.  

Then Catherine II, called Catherine the Great, ruled from 1762  when she permitted all aliens to live in Russia except Jews.  She ruled to 1796, and her Jewish policy was marked by a  combination of liberalism and coercion.  On one hand, Jews were allowed to register in the merchant and urban classes in 1780, but permission was restricted to White Russia (Belorussia) in 1786. Jews went to White Russia originally from Poland.  They were living in Grodno in the 12th century, at Brest-Litovsk in the 14th century, and at Pensk from 1506.  In eastern White Russia, Jews appeared in the 16th century, but owing to opposition from the local burghers, the communities were long unrecognized.  

Massacres happened at Polotsk in 1563, at Homel in 1659, at Mohilev , etc. in 1655.  The Jewish population suffered severely at the end of the 17th century from the Polish-Cossack and Swedish wars.  
                                                   

 This marked the beginning of the PALE OF SETTLEMENT, an area Jews had to live in as they were kept out of all other areas.  It was their confinement.  This happened during her last years, which were marked by reaction from 1789 to 1796. It was instituted in 1791.    She prevented the extension of Jewish settlement and in 1795, prohibited Jewish residence in even the rural areas.  25 provinces made up the Pale of Settlement of Czarist Russia which was itself made up of Poland, Lithuania, White Russia, Ukraine, Bessarabia -Belarus (Moldova and Ukraine),  and Crimea, where Jews were permitted permanent residence.  Permission to live outside its confines was granted only to certain groups who had to be members of the liberal professions with a high school diploma.  They would have been the big businessmen, skilled artisans, and ex-Cantonists. 

CANTONISTS were Jewish children who were conscripted to military institutions in czarist Russia with the intention that the conditions in which they were placed would force them to adopt Christianity. The "cantonist units" were properly barracks (cantonments) established for children of Russian soldiers. They provided instruction in drill and military training, as well as a rudimentary education. Discipline was maintained by threat of starvation and corporal punishment. At the age of 18 the pupils were drafted to regular army units where they served for 25 years. Enlistment for the cantonist institutions, which originated in the 17^th century, was most rigorously enforced during the reigns of *Alexander I (1801–25) and *Nicholas I (1825–55). It was abolished in 1856 under *Alexander II.

The fate of Jews ever found outside the Pale without permission depended on the arbitrary decision of the local governor.  The borders of the Pale were restricted from time to time arbitarily by the oppressive "Statute Concerning the Jews." of 1835.  By 1882, under the MAY LAWS, Jews were excluded from rural areas inside the Pale.  As a result of these restrictions, Jewish economic development was severely hampered.  The Pale was abolished in effect in August 1915 but legally in March 1917 by the end of World War I.  

Jews immigrated to the USA in 3 waves:  The European Ashkenazi group  arrived " between 1880 and the onset of restrictive immigration quotas in 1924 with over 2 million Jews from Russia, Austria-Hungary, and Romania."   

In the 1880's many European Jews immigrated to the USA.  Almost all the records say they were from Russia, and that was all.  We have to really dig to find out what part of Russia, and usually it was somewhere in the Pale.  Our grandfather, Nathan Goldfus/Goldfoot b: 1871, came over from Telsiai, Kovno, Lithuania  through a trip through England, Ireland, Canada and then finally landing in Council, Idaho marrying our grandmother, Zlata Jermulowskey from Lazdijai, Seinai,Suwalki, Lithuania/Poland.  They married in Boise, Idaho in 1905.  

The family of Louis Eskovitz Iskowitz Eskowitz Eskowitz b: 1875 in Russia and wife  Rose Kupper b: 1886 in Russia had to pay a guide to get them and their children; Chester, Baili, Leonard, Morris,   Dora, Fanny and Nat out of Russia.  The guide led them out at night between 1905 and 1906.  It became cloudy and they couldn't see each other.  One of the children let go of their parent's hands and the parent couldn't find it again.  They were panicking.  Finally, the parent had the little one and they were able to continue and cross over the line.  tt's hard to understand that they weren't allowed to leave. Nat, the youngest, told me this story several times.  His cousin became the rabbi who started Boy's Town in Jerusalem.                        

At Babi Yar, a ravine ouside Kiev where almost 34,000 Jews were killed in September 1941.The horror of the massacre together with the fact that no memorial was erected until the 1980s in memory of the Jewish victims turned Babi Yar into a symbol of anti-Semitism.  

                                                     
  It is estimated that more than half of the 6 million Jews of the Holocaust  died directly as a result of the Shoah and were Russian Jews. Many more emigrated to Israel, USA, Argentina, and Germany.  Communists denied any specific religious ethnicity of the dead. 

