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Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Ukraine's Chief Rabbi accuses Russia of disinformation


Hope his statements don't come back to bite him in the butt in the near future.  

Is it just me, or do other people too think that the moment people proudly state they are neo-Nazis or sympathizers of  the Nazi doctrine, that they would be, firstly against the Jewish community and then everybody else who is not White? There's an openly neo-Nazi "official" party in Ukraine that seems to be on the best of terms with the Jewish community of Ukraine.  Dodo that I am, I simply cannot understand how a democratic country can have an "official" neo-Nazi or a far-Right party in their government and how members from that party hold important posts in the new "temporary" govt. of  Ukraine and how Ukrainian Jews are confident that that's all okay.  
**sigh**

From JTA:
Ukraine chief rabbi accuses Russians of staging anti-Semitic ‘provocations’  
Rabbi Yaakov Dov Bleich, a chief rabbi of Ukraine, accused Russia of staging anti-Semitic “provocations” in Crimea in order to justify its invasion of the former Soviet republic.
At a press conference in the Manhattan office of the United Jewish Communities of Eastern Europe, Bleich compared Russia’s behavior to that of the Nazis prior to the Anschluss invasion of Austria in 1938.
“Things may be done by Russians dressing up as Ukrainian nationalists,” he said, adding that it’s “the same way the Nazis did when they wanted to go into Austria and created provocations.”
Bleich, a vice president of the World Jewish Congress, also announced the creation of an aid effort, KievRelief.org, to fund security for synagogues and mosques and to provide humanitarian relief for all Ukrainians.
Bleich, who moved to Ukraine in 1989 from Brooklyn, was slated, along with other Ukrainian political and religious leaders, to meet with Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday. He said he will urge Kerry to be assertive with Russian President Vladimir Putin, to move the G8 Summit to Kiev, as a show of solidarity with Ukrainians, and to consider sending military support to Ukraine. While acknowledging that Americans are “war-weary,” he said Ukrainians need “boots on the ground to protect democracy” and to prevent “the cold war from getting hot.”
Asked about anti-Semitism among Ukrainian nationalists, particularly two far-right parties that have been included in the new government, Bleich acknowledged concerns but said the Jewish community has received assurances from top government leaders that their safety will be protected.
“The Russians are blowing this way, way out of proportion,” he said, referring to the issue of anti-Semitism among some Ukrainian nationalist factions..........

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