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former Soviet Union

In this pool photograph distributed by the Russian state agency Sputnik, Russia's President Vladimir Putin attends a wreath-laying ceremony at the monument 'Motherland' at the Piskaryovskoye Memorial Cemetery in Saint Petersburg, on January 27, 2025, marking the 81st anniversary of the liberation of Leningrad from Nazi blockade in World War Two (Vyacheslav Prokofyev/Pool/ AFP)
January 9, 2026, 3:38 am
Russia accused of Holocaust distortion over ‘Genocide of the Soviet People’ memorial day
New remembrance day created by the Kremlin omits any mention of Jewish Holocaust victims, despite falling on the same date as the start of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
By ToI Staff
Then-Israeli ambassador to the United Nations Chaim Herzog addresses the UN General Assembly on November 10, 1975, at the vote to label Zionism as 'racism,' at the United Nations, New York. (UN Photo/Michos Tzovaras)
December 12, 2025, 8:54 am
How a UN vote 50 years ago equating Zionism with racism forever altered discourse on Israel
In November 1975, the USSR championed a resolution aimed at easing criticism of its own antisemitism at Israel’s expense. It was repealed in 1991, but experts say its effect lives on
By Ed Weinberg
Illustrative: People walk past a billboard depicting the first cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin in Tiraspol, the capital of the Russia-backed breakaway region of Transnistria, in Moldova on November 1, 2021. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)
August 30, 2025, 3:11 am
As war rages in neighboring Ukraine, Transnistria’s Jews feel caught in a Soviet time warp
The Russian-aligned breakaway state in Moldova had a Jewish population of 300,000 before the Holocaust. The few remaining today battle heightened poverty amid neighboring conflict
By Larry Luxner
US President Donald Trump, center, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, right, and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, at a trilateral signing ceremony in White House, August 8, 2025, in Washington. (AP/Mark Schiefelbein)
August 22, 2025, 4:28 pm
After decades of conflict, Armenia-Azerbaijan peace plan gives Caucasus Jews new hope
Jewish communities in the two former Soviet countries have had no communication, while Armenian ties to Israel have been strained over arms sales to its foe. All that may change
By Larry Luxner
Portrait of Soviet-born human rights activist and writer, Eduard Kuznetsov, in his home in Motza Illit, Israel, April 8, 2015. (Hadas Parush/Flash90)
December 22, 2024, 1:58 pm
Former prisoner of Zion, anti-Soviet dissident Eduard Kuznetsov dies at 85
Refusenik was one of the leaders of Operation Wedding, a failed attempt to hijack an empty civilian plane to escape Soviet Russia and head to Israel
By ToI Staff
An illustration by Zoya Cherkassky-Nnadi in 'For Our Freedom,' a new Haggadah in Ukrainian, an initiative of Project Kesher, available for Passover 2023 (Courtesy Project Kesher)
April 5, 2023, 4:01 pm
Ukrainian Jews celebrate Passover with fresh start and new Haggadah
‘For Our Freedom’ includes vivid illustrations by Kyiv-born Israeli artist Zoya Cherkassky-Nnadi
By Jessica Steinberg
Yosef Mendelevitch visiting St. Petersburg Airport, November 30, 2014. (Canaan Lidor)
March 28, 2023, 10:27 pm
Judicial overhaul divides ex-Prisoners of Zion from former Soviet Union
Groups on both sides of the issue have published open letters making arguments grounded in their experiences behind the Iron Curtain
By Canaan Lidor
'How the Soviet Jew Was Made' by Sasha Senderovich. (Courtesy)
February 11, 2023, 8:56 am
‘How the Soviet Jew Was Made’: A tale of wandering, oppression, language and lore
In his award-winning book, Prof. Sasha Senderovich mixes a rich, centuries-old body of Yiddish folklore with early 20th-century events to define a notoriously nebulous Jewish group
By JP O’ Malley
A couple prepares to step on a glass, a symbol in Jewish weddings, after their Jewish ceremony in Boston, February 7, 2023. (Igor Klimov via JTA)
February 11, 2023, 1:31 am
Boston Chabad marries 3 couples who were barred from having Jewish weddings in USSR
‘It was my dream’: Ukraine-born husbands and wives, married for a collective 125 years, stand under huppah for 1st time because religious ceremonies were illegal in Soviet Union
By Penny Schwartz
Supporters for the freedom of Soviet Jewry rally in front of the Soviet consulate in San Francisco in a undated photo. (Courtesy of American Jewish Historical Society)
February 7, 2023, 4:17 pm
FBI memo: Bay Area Soviet Jewry protest leaders secretly sought Jews for Jesus’ help
Freedom of information request yields stunning revelation that leadership recruited the well-organized but widely loathed proselytizing group to help organize and bolster crowds
By Asaf Elia-Shalev
From right, MK Ze'ev Elkin, One Million Lobby CEO Alex Rif, manager of the alternative Orthodox conversion program Giyur K'Halacha Yael Belenky, Heritage Minister Amichay Eliyahu, Afula Chief Rabbi Shmuel David and journalist Yair Sherki discuss the Law of Return at a conference in Ramat Gan on January 25, 2023. (Judah Ari Gross/Times of Israel)
January 27, 2023, 2:52 am
Even among its advocates, changing the Law of Return proves trickier than expected
Lobbying group for Russian-speaking Israelis holds fierce debate on cutting the ‘grandchild clause,’ with all sides acknowledging that it won’t happen fast
By Judah Ari Gross
Jewish immigrants fleeing from war zones in the Ukraine arrive at the immigration and absorption office, at Ben Gurion airport near Tel Aviv, on March 15, 2022. (Tomer Neuberg/Flash90)
January 25, 2023, 8:22 pm
Israelis split on whether Diaspora Jews should weigh in on changes to Law of Return
Poll finds more people think foreign Jews should be part of debate on proposal to revoke ‘grandchild clause,’ but lots don’t know; most think such a move would cut immigration
By Judah Ari Gross
Deputy Minister Avi Maoz, right, meets with Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi David Lau, center-left, in the latter's office in Jerusalem on January 11, 2023. (Avi Maoz's Office)
January 12, 2023, 5:32 am
Maoz looks to involve Rabbinate in determining Jewishness of would-be immigrants
As head of Nativ, which checks citizenship eligibility in FSU, far-right lawmaker seems to be trying to make process harder so as to keep out those who are not halachically Jewish
By Judah Ari Gross
Books in both Hebrew and Russian sit on a bookshelf at Medzhybizh. (Jacob Judah/ JTA)
December 10, 2022, 5:23 am
Ukrainian Jews have historically spoken Russian. The war is changing that
History led Jewish communities in Ukraine to eschew the language, but disgust at Russia’s invasion brings change — and an increased perception of being part of Ukrainian society
By Jacob Judah
Head of the Noam party Avi Maoz at the Knesset in Jerusalem on July 19, 2021. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
December 1, 2022, 6:56 am
He campaigned for Soviet immigration. Now Avi Maoz is poised to fight against it
As head of the Nativ program, the far-right nationalist could make immigration from the former Soviet Union much harder for those who aren’t Jewish according to Orthodox law
By Judah Ari Gross
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