Soviet refusenik and would-be plane hijacker Eduard Kuznetsov dies at 85

By Zev Stub

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22 December 2024, 11:50 am

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Zev Stub is the Times of Israel's Diaspora Affairs correspondent.

New York Mayor Edward Koch, center, talks with Soviet dissidents Mark Dymshits, right, Eduard Kuznetsov, and Kuznetsov's wife Sylvia at Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza in New York, April 29, 1979 (AP Photo/David Karp)

Eduard Kuznetsov, a Soviet refusenik and writer, has passed away at age 85. He was one of the leading figures in the struggle to help Jews leave the Soviet Union.

Kuznetsov was sentenced to death in the Soviet Union in 1970 after he led an attempt to hijack an empty civilian aircraft with 16 other refuseniks in order to escape to the West.

His sentence was later commuted to 15 years following a global outcry, and in 1979, he was released as part of a Soviet prisoner exchange with the United States.

After he moved to Israel following his release, Kuznetsov worked on behalf of Soviet Jewry as a writer and journalist in Israel and abroad.