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ZAKHORIUM
PTEN

Date

1942CE

1942–1986

After the war, purges and the doctors' plot smothered Jewish culture, until Soviet Jewish dissent probably helped loosen emigration in 1971 to 1972, before a new freeze after 1974.

Antisemitism and persecutionMigration and demographyPolitical history55.7541°N 37.6136°E
1950
2000
Into the Present: each bar is an event of the period; this one is in coral.

Sourced narrative

Each block is a verifiable statement. The number opens the cited page; amber or coral blocks flag tradition or contested interpretation.

7 statements

01Evidence and context

03

The prewar Soviet Jewish population stood at about 3 million. In 1945 about 1.5 million remained.

04

In 1943 Shlomo Mikhoels and the Yiddish poet Itsik Fefer toured the United States, Canada, and Mexico to back the Soviet war effort.

05

In November 1952 the Prague trial of Rudolf Slansky presented Zionism as a channel of treason. On December 3, 11 of the 13 people executed were Jews.

06

On January 13, 1953, Pravda accused Jewish doctors of a terrorist plot in the service of the Joint.

07

Pravda, a month after Stalin died on March 5, 1953, called the doctors' plot a fabrication.

01

The 1970 attempt to hijack a plane from Leningrad to Israel, and a trial in which the defendants voiced Zionism, probably helped loosen emigration in 1971 and 1972.

02

After the 1974 Jackson-Vanik Act, Moscow hardened and barely let any Jews leave between 1980 and 1986.

Context

03

The prewar Soviet Jewish population stood at about 3 million. In 1945 about 1.5 million remained.

04

In 1943 Shlomo Mikhoels and the Yiddish poet Itsik Fefer toured the United States, Canada, and Mexico to back the Soviet war effort.

05

In November 1952 the Prague trial of Rudolf Slansky presented Zionism as a channel of treason. On December 3, 11 of the 13 people executed were Jews.

§ 01Geography

Where it happened

Gazetteer coordinates (Pleiades for ancient places; Natural Earth and Wikidata for modern ones) over modern physical geography (Natural Earth). Coastlines and the Dead Sea have changed since antiquity.
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§ 04Network

Connections

    § 05Bibliography

    Further reading

    • Zvi Gitelman, A Century of Ambivalence: The Jews of Russia and the Soviet Union, 1881 to the Present (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001).

      Jews of Russia and the Soviet Union · recommended in Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 517

    • Salo W. Baron, The Russian Jews Under Tsar and Soviets (New York: Schocken Books, 1987).

      Russian Jews under tsars and Soviets · recommended in Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 517

    § 06Apparatus

    Sources on this page

    1. 01Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 497inspect
    2. 02Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 497inspect
    3. 03Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 494inspect
    4. 04Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 494inspect
    5. 05Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 495inspect
    6. 06Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 495inspect
    7. 07Efron, Lehmann and Weitzman, p. 496inspect
    • Documented evidenceAttested by contemporary evidence: texts, inscriptions, coins, papyri or archaeology.
    • Scholarly reconstructionHistorians' inference from indirect evidence.
    • Tradition or narrativeA literary, traditional or religious account; significant in itself, but not independently verified.
    • Contested interpretationScholars explicitly disagree; see the positions in the debate.
    • Illustrative reconstructionA hypothesis or visual scheme to guide reading; not a historical claim.