Union of Councils for Soviet Jews: Bigotry Monitor: Number 2, Volume 14

News

Bigotry Monitor: Number 2, Volume 14

(April 12, 2002)

Volume 2, Number 14
Friday, April 12, 2002

BIGOTRY MONITOR
A Weekly Human Rights Newsletter on Antisemitism, Xenophobia, and Religious Persecution in the Former Communist World and Western Europe

EDITOR: CHARLES FENYVESI
(News and Editorial Policy within the sole discretion of the editor)

Published by UCSJ: Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union

_____________________________________________________________

CONGRESS IS TO SET CONDITIONS TO FREEING RUSSIA FROM TRADE STRICTURES. Appearing as a witness at an April 11 hearing of the trade subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee, Rep. Tom Lantos (D-Ca.) proposed legislation to “graduate” Russia from the trade strictures of the 1974 Jackson-Vanik “Freedom of Emigration” law. However, Lantos asked Congress to set up new mechanisms ensuring compliance with human rights. In addition, he expressed the view that Russia should return religious properties seized by the Soviet state. He voiced optimism for reaching agreement with the Bush administration on provisions to address his concerns. Undersecretary of State Alan Larson told the panel that Jackson-Vanik accomplished its goal of promoting free emigration and greater religious freedom and that graduating Russia “is now the right thing to do.” He added that Russia has been told that Congress was unlikely to remove Jackson-Vanik until Moscow follows through on a promise to lift a ban on imports of U.S. poultry.

In a statement for the record, UCSJ expressed support for graduating Russia, but only if “a bilateral institutionalized mechanism is established to assure periodic review of Russia’s status and efforts to reform its human rights and civil society, including concrete steps to combat antisemitism, xenophobia, and manifestations of terrorism.” National Director Micah H. Naftalin praised President Vladimir Putin as “solidly on record as pledging such reforms. What remain to be accomplished are concrete actions that implement those pledges.” He noted that it is “always difficult to keep human rights goals on the regular agenda of bilateral diplomacy. While we view it as integral to America’s national security, it almost invariably is overshadowed by more quantifiable indices like trade or oil or weapons. In the Clinton years, we were critical of the Gore-Chernomyrdin semi-annual meetings because of all the original ten issue categories, only human rights failed to be included for automatic, regular review on each agenda.” Naftalin praised Jackson-Vanik for compelling Russia and the United States to negotiate Russia’s human rights at least once a year in the context of considering the annual waiver.

He characterized as “the genius of Jackson-Vanik” the linking of trade and human rights and asserted that “the linkage remains. The shortcomings of civil society remain a barrier to economic development and the confidence of foreign investors as long as there is government control of media, severe harassment of Muslims and non-Orthodox Christians, widespread corruption of the civil and criminal justice system. And then, even in the relative absence of Soviet-style official antisemitism, this historic scourge, which is rising across Europe and throughout the Middle East to levels not seen since the defeat of Hitler, is not being effectively combated in Russia’s regions. One way of explaining this is to say that President Putin and his government must go beyond decrying antisemitism and systematically punish antisemites as well… Despite his unprecedented and appreciated strong pledges to combat them, large-scale antisemitic, xenophobic and anti-American incidents and propaganda are nonetheless perpetrated, largely unchallenged, by dedicated Communists, neo-Nazis, Islamic extremists, and elements within the Russian Orthodox Church, often in league with local officials and police. Human rights-based civil society reforms must be institutionalized for Russia’s benefit and as a guarantor of a constructive and reliable bilateral relationship. How Russia handles the challenge of grassroots antisemitism is a reasonable indicator of its human rights progress overall.”

Naftalin proposed a number of mechanisms, such as regular bilateral human rights reviews involving governments and NGOs, regular Congressional oversight, and appropriations for joint human rights and business groups’ monitoring and exploration of mutual interests between civil society reform and an improved climate for foreign investment in Russia. He suggested that Russia take confidence-building steps, including prosecuting hate-criminals, repudiation of the discriminatory law on religion, and firing antisemitic officials.

Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Peter Allgeier assured the panel that lifting Jackson-Vanik would not reduce U.S. leverage in negotiations with Russia on the terms of its entry to the WTO. While witnesses speaking for the U.S. business community welcomed the removal of Jackson-Vanik, they expressed little or no interest in the human rights dimension. Questions by Rep. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) forced them to address the issue. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mo.) implied that it is unlikely that Congress will approve the change before President George Bush’s trip to Moscow in late May.

U.S. HELSINKI COMMISSION FINDS ANTI-ROMA DISCRIMINATION IN EUROPE. Roma throughout Europe still encounter human rights conditions that lack the basic elements of human dignity, according to testimony on April 9 before a hearing of the United States Helsinki Commission. The hearing focused on the human rights struggle of Roma (also known as Gypsies), barriers to education opportunities for Romani children, and activities of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. “A few years ago, a Hungarian Romani activist said to our commission, ‘We don’t want the fish, we want the net,’” said Commission Co-Chairman Rep. Christopher H. Smith (R-NJ). “Education is clearly the net.” He added: “Our own experience with de-segregation has not been easy, but it has always been necessary. If American experiences have any relevance for others, perhaps it is because of what can be learned from our failures, as well as our successes. Communities around this country continually strive to ensure that our schools are places that teach tolerance, not bigotry, and are places that bring people together, not places that drive them apart.” “The more I learn about the plight of Roma, the more I am struck by certain parallels with the experience of American Indians here in our own country,” said Commission Chairman Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-Co.), currently the only American Indian in the Senate. “Increasingly, Roma have begun to raise their voices not in search of special treatment, but for an opportunity to freely exercise their human rights and fundamental freedoms.” “Ethnic persecution and discrimination persist against the Roma in most nations in Europe,” said Commissioner Rep. Joseph R. Pitts (R-Pa.). “Stereotypes of the Roma abound throughout Eastern and Western Europe. Unfortunately, there is not overwhelming evidence that the majority ethnic groups in Europe desire to help end these stereotypes and the racism that does exist.”

NEW RUSSIAN LAW ON RELIGION SEEKS ‘SPIRITUAL SECURITY’ AND AIMS TO BAN EXTREMISM. The new religion law being drafted in Moscow pays particular attention to outlawing “the dissemination of ideas of religious extremism in any form” and seeks to provide for the state “spiritual security,” according to a Keston News Service report on April 3. To allay concerns with what the state means by “religious extremism,” six articles are being drawn up, while the right to freedom of conscience and creed are affirmed. “To lose the battle for hearts and minds in the modern world is a defeat far more serious than a military or strategic loss,” said recently the author of the draft law outlawing religious extremism, Communist deputy Viktor Zorkaltsev and chairman of the parliament’s Committee for Religious and Social Organizations. In a statement with potentially far-reaching implications, Zorkaltsev said that the law should not treat religious extremism differently from other forms of extremism.

Representatives of the security organs and the interior ministry will be asked to advise on whether this draft should be put before parliament, or the Criminal Code be amended instead, Keston News Service has learned. Another draft law against extremist activity in general, drawn up by the Ministry of Justice, is said to be “still at the drafting stage.” The comprehensive draft law “On Traditional Religious Organizations” is likely to be submitted to parliament in May. It is already a subject of controversy, as is the law it is designed to replace.

KISHINEV JEWISH CEMETERY VANDALIZED. Up to 50 tombstones in a Kishinev, Moldova Jewish cemetery were vandalized during Passover, according to Yakov Vayselbukh, president of the local Jewish community, whose statement was published by “Nezavisimaya Moldova” on April 9. Many of the tombstones are damaged beyond repair. Without giving the exact date of the attack, Vayselbukh pointed out that it took place not only during Passover, but close to the anniversary of the infamous Kishinev pogrom of 1903.

