Friday April 25, 2014

I've Been Thinking:

I cannot determine with 100% certainty those responsible for the new wave of anti-Semitism spreading through Ukraine and Crimea. But my sense is that both Russians and Ukrainians are responsible, each in the own way, for variant forms of the despicable racism.

The first major act of anti-Semitism took place in Donetsk, a province in Ukraine, on the eve of Passover when leaflets were passed out asking Jews over 16 years of age to register at their local offices and to register their property and cars, as well. The fee for this mandatory registration was $50.

The following Friday night, in the southern Ukrainian city of Nikolayev, two fire bombs were thrown at the main synagogue. The firebombing took place on the Sabbath eve of Passover.

This past Tuesday, in Crimea, in the city of Sevastopol, the Holocaust memorial was vandalized with a huge red sickle. The memorial is relatively new, having been erected in 2003.

In Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine's 4th largest city with a population of over one million, the grave site of Dov Ber Schneerson, the brother of Menachem, the previous Grand Rabbi of Lubavitch, Chabad was covered with graffiti swastikas.

And this past winter two synagogues were fire bombed and a Jewish person was stabbed in Kiev.

Anti-Semitic violence will only increase in both Ukraine and Crimea as long as stability and order elude those countries.

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