APPENDIX D Hebrew in the Soviet Union In July of 1977, five months after Anatoly Shcharansky was arrested, the KGB stepped up interrogations of his friends. One morning a black KGB Volga stopped outside my house. A KGB official rang the doorbell and handed me a written warrant summoning me immediately for interrogation on the Shcharansky case. "Dress quickly. The interrogation must begin in half an hour," he ordered. The official escorted me into the black car and delivered me to the KGB interrogation department in Lefortovo containing the KGB Investigation Prison where Anatoly was being held. The initial interrogation lasted eight hours. The senior investigator of the KGB, Mr. Sherudillo, wanted me to testify against Anatoly, but I used every possible means to avoid giving any answers at all. It was suggested that I at least testify in an indirect way that my friend Tolya was involved in smuggling out of Russia information about Soviet space missions which was obviously absurd. - After a day which yielded no results for the KGB, I was given a second warrant, requesting that I come for a second interrogation in three days' time. At the second interrogation, the pressure was inreased. They used all possible means, including threats to put me on trial, to get the required testimony. The formal part of an interrogation is a protocol which contains written questions by the interrogator and answers by the interrogatee. In my case, I demanded that I be given the right to write my answers myself. In this way, I hoped to avoid deliberate KGB distortions of my answers. When the pressure reached its peak, I wrote in the protocol, "I do not fully understand your question and, therefore, I demand the legal right to use an interpreter from the Russian language into my native language which is Hebrew." Sherudillo's face grew dark. The interrogator knew very well that my first langauge was Russian. He also knew that I learned Hebrew and had begun to teach it only a few years previously. There was a moment of silence in the room. Then he wrote, "The interrogation is over," and said to me, "You may go." I think there are three symptomatic elements in the story about my fortunate escape from the interrogation. One is that the interrogator did not reject outright my request for an interpreter, as would definitely have happened in the old days. It reflects the fact that the status of the Hebrew language in the Soviet Union has undergone a considerable change. During Stalin's time, Hebrew was considered an "instrument of counterrevolutionary subversive activities by Jewish religious clericals and Zionists." Anyone connected with Hebrew was automatically considered an enemy of socialism and was severely punished. However, during the fifties, Hebrew acquired a completely new status that of a "foreign language" which theoretically put it on a par with English, French or any other - - foreign language. The change resulted not so much from Stalin's death as from the establishment of the State of Israel. Although the Hebrew language began to be taught in the universities, admission to the lectures was severely restricted. The students for these classes were carefully selected by the authorities. Of course, Jewish students were not allowed to study Hebrew. The Hebrew specialists were trained in small closed groups mainly for KGB and military purposes. The publication in Moscow in 1963 of the famous Hebrew-Russian dictionary by Felix Shapiro highlighted the new situation. This magnificent book not only helped to educate a new generation of private Hebrew teachers after three generations of suppression of Hebrew culture in the USSR, but it also gave a kind of legality to unofficial Hebrew teaching in Russia. After the dictionary was published, dealing with the Hebrew language was no longer considered formally a criminal offense. The second symptomatic element was that the interrogator did not actually supply the interpreter as I had requested. This reflects the fact that at outside the synagogue and the right to teach it privately are not recognized. Had the interrogator brought in a Hebrew interpreter, it would have been a de facto recognition of the right to use this language. It should be pointed out that a teacher of English, French or any other foreign language can apply and be registered as a private teacher of a foreign language. He is then required to pay taxes and be registered in a District Financial Department which, in turn, registers and gives him legal status as a private teacher of a foreign language. How many private Hebrew teachers -including myself - have tried to apply for registration as private teachers of a foreign language and have all been refused by the District Financial Department! It was later learned that these offices had been given secret instructions forbidding them to register teachers of Hebrew. This makes private Hebrew teaching an illegal activity. In 1976, Iosif Begun was sentenced to three years' exile in Siberia on charges of parasitism and harassment by the police have become a nightmare for Hebrew teachers. Refusing