Judaism and Communism

Persecution of Jews in Communist countries

Jews have been persecuted in Communist countries: the destruction of religious traditions; the doctors’ plot, and more generally Stalin’s antisemitism that almost led to large scale murder of Jews; the fate of refuseniks and discrimination against Jews in the Soviet Union; official antisemitism in Poland in 1967-68.

Jewish radicalism

There is a conception that Jews were the founders of leftist movements and served as communist leaders in the states that were governed by communist parties; persecuting Christian religions, pre-eminent in the bloody communist dictatorships. While this conception is false but it does point to certain facts, specifically to the large number of Jews among active communists. As Andre W.M. Gerrits put it, the power of the association of Jews with communism comes from the fact that “it was based on elements of fiction and reality.” The myth of “Jewish Communism” is only a myth. What is real is the existence and importance of Jewish Communists.

Left-wing radicalism was relatively widespread among Jews, especially in Eastern Europe.

Most Jews who left closed traditional communities tended to support radical political ideologies. If they did not choose Zionism they supported the revolutionary left and sometimes both at the same time. The secular Yiddish culture was predominantly leftist.

Jews were important in communist movements. Jews were very prominent among revolutionary leaders, both before and after the seizure of power. Occasionally, other leaders praised Jews for this; Engels and Lenin for example.

Both Jewish activists in Eastern Europe and in Israeli kibbutzim were eagerly pro-Soviet in the period of terror in the later years of Stalin’s life.

In Poland, immediately after World War II, most Jewish organizations were pro-communist; they saw communists as the force that could bring security and stabi­lization.