ГУЛаг Палестины - Лев Гунин

other Jews in the West; (4) Jews occupied positions of authority, and in fact can be said to

have administered the famine. Thus, Jews had ample opportunity to save Ukrainians simply by

giving them food or by sabotaging the food-confiscation process. Or, in the mass deportations

and executions, during which Jews again occupied positions of authority, there was again ample

opportunity for Jews to subvert the process and hide or save Ukrainians.

We have already seen above innumerable cases of Ukrainians saving Jews, but can we now locate a

single case of a Jew saving a Ukrainian? Simon Wiesenthal, for example, had his life saved by

the Ukrainian Bodnar, but did Simon Wiesenthal ever in his long life reciprocate by saving a

Ukrainian? We saw above that an entire Ukrainian family was shot by the Nazis for hiding a

Jewish woman, but can we find a single instance of an entire Jewish family being shot by the

Bolsheviks for hiding a Ukrainian woman? We saw above that the Ukrainian mayor of a town was

shot by the Nazis for helping Jews, but can we find a single instance of a Jewish mayor - and

there were many Jewish mayors in Ukraine - being shot by the Bolsheviks for helping Ukrainians?

We saw above Metropolitan Sheptytsky risking his life and the lives of other Ukrainians by

hiding Jews on church property, but can we find a single instance of a rabbi risking his life

and the lives of other Jews by hiding Ukrainians on synagogue property? We saw above

Metropolitan Sheptytsky writing to Himmler protesting the shooting of Jews, but can we find any

similar case of a rabbi writing to Lazar Kaganovich protesting the starvation of Ukrainians?

One would like to see a statement from Morley Safer as to the justification for this double

standard. When the most rudimentary and obvious comparisons indicate that Ukrainians have been

disposed to Jews much more favorably than Jews have been disposed to Ukrainians, how can Morley

Safer justify concluding the opposite?

CONTENTS:

Preface

The Galicia Division

Quality of Translation

Ukrainian Homogeneity

Were Ukrainians Nazis?

Simon Wiesenthal

What Happened in Lviv?

Nazi Propaganda Film

Collective Guilt

Paralysis of the Comparative

Function

60 Minutes' Cheap Shots

Ukrainian Anti-Semitism

Jewish Ukrainophobia

Mailbag

A Sense of Responsibility

What 60 Minutes Should Do

PostScript

60 Minutes' Cheap Shots

60 Minutes peppered its broadcast with distortions and misrepresentations. Here are nineteen

miscellaneous instances:

(1) Doctoring the sound track to bring out the evil of torchlight parades. The torchlight

marchers are not a clear indication of anything, and without some enhancement, the scene would

have fallen flat, and so 60 Minutes overlaid an exaggerated, rhythmic tramping sound which added

an ominous militaristic flavor to the scene. In fact, given that it is dark and there is no

band and the marchers are not singing, it is impossible for any but local groups of them to keep

in step, and simple leather-soled or rubber-soled shoes could not have made such a sound - it

would have taken cleated boots. The rhythmic tramping superimposed by 60 Minutes continues to

be heard even when the paraders can be seen to be walking more than marching. One can see that

the added sound effects are only imperfectly coordinated with the movements of the feet.

(2) "Adolph Hitler Square". "The place they're marching in was once called Adolph Hitler

Square," Mr. Safer tells us, but does not add that it was so called by the Germans and that it

was not called that either before the Germans came or after they left.

(3) Gratuitous accusation of mimicking. Mr. Safer informs us of the marchers that "Their chants

and banners mimic another more fearsome time."

But this is absolutely gratuitous - neither the chants nor the banners are mimicking anything.

The marchers are not wearing swastika armbands and their banners do not contain Nazi symbols.

They are not chanting "Death to the Jews!" but only "Slava natsiyi!" which means "Glory to the

nation!" and is about as ominous in Ukrainian as "Vive la patrie!" is in French.

Mr. Safer's syllogism here seems to be: The Nazis sometimes held torchlight parades. These

Ukrainians are holding a torchlight parade. Therefore, all Ukrainians are Nazis.