AZERBAIJAN RE-REGISTERS 125 RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIES, 186 OTHERS IN LIMBO. A total of 125 religious organizations have been re-registered in Azerbaijan and 95 additional applications are still being considered, the State Committee for Relations with Religious Organizations told Keston News Service on April 8. Under the old system, 406 religious organizations were registered. Of the 125 re-registered communities, 107 are Muslim, 11 are Christian, 4 are Jewish, and 3 are of other faiths. Not being considered are applications from the Lutheran church in Baku led by Tamara Gumbatova and from the European (Ashkenazi) Jewish community in Baku led by Moshe Bekker. The State Committee claims that Gumbatova’s application had “no legal address” and contained “very many legal mistakes” and that Bekker had been “removed from office” by an internal community meeting last year and was therefore unable to apply for re-registration for his community. Also not being considered is the application from the Love Baptist church (Azeri-speaking) in Baku, which the State Committee has had liquidated through the courts. The State Committee could not explain what happened to the other 186 communities which have not been re-registered and whose applications are not under consideration. The end of May is the re-registration’s deadline.

KYRGYZSTAN’S AHMADIS, SEEN AS HERETICS BY MUSLIMS, FEAR FOR THEIR FUTURE. The new religion law due to be adopted by the Kyrgyz parliament in May could cause problems for the Ahmadi community, its leader Zahur Ahmad told Keston News Service on April 1. He cited as evidence the “constant attacks” by representatives of the country’s official Muslim leadership, the muftiate, supported by the chairman of the parliamentary subcommittee for religious affairs, Alisher Sobirov, author of the proposed new religion law. Sobirov denies that he wishes to see the Ahmadis banned, though he maintains that Ahmadis are not Muslims. The Ahmadi community was founded in India by Mirza Gulam Ahmad Kadiani who identified himself as the embodiment of the Muslim mahdi, the Christian messiah, and the Hindu Krishna. His doctrine is all-inclusive, seeking to appeal to Christians, Muslims, and followers of other religions. Ahmadi doctrine was brought to Kyrgyzstan in the early 1990s from Pakistan where Ahmadis are not allowed to call themselves Muslims or use Muslim terminology. “We have been and continue to be Muslims,” Zahur Ahmad told Keston, adding that the faith has about 100 Kyrgyz followers. Kyrgyzstan’s chief mufti, Kimsanbai Haji Abdrahmanov, told Keston that the Ahmadi doctrine is “ heresy” and banning it is “vital.”

KYRGYZ MUSLIMS OPPOSE CHRISTIAN SECTS JUST AS THEY OPPOSE RADICAL ISLAMISTS. Kyrgyz Muslims are against their compatriots’ conversion to other faiths, the Bishkek Kabar News Agency began a report filed on April 5. For example, residents of the village of Ak-Tyuz do not want to live next to a hundred of their fellow countrymen who have become Christians. At a village assembly, they demanded that the renegades should be evicted. The report went on to explain that this is not the first clash with Muslims who have converted to Christianity. Among 300 religious confessions registered in the country, 210 are Christian. “On the whole, they are so-called sects,” the report said, adding that “Muslims are quite tolerant of conversion to [Russian] Orthodoxy. During nearly 150 years of the existence of Christianity in the country, there have been no serious conflicts between the confessions.” Then the report concluded with a statement that seemed to be the purpose of the news item: “Muslims assess the new trends in Christianity as they do radical Islamists.”

FAR-RIGHT HUNGARIAN PARTY LOSES PARLIAMENTARY REPRESENTATION. In Hungary’s national elections on April 7, the far-right, antisemitic Hungarian Justice and Life Party (MIEP) failed to get the minimum required for entering the new parliament. The outcome shattered the hopes of MIEP’s garrulous, Falstaff-like leader, Istvan Csurka, who had predicted winning 20 percent of the vote and thought that he would follow the example of Jorg Haider in neighboring Austria and figure as a critical addition to a coalition government. Numerically, MIEP received the same number of votes, 240,000, as in the previous elections in 1998, but this time the high turnout at the polls—one million more people voted than four years ago—raised the numerical value of the threshold 5 percent for gaining a seat in parliament.

* * * QUOTE OF THE WEEK * * * “If deep-seated nationalism brought down the multinational Soviet Union, as the analytical herd asserts, then what accounts for the profound post-1991 weakness of the nations and the nationalisms in almost all the successor states?” Prof. Stephen Kotkin of Princeton asked in the weekly “The New Republic” of April 15 in an article titled “Trashcanistan.” “A part of the answer is that they, too, are multinational.”

