Answer to the article from The Jewish Chronicle article - 18/03/2011

Dear Editor, 

We react to the article you have published in your edition of 18/03/2011 (“street of shame”).

First of all, we would like to thank you for your article but we also want to underline some facts and to comment some of the testimonies published in your article :

1) Regarding Bandera and the Ukrainian war criminals :

The streets that are being named after Ukrainian Nazi criminals (e.g. Bandera, Shukhevitch , … )  and the monuments (statues, etc …) that have been erected to their memories are not only located in Kiev but in the whole of West Ukraine . In the city of Chernovtsy – the city where we are based - one can find one street named ‘Roman Shukhevitch Vul’.

This is exactly like if there was a street named ‘Heinrich Himmler Strasse’ in Munich or a street named ‘Rue Pierre Laval’ in Marseilles.

This must not be tolerated at any cost and must be fought.

Maybe that the precise history of Ukrainian war criminal is not very well known but facts are clear: Bandera and Shukhevitch (to mention only these two ones) were anti-Semitics, collaborationists and Nazi criminals. The fact that they are now being considered as ‘Heroes’ by West Ukrainians is deeply abnormal .I would like to mention that the collapse of the USSR have led to an official Ukrainian nationalistic propaganda and to the publishing of false history books by Revisionists Ukrainian writers with the clear intention to try to convince not only Ukrainians but also foreigners that these ‘Heroes’ were not ‘really anti-Semitic’ and were not ‘really Nazis’.

At this moment in time, one of the pillars of the foundation of the modern Ukrainian state is based on Anti-Semitic criminals that are considered as ‘Heroes’ .Beyond all, that is very disquieting because their importance is growing everyday.

Should we conceal this fact, like officials do because of the fear of a civil war between the eastern part and the western part of Ukraine? Should we adopt the ‘official Kiev’ attitude that consist in admitting that these historical figures were Nazi criminals but were also Heroes (sic)? Should we stay in the comfort of the center of Kiev, in a bubble, completely disconnected of the Ukrainian reality? Should we stay in the comfort of a big lie? I guess not.

The history of Ukrainian nationalism is very complicated and the Ukrainians have this very special ability to obfuscate the truth and to dissimulate the reality to foreigners.

Many ‘tricks’ are being used by the revisionist biographers of Bandera and by the revisionist historians of the related organizations (OUN-B, etc …) in order to convince the ‘external’ world that these people and their organizations were not ‘really’ Anti-Semitics (They just murdered or helped to murder everybody that was not a pure Ukrainian race)and that the ‘Banderas’ eventually fought the German (which is completely grotesque since the Banderas had been totally integrated in the local SS divisions until the very end of WWII).

2) Regarding the non restitution of the Jewish buildings:

In your article , Chabad’s Rabbi Menachem Mendel said (*) :

‘Of course that there are Jewish buildings or property from before the Second World War or the Communist period, which now belong to the government, but I guess that if we will ask for it back — we will receive. Don’t forget that Jews in Ukraine are only two or three per cent of the population, so of course we are the minority here.”’

One may first precise why the Jewish population in Ukraine is currently so low:

-         The collapse of the Soviet Union led gradually to a situation of impoverishment of the population and many Jews had no other choices but to migrate to Israel.

-         The Soviet Union was a multicultural society and racism was officially banned in all the soviet republics. After its collapse, many forms of Racisms and Anti-Semitisms raised in the former republics and especially in Ukraine and that also led many Ukrainians Jews to move definitely to Israel.

For example, in the city of Chernovtsy whose 50% of the population was Jew before the Second World War, even after the Holocaust and the integration of North Bukovina in the Ukrainian Soviet Republic, the Jewish population and culture remained important. From 1991 to 2009, most of this Jewish population had no choice but to move to Israel. This is the general comment of the ‘average’ Ukrainian citizen: “There are very few Anti-Semitism Problems in current Ukraine because 'we' forced all the Jews to leave during the last 20 years” … and some even add with an horrible smile , “Those that we didn’t kill during War world II”. 

The fact that the Ukrainian Government would give back the Jewish Buildings if they were asked to is completely unrealistic. In the only town of Chernovtsy, that would mean giving back more than 50% of the heart of the city!

Regarding the appropriation of Jewish buildings, one must understand the following process:

When the Soviet Union won the Second World War, it took incidentally control of western Ukraine. The USSR was the winner and to some historical logic (‘the winner takes it all’) it might have the right to appropriate itself the Jewish building since , for the USSR , private property was not really existing so that these buildings , like any others were to being used for and by the people . Since the communist society was supposed to be perfectly atheist, all churches, religious temples were closed, used for archiving. Since all citizens were equals and defined as workers , there was no point to consider a ‘Jewish Theater’ or a Synagogue .For example, in Chernovtsy, the Jewish house, a big building located in the center of the city, was transformed into a place for culture, dance theater, etc …The synagogue was transformed into a movie theater . The Jewish schools were transformed into public communist schools.

Now, when the USSR collapsed, what kind of rights had the buyers and the sellers of this former Jews real-estate? It is very clear that only because of corruption several people managed to ‘buy’ or illegally acquire or transfer the former Jewish real estate .The fact that the Ukrainian ‘state’ took possession of the vast majority of this real estate is also perfectly abnormal .On the opposite, all the Orthodox churches were not only restituted free of charge to the Orthodox Clergy but also thoroughly restored. 

Some old synagogues had been bought by ‘businessmen’ who curently use them as warehouse for cattle or as garages. How did these ‘businessmen’ took possession of the buildings?

3) Regarding the big recurring problems with the pilgrimage in Uman:

One must understand that many Ukrainians simply do not work, do not have access to culture facilities .They just stay in the streets doing nothing (most of the time they are drunken) and when they see a foreigner they start to provoke him with a xenophobic attitude . So one can easily imagine their reactions towards Jewish pilgrims! (**)

This is obviously a ‘Hot’ subject in Ukraine and nobody really wants to tell the truth about it. But from our point of view, this is important to bring the light on it and to fight what we consider as an emerging disquieting  threat.

U.K.R.L.A.A

(*) : (I also add, on a very personal note, that the idea of the Ukrainian ‘state’ giving back something that belongs to them only if – kindly – asked to, is really comic. I guess they might be willing to give back some of the Jewish real estate they own if one pay the price - usually 10 times the price of the building - to be paid cash in U.S dollars to their offshore account –

Joseph Litchblau)

(**)  Regarding the tensions in Uman between the 'locals' and  Jewish pilgrims , one can have a look at the following article that relates the death of Shmuel Tubul while he was on a pilgrimage to Uman .

Article  from The Jewish Chronicle