 Russia and Ukraine still have among the larger Jewish populations in the world today (440,000 in Russia; 300,000 in Ukraine.)   The Ukraine has been going through their own battle with Russia lately.  They do not want to be a part of Russia again.  

Russia had turned into the  Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), which was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 30 December 1922 to 26 December 1991. Nominally a union of multiple national Soviet republics, its government and economy were highly centralized.and back to Russia again.  They may have called it a socialist state but the world considered it a Communist State.  
                                                    

       Golda Meir was the newly appointed ambassador to the USSR in 1948 from Israel and she visited the GREAT SYNAGOGUE in Moscow during the Succot holiday.  She was mobbed by thousands of Jews, defying the intimidation of KGB infiltrators and the very real anger of being arrested.

I had moved to Israel in 1980 and had many Russians in my Hebrew class at the Ulpan.  They had just started allowing some Russians to leave by then, Russians that didn't matter to them.  They knew how to study a foreign language, and we didn't.  For starters, my husband and I were in a class with 40 Russians.  As we couldn't keep up, a smaller class was created for us, and get this-my husband had taught Hebrew to barmitzva preparing boys.  Conversational Hebrew was another thing.  
                                                      

Natan Sharansky b: 1948

More Jews have wanted to get out of Russia/USSR but were not allowed.  It was an atheistic country.  It had not only become a Communist state, but ended all religion for everyone.  Natan Sharansky was in prison since 1977 for trying to learn Hebrew.  He was there in 1980-81 when I was learning Hebrew in Haifa, Israel at an ulpan.  Our teacher was Sarah, and she sent him letters.  He tried to make aliyah to israel in 1973 but was refused permission as all Jews were not allowed to go there. By 1986 with the help of his wife's work and the president of the USA, he moved to Israel.    the Choral Synagogue (the only synagogue allowed to operate in Moscow) was filled with spies and the most conscious of the city’s Jews were the refuseniks who sought to leave Mother Russia forever.”
                                                   

Ukranian Jews getting out and making aliyah to Israel

Natan, THE CHAIRMAN OF THE JEWISH AGENCY FOR ISRAEL,  wrote an article for THE JERUSALEM REPORT MAGAZINE that came out in July 13, 2015.  He had a feeling that many more Jews would want to make aliyah to Israel, and it turned out that he was right.  In 1988 Natan was head of the Zionist Forum, an organization founded by aliyah activists and former prisoners of Zion.  400,000 Jews came out of Russia within the first 2 years.  
                                                    

2nd generation Russian Jews in Israel 

They found their place in Israeli society.  These Russians can boast of tremendous achievement.  They entered the hi-tech, Science, economics, the arts, sports and politics of ISRAEL.  They had to fight against the Soviet regime for the right of Jews to move to their historical homeland and had no doubt that in the end they would prevail.  
                                                    
I suppose Russia missed the Jews who left.  Something happened.  It started accepting Jews again.  I say this because I've read that " Instead of one synagogue, Moscow today is home to about 20 synagogues. The iconic Choral Synagogue has been refurbished and attracts scores of worshippers each Shabbat.
                                                       

In St. Petersburg, Jewish life has been revived as well: synagogues, a Jewish Community Center, schools, a Hillel and senior center all educate St. Petersburg’s Jews. In a city that before 1917 banned Jewish residency, public Shabbat dinners now draw crowds of Jews."

"Jews make up about 0.16% of the total population of Russia, according to the 2002 census, and Russia’s Jewish community is shrinking. Numbering 2,279,800."  Here's something also happening in the USA.  Small family sizes and high rates of assimilation and intermarriage mean that fewer Russians identify as Jews. As many as 80% of non-Orthodox Jews in Russia marry non-Jewish spouses.

Vladimir Putin likes Jews.  When he was a small child, his neighbor was an orthodox Jew.  His Jewish neighbors had him over for dinners many times and he was very appreciative as his family was very poor.  He never forgot their kindness to him. He became president in 2012.  
                                   

However, anti-Semitism has hit Russia as well.  "Despite Russia’s thriving Jewish life and pro-Jewish overtures from President Putin, Russia today is home to worrying levels of anti-Semitism. A 2015 ADL poll found that fully 23% of Russians harbor anti-Semitic views. In recent months, a series of high-profile anti-Semitic incidents has made some Russian Jews reconsider their place in Russian society." 


Resource: https://www.countries-ofthe-world.com/continents-of-the-world.html
https://www.countries-ofthe-world.com/continents-of-the-world.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collegium_of_Little_Russia_(1722%E2%80%9327)
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/jewish-immigration-to-america-three-waves/
http://www.worldometers.info/geography/largest-countries-in-the-world/
https://www.aish.com/jw/s/7-Facts-about-Jewish-Life-in-Russia-Today.html
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
Update: 5:00pm, again at 7:15pm.  .