FRANCE’S JEWS IN QUANDARY ABOUT ARAB THREAT TO THEIR COMMUNITY
Intense Debate on How to Protect Institutions – and Lives

French Jews do not agree among themselves either in their interpretation of the terrorist attacks that threaten their synagogues, schools, and their very lives, or in what their strategies should be in response, says Rabbi Andrew Baker, the American Jewish Committee’s director of international Jewish affairs and a frequent visitor to France. Their debate is intensely internal, taking place within French cultural terms as though they did not live in a worldwide Jewish community or even in a European one. Being French, they resent advice from outsiders, among them American Jews and Israelis, both recommending “standing up” to the enemy and “activism” when it comes to contacts with the government.

“We are all children of the Republic, and it is up to the Republic to protect its children,” manufacturer Jean Frydman intoned in an opinion piece in “Le Monde.” Without naming North African immigrants by name, he called for their “integration” and expressed the pious hope that recent immigrants would eventually emulate the successful example of preceding waves of immigration. Another opinion piece in the same prestigious Paris daily, by Olivier Guland, declared that the “Judeophobia of the ultra-left” should be fought with the same vigor as “the traditional antisemitism of the extreme right.” Editor of “La Tribune Juive,” Guland defined the community as divided between “unconditional supporters of Israel,” whom he found “inflexible and idolatrous,” and “contrary to Jewish tradition,” and another group that cares little or nothing for Jewish identity and is further alienated by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s attack on Palestinian towns and refugee camps. However, Guland suggested that the differences between the two groups are more apparent than real and ventured to say that the great majority of French Jewry would agree – or could be talked into agreeing – on a consensus. That consensus would be based on a few principles such as support for a Palestinian state that does not threaten Israel and admits in its midst Jewish and Christian minorities, including post-1967 Jewish settlers. Another principle is accepting the thesis that terrorism is the absolute evil.

While guest writers are carefully selected, “Le Monde” itself is aloof, conscious of its pedestal of excellence. In an editorial on April 8, it argued that the demonstrations in France taking sides in the Middle East war show “the vitality of the democratic debate” in France. However, it acknowledged that “signs of regression” accompanied the demonstrations as the Middle East conflict was “imported without nuances” and that risked the outbreak of violence. Then the editorial switched to the subject of communal violence, already condemned by Prime Minister (and presidential candidate) Lionel Jospin. “Le Monde” called on both communities to refuse to shut themselves into the political formulas of the warring parties in the Middle East, and the editorial allowed itself to dream of the two communities uniting one day in a demonstration for “peace, tolerance, and fraternity.”

On April 12, “Le Monde” headlined a quote from an interview with Behija Ouzini, identified as a Tunisian employee of an import-export firm in France, on the subject of French Jewry: “The fear of the Jewish community is not always justified.” The same day, Reuters reported an explosion in North Africa’s oldest synagogue, on the Tunisian island of Djerba, killing 7.

Israel’s ambassador to France, Elie Barnavi, is himself an intellectual and a scholar of French culture, and his views are often at odds with those of his prime minister. Barnavi suggests that “the new antisemitism” is not unique to France, and he finds similarly disturbing developments in other West European countries as well. He cautions against alarmist characterizations, and he differentiates between the antisemitism of today and 19th century Europe. Optimistic about the future, he cites opinion polls that show the vast majority of the French, particularly young people between the ages of 15 and 25, giving favorable answers to questions about accepting Jews as neighbors or as marriage partners. Roger Cuckierman, president of the Jewish umbrella organization CRIF, focuses on the following statistics: The Jewish community faces a society that is composed 10 percent far-right antisemites, 10 percent anti-Jewish Arabs, and 1 percent Jews so ultra-critical of Israel that they may be called self-haters. The remaining 79 percent, he says with a bitterness tempered by cynicism, is the same population that once switched its support from Marshal Henri Petain of the Nazi collaborationist Vichy to General Charles de Gaulle of the Free French.

In France, as elsewhere in Europe, many politicians and commentators contend that antisemitism is no longer a problem on the continent. A recent American Jewish Committee (AJC) delegation meeting with Anna Diamontopoulou, the European Union Commissioner for Social Affairs whose portfolio covers racism and xenophobia, heard her say that antisemitism is no longer a problem in Europe. She dismissed the numerous incidents over the past year in France as “political” in nature and cautioned that one must examine trends over ten years or more before they can be understood and labeled. At the same time, she voiced concern about anti-Arab sentiments since September 11 and suggested that “Islamophobia” is the most serious racial problem facing Europe now.

Nevertheless, French Jews do agree that the violence directed against them is unprecedented when it comes to the number of incidents and their seriousness. It is almost a miracle that so far no lives were lost. Since the three synagogue burnings on March 30, two more synagogues and one Jewish school were attacked, and Molotov cocktails were thrown at policemen guarding a synagogue in Marseille and at the office of a Jewish student group in Paris. The police say they have interrogated 39 suspects, ten of whom have been kept in jail.

The French, trained in order and logic, define “the new antisemitism” as dating to the beginning of the second intifada in September 2000. They accept as a credible study a recent survey conducted by a Jewish student group in cooperation with the respectable national organization SOS-Racisme that listed 400 incidents that range from a verbal assault on the street to firebombing a Jewish school. The great majority of the incidents took place in suburban neighborhoods of large cities where less-well-to-do Jews live, most of them originally from the former French North Africa, then as now often next door to Muslims. According to one Jewish observer from such a mixed neighborhood, France’s unemployed Arabs, especially the young, sit at home much of the day, watching the television station “Al Jazeera” and imagining themselves Palestinian fighters. Their immediate targets are often Jewish neighbors. Jewish schools and institutions feel especially threatened. Many Jewish parents now think twice about having their children wearing a skullcap or anything else that may identify them as Jews. But such concerns are not equally felt by the well-to-do, usually secular, and less easily identifiable Jews living in the center of Paris, which often leads to varying and sometimes contradictory assessments of the new antisemitic wave.

The perpetrators of the attacks are rarely apprehended, Jews say, as their neighborhoods are often so dangerous that the police will avoid them, fearing for their lives and worried about precipitating a riot. The authorities do not deny that this is a serious problem, but caution that the anti-Jewish dimensions are paltry when compared to other problems confronting Arab immigrants such as despondency, unemployment, criminal behavior, and pervasive anti-Arab prejudice. State officials acknowledge that the grand French tradition of absorbing new immigrants is on the verge of collapse, and they are particularly troubled that it is often the children of immigrants—whose birth in France confers citizenship—who reject identification with La Patrie. The phenomenon received prime-time publicity at a recent soccer match between the national teams of France and Algeria: French-born Arab fans booed loudly when the “Marseillaise” was played. A wave of nationwide indignation followed.

Many Jews blame what they say is the “intensive anti-Israel bias” of the news media’s coverage of the intifada, which in turn encourages Arabs in France. One Jewish monitoring group analyzed the dispatches by the French news agency AFP over the past 18 months and found the continuous use of such phrases as “Jewish extremist” on one side, with virtually no parallel terms applied to Palestinians or Arabs or Muslims who usually receive terms such as “militants” and “officials.” A television producer said that his editor would delete any effort on his part to identify a Palestinian—even a suicide bomber or Hamas operative—as a “terrorist.” The television station maintains that the word is “subjective” and therefore should not be used.

French Jews do not want to be seen as standing apart from the nation, and friends warn against the long-term dangers in creating the impression of two antagonistic blocs, one pro-Israeli Jewish and the other pro-Palestinian Muslim. This may be the reason the Jewish umbrella organization CRIF is redoubling efforts in building bridges to Muslim leaders in France, says Rabbi Baker of AJC. French Jews are keenly aware that the nation’s political culture opposes the idea of one minority community fighting another. The republic must be united, with moderates reaching across the divide and working together on the extremists to discourage violence. Given that framework, one wonders if there is an alternative.

* * * *

Send letters to the editor to: cfenyvesi@aol.com

How to Subscribe: Send an email to bigotrymonitor@ucsj.com with the word "subscribe" as the subject of the message.

How to Unsubscribe: Send an email to bigotrymonitor@ucsj.com with the word "unsubscribe" as the subject of the message.

All issues available at http://www.fsumonitor.com
_________________________________________________________
UCSJ:Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union
www.fsumonitor.com for daily human rights and news in the Former Soviet Union Located in Washington, DC