Saturday, August 18, 2012

Night of the murdered poets

So pervasive has been the persecution of the Jews throughout history that almost every day could be a memorial to someone. Aug 12, that passed unnoticed, was the "night of the murdered poets", when 13 Jewish intellectuals were executed by firing squad on Stalin's orders in the Lubyanka prison on that day in 1952, 60 years ago.  They had been imprisoned for 3 years and tortured. During the Soviet Jewry campaign of the 1970's and 80's, this anniversary was more often remembered.  But, since the Jews were released and the Soviet Union collapsed, we have tended to forget the great men who were murdered then. 
This following story by David B. Green appeared in Ha'aretz on Aug 12, 2012: On this day in 1952, 13 Jewish intellectuals were executed by a firing squad in Moscow’s Lubyanka prison. All had been convicted of anti-Soviet treason and espionage, in connection with their involvement in the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee. The JAC had been formed during World War II to lobby world Jewry to support the USSR in fighting Nazi Germany, but after the war, its members worked to save what remained of Jewish culture in liberated Eastern Europe.
Toward the end of his life, Joseph Stalin unleashed an intense campaign of persecution against the country’s Jews. One of the most notorious examples of this crusade was the trial of the 13 – who included Yiddish writers Peretz Markish, David Bergelson and Itzik Fefer (who had been an informer for the secret police) -- for alleged Zionist activity and other “counterrevolutionary crimes."
The execution became known as the “Night of the Murdered Poets,” though the victims also included scientists and army officers. Two other Jews tried at the same time were Solomon Bregman, a former deputy commissar of foreign affairs, who avoided execution by dying in prison, and biochemist Lina Stern, who was spared death because of her important medical work. After Stalin’s death, she was permitted to return to Moscow from internal exile.
Five other Jewish intellectuals were also murdered separately, most notably Solomon Mikhoels, a prominent Jewish actor, artistic director of the Moscow State Yiddish Theater and also the Chairman of the JAC, who was deliberately run over by a truck in 1948.  In this way Stalin hoped to eradicate Yiddish and Jewish culture from the USSR and he largely succeeded.  Survivors of this persecution, many of whom were anti-Zionists, managed to escape to Israel where there is a memorial to the murdered Jewish intellectuals in Jerusalem.

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