(4) If it sounds like "Nazi," then it must be "Nazi." 60 Minutes broadcast the above-mentioned

"Slava natsiyi!" several times, but never provided a translation. But as "natsiyi" sounds like

"Nazi," this invites the listener who does not know any Slavic languages to think that something

is being said about Naziism, and the context supplied by Morley Safer suggests that this

something is complimentary.

(5) The menace of boy scouts and girl guides. Desperate for any images that to a gullible 60

Minutes audience might be suggestive of undying Naziism within Ukraine, Morley Safer presents

film clips of Ukrainian boy scouts and girl guides.

(6) Censorship through muted translation. When a Ukrainian in Lviv says "A Russian shot my

brother!" 60 Minutes mutes the English translation to the point that it is almost inaudible.

The critical viewer is left wondering whether the operating principle might not be that when a

Ukrainian says something that might win sympathy for Ukrainians, omit it; in the case where the

image has some overriding appeal (that was a pretty craggy Ukrainian, he was pretty excited, and

the lighting was wonderful), then mute the translation to the point of inaudibility.

Furthermore, in the 60 Minutes transcript of The Ugly Face of Freedom, the statement "A Russian

shot my brother!" is entirely omitted, one might imagine following this same principle of

avoiding attracting sympathy to Ukrainians.

(7) Who welcomed the Germans? Mr. Safer says that "The same square greeted Hitler's troops

fifty years ago as liberators," making this seem like another symptom of a Ukrainian addiction

to Naziism.

Of course we understand that it was not the square which greeted Hitler's troops at all, but

rather people in the square, and it was smart on Mr. Safer's part not to draw attention to the

people, because there might follow the natural question of "What people?" and the honest answer

would have to be "All people - Ukrainians, Poles, and Jews." Jews welcomed Hitler's troops?

Yes, so it would appear:

The prevailing conviction [was] that bad things came from Russia and good

things from Germany. The Jews were historically oriented away from Russia and

toward Germany; not Russia but Germany had been their traditional place of

refuge. During October and November, 1939, that conviction, among other

things, drove thousands of Jews from Russian-occupied Poland to German-occupied

Poland. The stream was not stopped until the Germans closed the border.

Similarly, one year later, at the time of Soviet mass deportations in the newly

occupied territories, [there was] widespread unrest among Ukrainians, Poles,

and Jews alike. Almost everyone was waiting for the arrival of the German

army. When the army finally arrived, in the summer of 1941, old Jews in

particular remembered that in the First World War the Germans had come as

quasi-liberators. These Jews did not expect that now the Germans would come as

persecutors and killers. (Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews,

1961, p. 206)

Upon experiencing the impulse to blame Ukrainians for welcoming the Germans, the impartial

journalist might recognize that all groups had been traumatized by their exposure to Communism,

and all hoped for relief from the Germans.

(8) Chief Rabbi of Ukraine. Although Rabbi Bleich is introduced by 60 Minutes as the "Chief

Rabbi for the Ukraine," he is in fact an American from Brooklyn, New York, perhaps unqualified

to hold such an exulted title for several reasons: (1) Rabbi Bleich is a Hasidic Jew, and so

perhaps not authorized to speak for other Jewish sects. (2) Rabbi Bleich is newly-arrived in

Ukraine carrying his full load of American-engendered prejudices, and seemingly unaware of the

history of Ukraine, or even of the contemporary situation of Jews in Ukraine. (3) Rabbi Bleich,

as of the date of the 60 Minutes broadcast, spoke some Russian, but negligible Ukrainian. Some

Ukrainians might think that one prerequisite for the post of "Chief Rabbi of Ukraine" would be

fluency in Ukrainian.

The title of "Chief Rabbi of Ukraine," then, may be viewed as being self-proclaimed and

presumptuous, and as carrying no standing within Ukraine or anywhere else. In crediting the

title, Morley Safer was just blowing up Rabbi Bleich's credentials to give his words more

weight.

(9) An observation or a hypothetical case? Rabbi Bleich is shown saying, "Obviously, if someone

- you know? - screams 'Let's drown the Russians in Jewish blood!' there isn't too much love lost

there."

Yes, if anyone did scream such a thing, we might safely infer that the screamer was motivated by

a hatred of both Russians and Jews (even though we wouldn't be able to conclude much about

anybody other than the screamer). But in fact Rabbi Bleich does not claim that anybody ever did

scream such a thing. The 60 Minutes viewer is left with the impression that Rabbi Bleich was

reporting something that he witnessed, but his wording commits him to nothing more than

contemplating a hypothetical case.

(10) Lenin's Jewish ancestors. After interviewing the editor of Lviv's daily For a Free

Ukraine, 60 Minutes cuts to Rabbi Bleich saying "There's an article that came out just two weeks

ago where they tried to prove that Lenin was really Jewish...." The impression created is that

this article was published in For a Free Ukraine, and that For a Free Ukraine is a major

newspaper in Western Ukraine's major city.

In fact, however, "there's an article that came out" does not precisely inform us where the

article was published. Perhaps it was published in Ukraine's equivalent of a supermarket

tabloid. Perhaps it wasn't published at all, but only circulated in pamphlets. Perhaps it's

just a rumor and nobody can produce such an article. But even if published in For a Free

Ukraine - so what?

A higher standard of journalism than that exhibited by 60 Minutes would have reported who was

the author of this article, what position he holds in Ukrainian society, how good were his data

and his arguments, where was the article published, about how many people may have read it, does

anyone believe it, does it alter anybody's attitudes toward contemporary Jews even if they do

believe it? - But of course such questions weren't answered, and we are left able to conclude no

more than that Rabbi Bleich wishes us to believe in the existence of a virulent Ukrainian

anti-Semitism.

The Bleich statement is representative of a large number of statements in which events are

referred to obliquely, indirectly, vaguely - and on this basis, the viewer is invited to jump to

some strong conclusion. "I get the impression from people...." says Mr. Safer. Now there's a

lazy substitute for investigative reporting! What people? Why can't we see these people for

ourselves? Perhaps they are just a couple of cronies of Mr. Safer's whose company he prizes

because they are as bigoted as himself. And what do we care what one or two of Mr. Safer's

friends think? 60 Minutes should show its viewers the data on which these people are basing

their conclusions and let the viewers draw their own conclusions. But this is not what 60

Minutes did - its broadcast was short on data and long on instructions on how to feel.

(11) Morley Safer, genetic theorist. Mr. Safer tells us that "The Church and Government of

Ukraine have tried to ease people's fears, suggesting that ... Ukrainians, despite the

allegations, are not genetically anti-Semitic."

Here we see a new escalation in the level of irrationality with Mr. Safer now divulging to us

the existence of the allegation that Ukrainians are genetically anti-Semitic. For an

anti-Semitism which Mr. Safer failed to document, he now suggests a cause from the fairyland of

pseudoscience, and suggests furthermore that the Church and Government of Ukraine have dignified

this charge by denying it. That Ukrainians are pronouncedly anti-Semitic, Mr. Safer takes as a

given requiring no corroborative evidence, and so he shifts attention to speculating as to how

they could have gotten that way.

Perhaps Morley Safer will appreciate how bizarre and inflammatory his statement is when its

direction is reversed: "The World Jewish Congress has tried to ease the growth of

anti-Semitism, suggesting that Jews, despite the allegations, are not genetically predisposed to

usury." Now if Mr. Safer had heard that on Ukrainian television, he could have brought it back

as very good evidence not only of Ukrainian anti-Semitism, but of Ukrainian irrationality as

well - but he didn't hear any such thing during his visit to Ukraine, and he brought back

nothing. To encounter that degree of hatred and that level of irrationality, you have to leave

Ukraine for the United States and tune in to 60 Minutes.

(12) Church of Ukraine. But even while rebutting Mr. Safer's main point, I have been carelessly

adopting his slovenly terminology. "Church of Ukraine"? What "Church of Ukraine"? There is no

"Church of Ukraine" any more than there is a "Church of Canada" or a "Church of the United

States." Ukraine has more than one variety of Orthodox church, more than one variety of

Catholic church, more than one variety of Protestant church; and Ukraine has as well a full

slate of non-Christian religions. It even has agnostics and atheists just like a real

country.

Thus it is not only in his big lies, but also in his small misstatements that Mr. Safer reveals

to us that his perception of Ukraine is uninformed, indeed wholly stereotypical. To him,

perhaps all Ukrainians conform to some archetypal image - wielding a saber, hard-drinking,