to register Hebrew teachers is in open contradiction to the recognition of the Hebrew language as a legitimate foreign language. - The third symptomatic element was the fact that the interrogation was stopped. It shows that the authorities are aware of the contradiction that they themselves have created. Moreover, they are embarrassed when they are reminded of it. International cultural and trade organizations could use this weak point to pressure the Soviet authorities to legalize private Hebrew teaching in the Soviet Union. Such pressure would be tremendously helpful to thousands of private students and teachers of Hebrew in the Soviet Union and, even more, would provide invaluable encouragement to thousands of Jews who lack the courage to join existing classes. At present, in Moscow alone, there are about 40 active Hebrew teachers and about 500 adult students. The effectiveness of these courses is fantastic due to the high motivation of both students and teachers. There are also numer ous classes in Judaism, Jewish culture and Jewish history, both in Hebrew and Russian. The Jewish cultural movement in Russia is developing rapidly. However, there are two problems which have yet to be overcome. The major stumbling block is the great shortage of dictionaries and basic Hebrew textbooks. The second problem is the need for the legalization of private Hebrew lessons. These two problems are interconnected, because the legalization of Hebrew would make it much easier to supply Hebrew books to the Soviet Union which, in turn, would be of great help to the teachers. At the moment, the Jewish cultural movement is based mainly upon learning the Hebrew language first before proceeding to learning Torah and other elements of Jewish culture. Here, I must dwell in greater detail on the fundamental difference of status between the Hebrew and Yiddish languages in the USSR. From the very beginning of the Soviet state, the language of Soviet Jews was officially considered to be Yiddish. There were numerous attempts on the part of the authorities to create a Soviet Jewish culture based on the Yiddish language which would be communistic in content. In Leningrad, the other communist writers were extensively published in Yiddish. ΑΠ these attempts failed because the Russian Jews were not enthusiastic about this absurd combination of the Yiddish language and Communist culture. The Moscow-published Sovietishe Heimland, a Yiddish magazine, is not widely read in Russia because it is bascially a translation into Yiddish of articles from Pravda. When the Soviet authorities claim from time to time that Jewish culture is flourishing in the USSR, they mean exactly this sort of culture. Actually, they cannot mean anything else because the national cultures of other minorities are more or less the same, perhaps on a larger scale, with schools and radio programs. On the other hand, there are not Jewish schools or even courses in Yiddish in the whole of the Soviet Union. Stalin slaughtered the leading Yiddish writers and intellectuals not long before his death. Recently, the Soviets, trying to show the outside world an increase in Jewish culture in the USSR, organized two Yiddish theaters. However, they could not find enough Yiddish-speaking actors and had to teach those who agreed to appear (some of them non-Jewish) the language from the very beginning. You can see that a considerable part of the audience does not understand the language. They come to the performance as a social event and out of Jewish solidarity and curiosity. On the whole, Yiddish is rapidly becoming a dead language in the Soviet Union. In May of 1979, Riva Feldman, in Moscow, started to teach privately two Yiddish classes, something unheard of heretofore. At the same time, she applied to the taxation authorities for registration as a private Yiddish teacher, mentioning that her profession was a language teacher. After some time, she received a written reply saying that she cannot be registered as a Yiddish teacher because her diploma states she is a techer of German not of Yiddish. Since no one in Russia can receive a diploma as a Yiddish teacher, it follows that the teaching of Yiddish is not legal in the USSR. The Soviet Union is a multinational state, and the Jews comprise one of the largest minorities in the country. Yiddish is considered to be one of many official languages. Although books, magazines and newspapers are still published in Yiddish in the USSR, very soon only very old people will be able to read them. When talking about Jewish culture in the USSR, it is important to bear in mind that the Soviet authorities understand it to be Soviet Yiddish culture. That is why all efforts to extract from them concessions on Jewish culture in general will lead, at best, to publication of Yiddish books, magazines, newspapers, more theaters, and maybe, even Yiddish schools -- all with communist content which will be a total failure. - The best way to pressure the Soviets about true Jewish culture in the USSR is to begin with the legalization of private Hebrew langauge classes which are already functioning so effectively in the large cities. Foreign language status for the Hebrew language in the USSR provides a good basis for fresh pressure and the success of such a campaign would give a tremendous boost to a true Jewish education in Russia, which is so urgently needed at present. Chairman FASCELL. Our next witness is Ms. Ayshe Seytmuratova, a Crimean Tatar dissident historian who managed to emigrate from the Soviet Union in 1978. She is here to testify about the continuing struggle of the Crimean Tatars to return to their homeland in the Crimea from where Stalin forcibly expelled them in 1944. We are very pleased to welcome her here before the Commission. She has spent 3 years in Soviet labor camps for anti-Soviet activities and we are pleased to hear from her. STATEMENT OF AYSHE SEYTMURATOVA MS. SEYTMURATOVA [through interpreter]. First of all, I would like to thank the Helsinki Commission for inviting me here and for its interest in the fate of my people. The tragedy of my people began 36 years ago, on May 18, 1944. I will not go into great detail about those tragic events. Basically, I will concentrate on the situation of my people today, more exactly, on the post-Helsinki period. After the signing of the Helsinki Final Act, repression against Crimean Tatars was intensified. These repressions were initiated and conducted not by individual people, but as systematic government policy. Ever since 1944, there have been a series of decrees, orders and other secret administrative orders in relation to the Crimean Tatars. Many of these documents and these governmental instructions are, in fact, official governmental documents. One of these, which was issued on April 26, 1978, is an official order of the ministry of internal affairs of the Republic of Uzbekistan, Secret Order No. 221. The name of this secret order is "On Citizens of the Tatar Nationality Who Were Previously Living in the Crimea." In this order, specific mention is made of the fact that it is forbidden for any Tatar to leave Uzbekistan for the purpose of resettlement in the Crimea. There the Soviet Government has adopted again essentially a Stalinist policy of special secret orders restricting the rights of Crimean Tatars in regard to their residence. Another order restricting the rights of Crimean Tatars is the Decree of the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. which is entitled, “On Intensifying the passport regiment in the Crimea region," dated August 15, 1978. Ms. Seytmuratova is showing us a photograph of the physical eviction of a Crimean Tatar family who have been literally thrown out into the street. They have no place to live and have been told to get out of the Crimea. Or, as is shown in another photograph of a Crimean Tatar family, children are thrown out of their homes onto the street, beaten up and told this is where they must stay. These repressive measures particularly were strengthened in 1979, on the 35th anniversary of the deportation of the Crimean Tatars from the Crimea. We, decade after decade, are not allowed to forget the tragic events of the year 1944 when we were deported wholesale. In an appeal to the Belgrade Conference dated October 4, 1977, I described another order issued by the Supreme Soviet in regard to education. On the basis of this decree of December 24, 1975 of the supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R., I was deprived of the right to higher education in my specialty, history. On the basis of these legal documents to which I have referred, I think I am justified in saying that the Soviet Union is conducting a governmental policy of genocide. In fact, these secret decrees, orders, and instructions contradict not only international law, but also the Soviet Constitution. The repressive measures of the Soviet Government against the Crimean Tatars have reached such proportions that three people have hung themselves as a sign of protest. In 1978 one Crimean Tatar committed self-immolation in protest against these Soviet policies. Musa Mamut, 46 years old, had just returned from prison when he began to be persecuted by a policeman; he burned himself to death in front of his 11-year-old son. Today, the children and many of those people whom Stalin had deported by special order are in Soviet prison camps for their Crimean Tatar activism. Memidi Chobanov, who went to Sakharov's apartment in Moscow in 1979, informed Western newsmen about the continuing repressions against the Crimean Tatars. Precisely and merely for this action, he was sentenced for the third time to 3 years in a prison camp. They confiscated from Memidi Chobanov the Holy Koran. Another person, Elder Shabanov, was also sentenced to 3 years in camp for merely protesting the fact that families were being evicted from the Crimea. Seydamet Memetov was sentenced for the fifth time for his Crimean Tatar activism. Mustafa Dzhemilev, one of the leading Crimean Tatar activists, was sentenced last year for the fifth time to 5 years of internal exile in the Arctic North merely because he asked to join his family in the United States. |