FACES AND PLACES: "60 Minutes" virus spreading (04/23/95)

FACES AND PLACES

by Myron B. Kuropas

"60 Minutes" virus spreading

Thanks to the alert efforts of Genyia Paliy-Moore and Stefa Dmytriw of the newly established MediaWatch Ukraine in Canada, evidence is growing that the October 23 "60 Minutes" broadcast on Ukraine was not an isolated event.

As I suggested in "Benefits of CBS Scourging" months ago, the Morley Safer report will assist that segment of the Jewish-American community that wishes to restore refugee status for Jews from Ukraine.

According to a MediaWatch press release, three members from MediaWatch Ukraine and two Ukrainian students from the University of Toronto attended a closed circuit international satellite broadcast from Paramount Studios and Moscow on April 2.

The event was publicized in the March 31 Toronto Globe and Mail by Liam Lacy who wrote that "gregarious host Larry King will play to a small, very select TV audience... His 90-minute closed-circuit satellite telecast will reach just 150 homes and 36 universities around the world, but the circumstances of its creation make it an unprecedented television event...

"Entitled 'Help Our People Know,' the telecast launches a worldwide campaign to raise awareness about the danger to Russia's 1.5 million Jews, currently endangered by rising anti-Semitism and Russia's unstable politics," wrote Mr. Lacy. "Such guests as U.S. Vice-President Al Gore, Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal and Toronto philanthropist Leslie Dan will speak to audiences at sites in Moscow, Jerusalem, New York and Toronto, including the University of Toronto.

"The project's mastermind is 40 year-old Rabbi Irwin Katsof, a Montrealer who now lives in Los Angeles. He managed in a few months to enlist the help of some of the most powerful executives in Hollywood..."

The main purpose of the broadcast was to raise millions of dollars for the Jerusalem Fund of Aish Hatorah.

During the broadcast, according to MediaWatch, Larry King acknowledged "my good friend" Morley Safer and ran a clip from Mr. Safer's report of October 23. A taped message of congratulations and best wishes was later extended by President Bill Clinton.

Distorted and juxtaposed footage was presented in documentary format. Lviv and Kyyiv were referenced as part of Russia, and Bohdan Khmelnytsky's freedom crusade against Polish oppression was presented as a vicious pogrom against the Jews.

That old Ukrainophobe Simon Wiesenthal, according to MediaWatch, claimed that Jews in western Ukraine are endangered due to anti-Jewish influence and agitation by the 1.5 million Ukrainians living in Canada. If this calumny can be documented, Ukrainian Canadians may have grounds for a class-action suit charging Mr. Wiesenthal with a hate-crime.

MediaWatch Ukraine is currently trying to obtain either a print or a transcript of the 90-minute airing of "Let My People Know." Jewish organizations based in Toronto claim they have neither the transcript nor the print of this broadcast.

There's more. During a recent conversation with an official of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in the United States, I was asked what was going on in Ukraine. The official told me that Jews whose American visas were expiring were, coming into INS offices claiming that they couldn't return to Ukraine because their lives were in danger. The official had seen the CBS broadcast and was wondering if there was any truth to it. "Every one of the Jews tell the same story," the INS official told me. "It's almost as if they were coached. They claim they can't walk the streets in Ukrainian cities because they may get beaten. They also claim that their synagogues are being burned. These Jews are asking for refugee status."

Soon after hearing this, I called Pam Cohen, national president of the Union of Councils, an organization that bills itself as "The Voice of Emigration, Jewish Survival, and Human Rights in the former Soviet Union since 1970." I had met Ms. Cohen previously and believed her to be a friend of Ukraine. When I told her about the comments of the INS official, she was outraged that any U.S. government official would share that information with me. When I told her I planned to write about the incident, she asked me to wait while she got a tape recorder so that she would have a record of what she said to me.

"In the eyes of people who lived in Ukraine," she told me, "there is reason to seek asylum in the United States." When she claimed that synagogues were being burned in Ukraine, I asked for more information. A few days later I received a well-documented report of alleged attempts to destroy a synagogue in Kremenchuk, Ukraine, beginning April 16, 1994. As it turned out, the synagogue was only one of several institutions housed in a building that also included an accounting school. At the time no one thought it was an anti-Semitic incident. Later, however, Solomon Gulkin, chairman of the Jewish Religious Community, was allegedly threatened by phone. "This is only the beginning," a voice told him. Although little damage was done on April 16, a second arson attempt on April 24 severely damaged most of the valuable religious items in the synagogue.

Despite letters from Sens. Dennis DeConcini and Steny Hoyer to Ambassador Yuri Shcherbak and a letter to the Kremenchuk Mayor I.K. Panomerenko, Ms. Cohen informed me that no satisfactory resolution has been reached. The matter is still under investigation. Based on my information thus far, there is reason to believe that it was, as Ms. Cohen claims, an anti-Semitic incident. Since the region has a heavy Russian population, it could have been a provocation by a Russian. Even if it was a Russian provocation, however, the incident took place on Ukrainian soil and, horrendous as the crime is, Ukraine must take responsibility.

But does the burning of one synagogue in an area of eastern Ukraine signal a wave of anti-Semitism throughout Ukraine? Does it mean that all Jews are in danger for their lives? Does it justify refugee status for all Ukrainian Jewish visitors in the United States?

Personally, I have no problem with Jews or anyone else wanting to legally emigrate to the United States. I would not be here today if my parents had not made the very wise decision to move to America. What I and most other Ukrainians deeply resent, however, is the use of defamation and obloquy of the people of Ukraine in order to provide a haven for Ukrainian Jewish visitors in the United States. This is outrageous, a scam aimed at defrauding the U.S. government.

As the Office of Special Investigations (OSI) has pointed out to us time and time again, lying to INS officials is grounds for extradition.

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