Ida permission denied11/19/2022 ![]() ![]() ![]() The packages she sent passed inspection of prison guards and included items like children’s gummy vitamins (which appeared to be candy), white chocolate, warm underwear and the 3-D postcards the guards favored. ![]() She collected goods for parcels she sent to prisoners filled with goods we sent with Western tourists. She went on a hunger strike to protest an arrest. Her efforts for them were often at personal risk. A ‘Guardian Angel’įor the prisoners of Zion, she was their “Guardian Angel,” their “Mama.” While fighting for her own visa, she championed the desperate situation of refuseniks who had been arrested and sentenced to prison and forced labor camps for their emigration activity. What she did during her struggle for a visa to emigrate makes her a symbol of resistance for the ages. Ida was a tiny woman who stood tall against the Kremlin and the fearsome KGB security apparatus empowered to persecute and intimidate by any means Jews intent on leaving the USSR. Instead of allowing Ida’s life to lapse into forgetfulness, we must learn from her because what she did in Moscow serves as a model for generations. With her death in Jerusalem just before Yom Kippur at age 90, another mega-symbol of the Soviet Jewish emigration movement has left us. And unless you were among the fortunate few to have gone to meet them in the former Soviet Union during the decades from 1970s to the 1990s, you probably don’t know about those Jewish heroes and heroines whose actions defined moral courage and stamina in the face of relentless government persecution.īut for those Americans who did travel to the USSR, meeting with Jewish refuseniks, who were refused the right to emigrate, had a profound impact on them. ![]() The heroes of our generation are slipping away. (Photo Credit: Nati Harnik/Wikimedia Commons) What she did for Soviet Jewry makes her a symbol of resistance, a model for generations. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |