\n<\/em><\/h3>\n
By Jonas E. Alexis, Assistant Editor
\nVeterans Today<\/p>\n
A correspondent who goes by the moniker \u201cGennadiy Gessen\u201d emailed me on November 17th<\/sup>\u00a0and wanted to ask a litany of questions. What follows is the interaction, which is quite lengthy.<\/strong><\/p>\n Gessen:<\/strong>\u00a0I read with interest your article on Veterans Today on Putin and the \u201cNew World Order\u201d. While you make some halfway sound points when you discuss objective morality and the transvaluation of values in the West, your reverence for Putin as the imagined vanguard against the \u201cNew World Order\u201d seems to me to be incoherent, and flatly ignorant of many of Putin\u2019s own positions. Your worldview is a strangely Manichaean fantasy permeated with an attitude towards Putin which approximates an unholy mix between idolatry and fascist servility. You would be wise to consider how this worldview squares with the facts.<\/p>\n I will attempt to mention just a few of the inconsistencies.First, consider that a great deal of your conspiracy theory rests on the assumption that the Russian Revolution was somehow a Jewish creation\u2014an assertion denied by every historian of the Russian Revolution from the anti-Putin (e.g. Orlando Figes) to the pro-Putin (e.g. Solzhenitsyn). Even if it were true that the first Soviet government was 85% Jewish, the point is moot unless you present primary evidence to support any relationship between their Jewish heritage\/religion and their actions. The point is no more relevant that the fact that Stalin was a Georgian or that Lavrentiy Beria was a Mingrelian. It is also no more relevant than the fact that two of Putin\u2019s closest friends and political confidants are Jewish oligarchs\u2014Arkady Rotenberg and Roman Abramovich. Putin\u2019s relationship with Abramovich\u2014described by Chris Hutchins, a noted biographer of Putin, as akin to that of a \u201cfather and son\u201d\u2014should be all the more of interest to you since Abramovich is also a Zionist with Israeli citizenship. If Zionism and Jewish money are a part of the \u201cNew World Order\u201d, as you imagine it, you have a bit of explaining to do, my friend.<\/p>\n Second, consider the close political relationship between Putin and Netanyahu, and the increasingly close relationship between Russia and Israel. Much of Russian foreign policy towards Israel is a reversal of Soviet policy, which was, as is documented everywhere from the mainstream to Solzhenitsyn\u2019s\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together<\/em>, vociferously anti-Zionist. This in itself is an inconsistency you will have to explain at some point in time, if Soviet Russia was controlled by Jews. Moreover, some disagreements over Syria aside, Putin has been an important regional ally of Israel in many respects. Putin himself has described Israel as a \u201cspecial state [to Russia]\u201d (https:\/\/www.themoscowtimes.com\/2019\/09\/18\/israel-is-a-russian-speaking-country-putin-says-a67337<\/a>), tied to Russia by \u201cfamily and friendship\u201d (ibid.), and enjoys the support of most Russian citizens living in Israel (http:\/\/9tv.co.il\/news\/2018\/03\/19\/255435.html<\/a>). The Kremlin has also supported Israel as an \u201cunconditional ally against [international terrorism]\u201d (https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/Israel-News\/Politics-And-Diplomacy\/Putin-to-Netanyahu-Were-unconditional-allies-in-the-war-against-terror-456193), and supported Israel in Operation Protective Edge, meeting and expressing his support for the operation with none other than Yisrael Meir Lau, and Yitzhak Yosef, son of the infamous racist rabbi Ovadia Yosef:\u00a0https:\/\/fjc-fsu.org\/president-putin-support-israel\/<\/a>. You have more explaining to do, my friend.<\/p>\n Third, you should acknowledge that Putin\u2019s renunciation of his country\u2019s Soviet past is not wholesale. Putin is deeply proud of the Red Army\u2019s fight against Nazi tyranny\u2014still memorialized in Russia as among the proudest moments in Russian history. Taking your conspiracy theories about World War II into account, this should strike you as quite a bit more than a strange coincidence, my friend. Here is a photograph of Putin and Netanyahu together in Moscow on Victory Day, celebrating the victory of the Red Army over Nazi Germany:\u00a0https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/8\/84\/2018_Moscow_Victory_Day_Parade_07.jpg<\/a>. Here he is meeting with Jewish veterans of the Red Army in Israel:\u00a0https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/7\/79\/Vladimir_Putin_in_Israel_27-29_April_2005-17.jpg<\/a>.<\/p>\n Putin is many things\u2014a supporter of autocrats, the only man since Saddam Hussein to have annexed another country\u2019s territory, a closet billionaire who lives at the expense of a largely poor populace, a jailer of opposition leaders, journalists, and political dissidents, and the oligarch-propped leader of an oil-dependent country with some of the highest poverty rates and lowest life expectancies in the developed world\u2014but he is, unfortunately for you, not quite the man you thought he was. So yes, I\u2019d say you have some explaining to do, my friend. Maybe you can start with me?<\/p>\n Alexis:<\/strong>\u00a0With all due respect, I believe you are living in a fantasy world, and I cannot take time to answer all the historically risible points you have raised here. I can only address just a few.<\/p>\n No serious historian or scholar with an ounce of common sense will deny the fact that the Russian Revolution was a largely Jewish movement. For example, read Erich E. Haberer\u2019s\u00a0Jews and Revolution in Nineteenth-Century Russia<\/em>\u00a0(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998); Jonathan Frankel\u2019s\u00a0Crisis, Revolution, and Russian Jews<\/em>\u00a0(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008); Yuri Slezkine\u2019s\u00a0The Jewish Century<\/em>\u00a0(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006); Jerry Z. Muller\u2019s\u00a0Capitalism and the Jews<\/em>\u00a0(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010). The scholarly literature on this very issue is just an embarrassment of riches.<\/p>\n It is all the most disingenuous that you would even bring in Solzhenitsyn in order to buttress the silly claim that the Russian Revolution was not really a Jewish enterprise! Have you really read Solzhenitsyn\u2019s\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together<\/em>? If so, have you read it to the end? If so, did you read the chapters on the conflict between Jews and Russia? If so, then you are absolutely a disingenuous person and that further exchange with you will not change anything because your mind is made up.<\/p>\n Moreover, do you know why Solzhenitsyn\u2019s\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together<\/em>\u00a0hasn\u2019t been published by any major publisher in the English speaking world? Do you know why Jewish historians like Richard Pipes have labeled Solzhenitsyn an anti-Semite? It\u2019s just plain silly that you would mention Solzhenitsyn in order to buttress a laughable claim.<\/p>\n The fact is that some historians do not want to point out that the Russian Revolution was largely Jewish because that would put their lucrative career into jeopardy. Or if a historian is brave enough to make some historically reasonable comments about Russia and even Nazi Germany, then the Holocaust establishment will kick him out of academia. Read what happened to Stanford historian Norman Davies.<\/p>\n Gessen:<\/strong>\u00a0If my claims about Putin (his connection to Jewish oligarchs, the strong relationship between\u00a0Israel and Russia, and Putin\u2019s memorialization of the Red Army) are \u201chistorically risible\u201d, I would be grateful if you could tell me why, my friend. The unavoidable impression is that the \u201cPutin vs. NWO\u201d dualism you have propagated needs revision. If you tell someone that their statements are \u201crisible\u201d, it\u2019s customary to proceed by telling them why you\u2019re laughing!<\/p>\n In response to what you do say, however, no historian or scholar has claimed that the Russian Revolution was a \u201clargely Jewish movement\u201d. There were Jews who participated in the Revolution; many of them quite prominently. Many of the wonderful books you mention discuss such Jews eloquently, and with great care and rigour. But I\u2019m afraid that does not make it a \u201clargely Jewish movement\u201d. Simply\u00a0listing books with \u201cJews\u201d and \u201cRussia\u201d in their titles is not evidence of any scholarly basis for the allegation. You do actually need to cite responsibly. In particular, you need to cite any passage which describes the Russian Revolution as a \u201clargely Jewish movement\u201d. You would be hard-pressed to find one, and I\u2019d be very impressed indeed if you managed to do so.<\/p>\n I have read\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together.\u00a0<\/em>In Russian. Can you say the same? You seem to be unfamiliar with it.\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together\u00a0<\/em>was critically panned, not just because of its antisemitism, but because of its unscrupulous scholarship, with claims which are frequently not buttressed by any primary data. The most famous of those claims is the one that the first Soviet government was 85% Jewish (which Putin, as you noted, repeats). He never cited any data to support this claim. You can open your copy of\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together<\/em>, and true to my\u00a0word, you will find no in-text citation, footnote, or bibliographic mention of the source which gives him this impression.\u00a0The reason he does not, simply stated, is that the claim is false. Solzhenitsyn, though a man of great literary talent and moral integrity, knew it too. A book which makes such errors is not likely to be received warmly by other academics, and true to expectation, it was not. The Norman Davies case is a little different, my friend. Davies was not \u201ckicked out of academia\u201d; he was denied tenure, by a very close vote of 11-10, if memory serves. This is not unusual in academia dealing with any subject; I regret it is unfortunately just the way of the world.<\/p>\n You should read\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together\u00a0<\/em>carefully again, if you did in fact read it in the first place. Its extensive shortcomings and biases aside,\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together<\/em>\u00a0emphatically denies that the Russian Revolution was a largely Jewish movement, and is quite careful to caution readers not to draw these conclusions, frequently condemning them as conspiracies popular in far-right Russian circles. He devoted much of his writing in his last days (and his last book too) to excoriating these beliefs and similar conspiracies. But in\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together<\/em>\u00a0alone,\u00a0at the end of Chapter 9, for example, he has quite strong words against people like yourself that have used his book to draw the conclusions you do. I quote,<\/p>\n \u201c[some] have yielded to the temptation of simplistic explanation: Russia is fundamentally sound, and the whole revolution, from beginning to end, is a dark plot hatched by Jews, an episode of the Judeo-Masonic plot. Explain everything by one and the same cause: the Jews!\u2026The superstitious belief in the historical force of conspiracies\u2026leaves completely aside the main cause of failures suffered by individuals as well as states: human weaknesses\u2026No, it cannot be said IN ANY CASE that it was the Jews who organized the revolutions of 1905 or 1917\u2026\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n It sounds an awful lot like he\u2019s talking to you, my friend. So no, not even Solzhenitsyn made the claim that the revolution was a largely Jewish movement. I have cited all the claims I have made. It wasn\u2019t very difficult, because they\u2019re all true. You, conversely, have not dealt with anything I have said about Putin, and have cited nothing to support your own conclusions. So is it really my fantasy? I would like to add that my thesis was on the relationship between Jewish members of the NKD and the Bund. So I\u2019m well aware (and deeply cognizant, on a personal as well as an academic level) of Jewish participation, of all kinds, in the Russian Revolution and in early Soviet governments. But the claim that the Revolution was a \u201clargely Jewish movement\u201d is not a claim made in mainstream historiography; it is the claim of conspiracy theorists like those even Solzhenitsyn condemned in his last years, like people like David Duke have made frequently, and so forth. If you can find a mainstream scholar who has said it is, it would be of great personal interest to me. So feel free to reply if you can find any, or if you are prepared to deal with anything of what was said about Putin in my first message.<\/p>\n Alexis:<\/strong>\u00a0In the last response, I never said anything about Putin or that your claim about him was risible. If you were paying close attention, I was talking about your claim on the Bolshevik Revolution. I didn\u2019t even feel to talk about Putin because if we cannot agree even on the Bolshevik Revolution, then it is no use to even discuss Putin. It\u2019s just that simple.<\/p>\n The way I see it, Mr. Gennadiy, is simply this: You are either an intellectually dishonest person or you are not familiar with the scholarly literature or you simply do not want to know at all. If you were interested in scholarly pursuit, you would have checked the books that I cited in my earlier response and found out about what those scholars themselves have said about the Bolshevik Revolution. I cited you no less than 4 scholarly studies on the Jews and the Bolshevik Revolution, and your quick response is that \u201cI\u2019m afraid that does not make it a \u2018largely Jewish movement\u2026\u201d For example, listen to Muller: \u201cJews were highly visible in the revolutions in Russia and Germany, in Hungary they seemed omnipresent\u2026Of the government\u2019s forty-nine commissars, thirty-one were of Jewish origin.\u201d<\/p>\n Muller goes out of his way to cite the names of many of those revolutionaries: Bela Kun, Tibor Szamuely, Otto Korvin (Klein), Georg Lukacs, and Matyas Rakosi (Roth). Sandor Garbai, a Gentile, was chosen because the Jews needed \u201csomeone who could sign the death sentences on Saturday.\u201d The same pattern continues in places like Czechoslovakia, where the general secretary of the Communist party was Rudolf Slansky; in Poland, it was Jakub Berman who was in charge of the secret police, and Jacek Rozanski, trained by the NKVD, \u201cbecame head of the investigative department of the ministry of public security.\u201d<\/p>\n Jewish historian Yuri Slezkine notes in his widely read study\u00a0The Jewish Century\u00a0<\/em>that a number of Russian Jewish intellectuals wrote a collection of essays in 1923 entitled\u00a0Russia and the Jews<\/em>, in which they argued throughout that Jews committed a \u201cbitter sin\u201d in the Revolution. I. M. Berkerman, one of the contributors, lamented that \u201cit goes without saying that not all Jews are Bolsheviks and not all Bolsheviks are Jews, but what is equally obvious is that disproportionate and immeasurably fervent Jewish participation in the torment of half-dead Russia by the Bolsheviks.\u201d<\/p>\n The books that I cited again extensively go over these issues! The fact that you are not even interested in checking them out gives the impression that you are not interested in scholarly pursuit. This is why this conversation is going nowhere. It is so ridiculous that even Winston Churchill, a flaming and thorough Zionist, wrote an entire article way back in 1920 entitled, \u201cZionism Vs. Bolshevism: A Struggle for the Soul of the Jewish People.\u201d I would encourage you to read the whole article.<\/p>\n Second, as I pointed out in my first response, some historians do not want to say anything about the connection between Jews and Bolshevism because they would lose their financial or academic status. Paul Johnson is a classic example. If you read his\u00a0History of the Jews<\/em>, he cites one document after another saying that Jewish participation in the Bolshevik Revolution was an embarrassment of riches. But, says Johnson, these people were \u201cNon-Jewish Jews\u201d!<\/p>\n I brought up Davies again because he was denied tenured. Why? Because one Jewish professor by the name of Lucy Dawidowicz ridiculously started calling him an anti-Semite. It is the same thing with Norman Finkelstein.<\/p>\n The last point I want to make would be about Solzhenitsyn. In your first response, you wrote: \u201cMuch of Russian foreign policy towards Israel is a reversal of Soviet policy, which was, as is documented everywhere from the mainstream to Solzhenitsyn\u2019s Two Hundred Years Together, vociferously anti-Zionist.\u201d Now you are saying that \u201cTwo Hundred Years Together was critically panned, not just because of its antisemitism, but because of its unscrupulous scholarship, with claims which are frequently not buttressed by any primary data. The most famous of those claims is the one that the first Soviet government was 85% Jewish (which Putin, as you noted, repeats). He never cited any data to support this claim.\u201d So is Solzhenitsyn an anti-Semite or not? And if he is close to being one, then how can he be an anti-Zionist at the same time and in the same respect? Your argument doesn\u2019t seems to make sense at all.<\/p>\n Did you read Richard Pipes\u2019 statements on Solzhenitsyn? And why didn\u2019t you mention the long discussion that Solzhenitsyn had on the conflict between Jews and Russians in your first response? Yes, I\u2019ve read Solzhenitsyn\u2019s book\u2014the English version that is available online. I also know people who have read it in Russian and verify that the English version is close enough. Keep in mind that Solzhenitsyn had to constantly face this \u201cJewish question\u201d in the media, and that somehow he had to adjust according to the time. I am not going to fight the good man. But polite people of this world are saying that he is an anti-Semite for\u00a0writing Two Hundred Years Together<\/em>, not because he probably made a mistake. We all know that historians make mistakes all the time.<\/p>\n Even if you want to say that the Jewish participation in the Bolshevik Revolution was less than 85%, the fact is that the scholarly literature shows that the Bolshevik Revolution was essentially Jewish. And if you attempt to wriggle out of this, then let me cite to you just a few sentences by Churchill himself: \u201cThere is no need to exaggerate the part played in the creating of Bolshevism and in the actual bringing about of the Russian Revolution by these international and for the most part atheistic Jews. It is certainly the very great one; it probably outweighs all others. With the notable exception of Lenin, the majority of the leading figures are Jews.\u201d Churchill didn\u2019t even know that Lenin was also Jewish. Finally, if you insist on arguing otherwise, then I would encourage you to read \u201cStalin\u2019s Jews\u201d by Jewish writer Sever Plocker of the Brookings Institute. Here is the link to the article:<\/p>\n https:\/\/www.ynetnews.com\/articles\/0,7340,L-3342999,00.html<\/a>.<\/p>\n Gessen<\/strong>: I do wonder, my friend: what would have been your diversionary tactic had I not mentioned Solzhenitsyn? It seems this one mention was enough for you to wholly disregard the content of the first message, and get you off on something else you are prepared to deal with. But I will play your game nonetheless.<\/p>\n You have avoided providing any cited evidence for the claim that the Russian Revolution was largely Jewish. I quoted you Solzhenitsyn emphatically denying this; you have not addressed this. You do actually need primary data, my friend; without it the claim is unverifiable (Churchill saying so, which he does without evidence, is not primary data). Instead, you continue to request that I read books about the participation of Jews in the Revolution, a fact of which I, and all scholars of the Revolution, are aware. But come now: let us discuss some of these scholars, not with suspicions that the other has not read them (I think we each have our suspicions, and it is no good to continue to make such imputations of ignorance), but on the basis of what they actually say.<\/p>\n Muller says that the Jews were \u201chighly visible\u201d in the Hungarian socialist parties. Does it follow that the Russian Revolution was largely Jewish?\u00a0No one doubts that Jews were highly visible in socialist movements across the continent. Jews were (and are) highly educated relative to the people they live among; thus they are disproportionately prominent in virtually every political and intellectual movement in Western history. The question at the heart of the matter is whether the Russian Revolution was \u201clargely Jewish\u201d; or merely had Jewish participants. You have not cited evidence from these books to support the claim that the Revolution was largely Jewish. Slezkine\u2019s wonderful book, too, discusses in great detail the reception of the Russian Revolution among Jews, but denies that the Revolution was largely Jewish.<\/p>\n I have already read these books, my friend. It is your place now to cite these books, if they do in fact claim that the Revolution was largely Jewish. I have read them, and they do not. You need explicit, primary evidence supporting the claim that the Revolution was largely Jewish. You are stuck here because you will not find scholarly support for what is widely considered to be a claim of \u201cJewish Bolshevism\u201d; a discredited belief known to most as an antisemitic canard and a conspiracy theory. This is a canard that you propagate, without recourse to primary data.<\/p>\n Here is the primary data I am familiar with, my friend. These figures are widely available, and cited in much of the literature you ignore. In 1922, the Bolshevik party took a census of its own ethnic composition. At this time, Jewish participation in Soviet affairs was at its highest; this was years before the Soviets turned anti-Jewish and Stalin got rid of most remaining Soviet Jews in the Great Purge. The census found 19,564 Jewish Bolsheviks; 5.21% of the total. It also found that of the 417 members of the highest Soviet political bodies (the Party\u2019s Central Committee, the Presidium of the Executive, and the People\u2019s Commissars), 6% were Jews. The total proportion of Jews in Russia at that time was approximately 2.5 million, out of a total population of around 145 million (so 1.7%). So, my friend, disproportionately represented and prominent? Of course. But largely Jewish? No. Now it is your turn. You need primary data supporting the view that the Revolution was \u201clargely Jewish\u201d. You have a right to your own opinion; you do not have a right to your own facts.<\/p>\n Let us proceed to the matter of the connection between Jewishness and Jewish participation in the Revolution. Paul Johnson is largely correct on the matter of them being \u201cnon-Jewish Jews\u201d. Jewish Bolsheviks were not Jewish by faith, were largely atheistic, and held views in diametric opposition to those of most Jews in the Empire. Unless you can delineate a relationship between their Jewishness and the fact that they were also Bolsheviks, the point is moot. Why is it important, for example, that Lenin had some Jewish ethnic background? How is that relevant; any more relevant than the fact that Stalin was of Georgian ethnic background? If they are mass murderers, it doesn\u2019t matter what their ethnic background is. They\u2019re just mass murderers. The ynet article you cite makes the same point, my friend. You go on to misread my argument about Solzhenitsyn. Here, once again, is what I originally wrote:<\/p>\n \u201cMuch of Russian foreign policy towards Israel is a reversal of Soviet policy, which was, as is documented everywhere from the mainstream to Solzhenitsyn\u2019s Two Hundred Years Together, vociferously anti-Zionist.\u201d<\/p>\n Yes, as Solzhenitsyn documented, Soviet policy for most of the century was anti-Zionist and pro-Arab. I had originally asked you what you make of this fact, given your belief that Bolshevism was a largely Jewish creation. You have not answered, just as you have not answered anything else I originally asked.\u00a0 Current Russian policy is largely a reversal of Soviet policy; it is generally supportive of Israel, and Israel has a strong alliance with Putin\u2019s Russia; some disagreements about Syria notwithstanding. Solzhenitsyn was not an anti-Zionist, but he made statements in\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together\u00a0<\/em>which were irresponsible and latently antisemitic. I cited as an example his claim of the first Soviet government being 85% Jewish; a claim which, as everyone now knows, he made up, with no reference to primary data.<\/p>\n When you allege a terrible group of people to be 85% Jewish with no evidence, it reeks of prejudice. Just imagine if someone in academe purported the lie that 85% of mass shooters are black. Some mass shooters have been black. Just as much as with Jewishness, the point is irrelevant. But if someone said so, they would very rightly be suspected of prejudice against blacks. So things like this are not just \u201chistorians\u2019 mistakes\u201d. They are egregious, prejudicial errors, which have resulted very directly in the negative reception that Solzhenitsyn\u2019s work has been accorded in academia.<\/p>\n So I do happen to agree with Pipes on that matter. As for \u201cwhy [I] didn\u2019t mention the long discussion that Solzhenitsyn had on the conflict between Jews and Russians in [my] first response\u201d, the answer is exceedingly simple. Solzhenitsyn does not describe a \u201cconflict\u201d between Russians and Jews. Russian Jews were Russians as much as Stalin was. This misconstrues\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together<\/em>, for all its shortcomings. Solzhenitsyn describes the participation of Russian Jews in the Revolution, and suggests that they be held accountable alongside with\u00a0the much more numerous non-Jewish Russians who participated in it. This is a very reasonable demand. But he categorically denies that the Revolution was a Jewish creation, and he does so in the passage I cited, and you blithely ignored. To his credit, Solzhenitsyn describes your view as a \u201csuperstitious\u00a0belief\u201d and a \u201cconspiracy\u201d. And that, my friend, it most certainly is. And until you can cite primary data which says that the Revolution was \u201clargely Jewish\u201d, that it will\u00a0stubbornly remain.<\/p>\n Alexis:<\/strong>\u00a0You honestly have got to be kidding. The content of the first message? The message about Putin? Have I not made myself clear enough?<\/p>\n You continue to say that I have \u201cavoided providing any cited evidence for the claim that the Russian Revolution was largely Jewish.\u201d Are you really serious? What does the term \u201clargely Jewish\u201d mean to you? You said you read Slezkine\u2019s\u00a0The Jewish Century<\/em>, and yet you completely ignore what he actually says in the book. Do you want me to repeat what I said in the previous email? \u201cI. M. Berkerman, one of the contributors, lamented that \u201cit goes without saying that not all Jews are Bolsheviks and not all Bolsheviks are Jews, but what is equally obvious is that disproportionate and immeasurably fervent Jewish participation in the torment of half-dead Russia by the Bolsheviks.\u201d<\/p>\n I also cited Winston Churchill, but your only defense is that the claim is unverified, which is another way of saying that it is some kind of conspiracy theory again. Or, as you put it, it is \u201ca discredited belief known to most as an anti-Semitic canard and a conspiracy theory. This is a canard that you propagate, without recourse to primary data.\u201d<\/p>\n I honestly don\u2019t believe you have read any of the books that I actually propose, and if you have, then I am definitely going to call you a dishonest person. Plain and simple. Slezkine again details how Jews \u201cwere particularly well represented at the top, among theoreticians, journalists, and leaders.\u201d Albert S. Lindemann of the University of California makes similar claims in his study\u00a0Esau\u2019s Tears: Anti-Semitism and the Rise of the Jews\u00a0<\/em>(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998). Slezkine himself cites one historian Mikhail Beizer, who declared that \u201cJewish names were constantly popping up in newspapers. Jews spoke relatively more often than others at rallies, conferences, and meetings of all kinds.\u201d Keep also in mind that the Jewish population was never more than 4 percent!<\/p>\n Since you continue to bring in Solzhenitsyn, here is what the\u00a0Guardian<\/em>\u00a0wrote back in 2003:<\/p>\n \u201cIn his latest book Solzhenitsyn, 84, deals with one of the last taboos of the communist revolution: that Jews were as much perpetrators of the repression as its victims. Two Hundred Years Together \u2013 a reference to the 1772 partial annexation of Poland and Russia which greatly increased the Russian Jewish population \u2013 contains three chapters discussing the Jewish role in the revolutionary genocide and secret police purges of Soviet Russia.<\/p>\n \u201cBut Jewish leaders and some historians have reacted furiously to the book, and questioned Solzhenitsyn\u2019s motives in writing it, accusing him of factual inaccuracies and of fanning the flames of anti-Semitism in Russia. Solzhenitsyn argues that some Jewish satire of the revolutionary period \u2018consciously or unconsciously descends on the Russians\u2019 as being behind the genocide. But he states that all the nation\u2019s ethnic groups must share the blame, and that people shy away from speaking the truth about the Jewish experience.<\/p>\n \u201cIn one remark which infuriated Russian Jews, he wrote: \u2018If I would care to generalise, and to say that the life of the Jews in the camps was especially hard, I could, and would not face reproach for an unjust national generalisation. But in the camps where I was kept, it was different. The Jews whose experience I saw \u2013 their life was softer than that of others\u2026 The Jewish subject for a long time was considered prohibited. Zhabotinsky [a Jewish writer] once said that the best service our Russian friends give to us is never to speak aloud about us.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Do you think that lines up with what you have been saying? And if not, why are you picking and choosing about what you want to say on Solzhenitsyn? Do you think this is a really scholarly pursuit? Whenever Solzhenitsyn appears to be saying positive things about Israel, you applaud him, but whenever he seems to be saying uncomfortable things about the Russian Revolution, he is an anti-Semite! How can you hold these positions and still maintain that you are engaging in a serious historical discussion?<\/p>\n My final point to you is this: since you have professed to be a scholar, why don\u2019t you tell me your published work? Where you teach and so on? I will do my best to peruse whatever you have written next month. You certainly know who I am. But I don\u2019t like to go on a litany of correspondence with a person who seems to be a ghost. Reveal yourself, and we\u2019ll continue the discussion.<\/p>\n Gessen:<\/strong>\u00a0You will have made yourself clear when you respond to the questions I originally asked you. You have invited interested readers to e-mail you with their questions, and I am an interested reader. I\u2019m afraid it\u2019s rather disingenuous to do so while refusing to answer the questions that were originally asked of you. I e-mailed you with regards to Putin; not with regards to Jewish participation in the Russian Revolution.<\/p>\n I take \u201cthe Revolution was largely Jewish\u201d to mean that a majority (or even plurality, if you prefer a liberal definition) of the revolutionaries were Jewish. I cited primary data (i.e. Soviet statistics!) showing that this is not the case. You have not provided evidence to the contrary. You cite Churchill\u2019s well-known statement to that effect, but not the primary data which led him to this conclusion (as it happens, there was none; it just so happens that Churchill, a deeply contradictory figure, happened to have certain prejudices; against Jews as much as Indians, the Irish, and others).<\/p>\n You cite Berkerman and Slezkine\u2019s work about disproportionate Jewish participation in the Russian Revolution, and this disproportionate participation is something neither I nor most scholars have denied. But this does not make the Revolution largely Jewish. If you have a definition of \u201clargely\u201d which differs from the common one, I would encourage you to make your private definition clear, my friend.<\/p>\n Slezkine\u2019s\u00a0Jewish Century\u00a0<\/em>seems to be a particular favourite of yours. It is indeed a wonderful book; and I find his thesis about the Jewish role in European history and on modern history to be an Apollonian influence (Slezkine\u2019s terminology) to be particularly compelling. But read carefully the very quotes you have aped. They say that Jews \u201cwere particularly well represented at the top\u201d and spoke \u201crelatively<\/strong>\u00a0[emphasis added] more often than others at rallies, conferences, and meetings of all kinds\u201d. What does this mean, friend?<\/p>\n It means they were disproportionately represented. I have already granted this point. But this does not make the Revolution \u201clargely Jewish\u201d. Jews participate disproportionately in all intellectual and political movements to which they are allowed to participate; not because of any religious perspective (indeed, participants are almost always secular), but because they are well-educated relative to the general population. This has been the case in the West since the Church\u2019s prohibition of Jewish land ownership relegated them to what Slezkine calls \u201cApollonian\u201d labour. If you actually read Slezkine\u2019s work instead of exploiting it to bolster your conspiracies, you will find that their disproportionate participation in the Revolution is well-explained in light of this thesis. But this does not make the Revolution \u201clargely Jewish\u201d.<\/p>\n I pointed out evidence showing that the representation of Jews in the Bolshevik Party and leadership was disproprtionate relative to their small population, but never even close to a majority or plurality. I have also pointed out to you how even those scholars (i.e. Solzhenitsyn) charged with antisemitism deny that the Revolution was a Jewish creation, and referred to that view as a \u201cconspiracy\u201d. This is the second consecutive e-mail in which you have blithely ignored this point, my friend.<\/p>\n You go on to cite the Guardian on Solzhenitsyn, which summarizes cogently the basis for charges of antisemitism in Solzhenitsyn\u2019s work. I take them to be valid, my respect for Solzhenitsyn notwithstanding. Solzhenitsyn was not an anti-Zionist, however, and much of\u00a0Two Hundred Years Together\u00a0<\/em>condemns Soviet anti-Zionism as a form of antisemitism. There is nothing \u201cunscholarly\u201d about noting a divergence of opinion in someone\u2019s work. Solzhenitsyn\u2019s work has very mixed merit, with his literary works being outstanding and celebrated, while his histories are generally not taken seriously (no academic press has published them in English precisely because they are sloppy with the primary data).<\/p>\n Agreeing with aspects of a scholar\u2019s work while disagreeing with others is not \u201cunscholarly\u201d; it is the launching point for all scholarly discussion. I invite you to participate in it. I have not professed to be a scholar. Like many urban Russians, I have much more education than I need (haha), and I completed a doctorate in Ukraine on the relationship of Jewish members of the NKVD to the Bund, before entering medical school and becoming a doctor. I lived in Israel for a while before moving to the States, and I maintain a serious interest in Russian history and particularly in the history of Russian Jews. Is there anything else you\u2019d like to know about me? The point is hardly relevant, though I\u2019d be happy to answer. You are not a scholar.<\/p>\n You have never been published in an academic press, and unless your writing (characterized by weirdly placed faux-philosophical adverbs and adjectives) and general scholarship seriously improves, it\u2019s unlikely you ever will be. So I\u2019d say that makes me slightly more of a scholar than you are, my friend. But if you believe that there are scholars who agree with you on the Revolution being \u2018largely Jewish\u2019 (there aren\u2019t really), then I would invite you to e-mail them. Here\u2019s Slezkine\u2019s e-mail:\u00a0slezkine@berkeley.edu<\/a>. Why don\u2019t you ask him what he makes of your work?<\/p>\n I will repeat, for your convenience, some of the questions you have ignored. I don\u2019t expect you to answer them, but just to see your record of dodged points:<\/p>\n 1) What do you make of Putin\u2019s close political relationship to Jewish oligarchs (and to the wealthiest man in Israel)?<\/p>\n 2) What do you make of the strong and improving relationship between Israel and Putin\u2019s Russia, and of Putin\u2019s statements on Israel?<\/p>\n 3) What do make of Putin\u2019s memorialization of the Red Army and its victory against Nazism?<\/p>\n 4) What is the relevance of Lenin\u2019s Jewish ancestry? What is the relevance of the Jewish ancestry of other Jewish Bolsheviks? Why is Yagoda\u2019s Jewish background any more relevant than Stalins\u2019 Georgian background, for example? Mass murderers come in all colours and ethnicities.<\/p>\n 5) What do you make of the primary statistical data I presented? Does it support your view of the Bolsheviks being largely Jewish?<\/p>\n 6) What do you make of Solzhenitsyn\u2019s condemnation of your statement as \u201csuperstititious\u201d and as a conspiracy?<\/p>\n These are all the points you have refused to address. Arguing with you is a bit like trying to whack a groundhog. Every time I ask you a question, you pop up somewhere else. Time to come back up to the surface, my friend.<\/p>\n Alexis:<\/strong>\u00a0I think we are going in circles. Your insistence that you cited \u201cprimary data (i.e. Soviet statistics!)\u201d made me laugh a bit. Did you provide the actual source of the data? Was the source verified? Who did verify the sources? You?<\/p>\n Furthermore, I don\u2019t think you read what I said about Putin carefully.\u00a0If we cannot even make a dent on the Bolshevism issue, then I said again and again that answering questions about Putin isn\u2019t going to be productive at all. After all, you have already propounded that I am somehow a \u201cconspiracy theorist.\u201d Why do you really want to hear what \u201cconspiracy theorists\u201d like me have to say?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n I really love the way you toe-dance around the anti-Semitic game. Slezkine declares on the very first page of his book that \u201cThe Modern Age is the Jewish Age, and the twentieth century, in particular, is the Jewish Century\u2026Modernization is about everyone becoming Jewish.\u201d Slezkine, of course, is highly praised by you for saying things like that. In fact, Slezkine\u2019s study \u201cis indeed a wonderful book.\u201d<\/p>\n But if person happens to take Slezkine thesis and expand it on the Bolshevik Revolution, that person would\u00a0ipso facto<\/em>\u00a0be an anti-Semite. Perhaps you should pick up a copy of Norman Finkelstein\u2019s study,\u00a0Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History<\/em>\u00a0(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005).<\/p>\n Churchill wasn\u2019t the only person who happened to make those types of remarks on the Bolshevik Revolution. Almost every serious leader in Europe was scared to death about the burgeoning movement. Jews just happened to participate disproportionately in political movements? And there was no ideological motive at all? Did you actually read Lindemann\u2019s\u00a0Esau\u2019s Tears: Anti-Semitism and the Rise of the Jew<\/em>s? Did you read his assessment on why German intellectuals began to revolt against Jewish historians like Heinrich Graetz?<\/p>\n I am not ignoring any point that you have attempted to make, but it seems that we are going in circles. You just don\u2019t make any sense at all when you say things like Solzhenitsyn was an anti-Semite for saying things that you or Jewish historians like Richard Pipes don\u2019t like and then use Solzhenitsyn to say that I am propounding \u201cconspiracy\u201d theories. And when the Guardian points out something that seems to be standard reference, you then move on to say that \u201cThere is nothing \u2018unscholarly\u2019 about noting a divergence of opinion in someone\u2019s work.\u201d If a person\u2014say, Jonas E. Alexis\u2014attempts to do the same thing, then you would condemn him for \u201cblithely\u201d ignoring your comment. Brilliant!<\/p>\n \u201cAgreeing with aspects of a scholar\u2019s work while disagreeing with others is not \u2018unscholarly\u2019; it is the launching point for all scholarly discussion. I invite you to participate in it.\u201d Well, let me use this premise for a moment. For the sake of argument, let me grant you the thesis that Solzhenitsyn did say pretty nice things about Israel. If he did say those things, then I would respectfully disagree with the noble man, precisely because Israel, as my dear friend and colleague Mark Dankof aptly put it, was built on \u201cthe philosophical underpinning for land thievery, terrorism, and genocide in Palestine.\u201d<\/p>\n If you think this is some kind of \u201cconspiracy\u201d theory again, then I would encourage you to pick up some of these scholarly studies: Ilan Papp\u00e9, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine<\/em>\u00a0(Oxford: One World Publication, 2006);\u00a0The Forgotten Palestinians: A History of the Palestinians in Israel<\/em>\u00a0(New Haven: Yale University Press, 2013);\u00a0The Biggest Prison on Earth: A History of the Occupied Territories<\/em>\u00a0(Oxford: One World, 2019); Ami Pedahzur and Arie Perliger,\u00a0Jewish Terrorism in Israel<\/em>\u00a0(New York: Columbia University Press, 2011); Norman Finkelstein,\u00a0Gaza: An Inquest into Its Martyrdom<\/em>\u00a0(Oakland: University of California Press, 2018);\u00a0The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering<\/em>\u00a0(New York: Verso, 2000);\u00a0Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict<\/em>\u00a0(New York: Verso, 2003);<\/p>\n Once again, I find your questions to be really comical precisely because you are trying to get some answers from someone whom you have explicitly labeled a conspiracy theorist, a person who is not a serious scholar, and someone who has no future in the academic world. Isn\u2019t that ironic? Why are we going back and forth on these issues? In any event, I am running out of time.<\/p>\n Gessen:<\/strong>\u00a0We are going in circles because you are refusing to deal with the points that have been raised. I have added to the running tally below the points which you have still refused to answer.<\/p>\n You begin by stating that statistics make you laugh. Again, if something is \u201c[insert nonsensical adverb here] risible\u201d, you do need to say why you find the primary data risible or otherwise unreliable, my friend. I am not sure what sort of criteria you require to ascertain that primary data are reliable (it seems that primary data you like you will accept, and primary data you do not like you will not accept), but the 1922 Soviet census is government statistics from the archives of the very bodies you are so interested in. It is extensively cited in the academic literature, and a simple search on JSTOR will lead to over one thousand journal articles and books which have made use of these extensive Soviet archives made available. If you have better primary data, I have asked you to present it.<\/p>\n You have not presented any primary data to support your claim that the Revolution was \u2018largely Jewish\u2019 nor have you shared your private definition of \u2018largely\u2019. Until that happens, I\u2019m afraid there is little point in arguing about the reliability of Russian sources with a man who doesn\u2019t speak Russian. You proceed by itacilizing your third consecutive diversion of the initial questions raised.<\/p>\n Once again, the gist of your argument is that \u2018we disagree on this, so we\u2019ll probably disagree on that too, and I don\u2019t think I have to say anything about it before we finish talking about the thing I wanted to talk about\u2019. There is nothing I need to respond to this childishness apart from my continued documentation of the points you have ignored.<\/p>\n You go on to talk about an \u201canti-Semitic game\u201d, and argue that if Slezkine\u2019s thesis was extended to the Bolshevik Revolution, this would be called anti-Semitic. I invite you to actually read the book, and consider what Slezkine\u2019s thesis is. Slezkine\u2019s thesis is that the Jews are a largely \u201cMercurian people\u201d; a people whose primary economic and social activity consists of the provision of intellectual, economic, and diplomatic services to the food-producing, \u201cApollonian\u201d societies around them, and that the modern century is a \u201cJewish one\u201d in the sense that the dominant source of human capital of all kinds in modern times are the Mercurian activities that used to be restricted to particular groups (like Jews), but are now universal.<\/p>\n It is a brilliant and unique thesis, and is extended to the Bolshevik Revolution as a means of explaining the disproportionate representation of Jews in that Revolution and in other political and intellectual movements. There is nothing antisemitic about this. Making up facts that demonize Jews (like the \u201cfact\u201d that the Bolshevik movement was a Jewish one, or that the Revolution was \u2018largely Jewish\u2019; for which you have still not provided any primary data; of whatever reliability!) is antisemitic, and would be recognized as antisemitism by Norman Finkelstein just the same. If you think that Finkelstein\u2019s work on antisemitism is a vindication of people like you, I would advise you to read him more closely, my friend. Finkelstein is well-aware of real antisemitism when it exists.<\/p>\n You proceed to talk about Churchill\u2019s non-uniqueness in this regard and ask if there was an ideological motive for the Jews\u2019 disproportionate representation in revolutions and movements. Let us begin with Churchill. Of course, he was not unique. Many other people said the same thing. In each case, unless they present evidence, there is no reason to take their beliefs on faith.<\/p>\n Political leaders have prejudices, and their statements are reflections of those prejudices. As for ideological motives, of course any individual who participates in a revolution\/intellectual movement has a motive for doing so. But these motives are individual. They are not Jewish. If you believe they are Jewish, point out those places in which they use their Judaism as a motivation for participation in Bolshevism. In the vast majority of cases, ethnically Jewish Bolsheviks had little connection to Judaism. Their motivations were their own, and as unique to themselves as the motivations of individual Georgians, Tatars, Russians, etc. who participated in the Revolution.<\/p>\n A Jew who participates in the Revolution does not have a Jewish motivation for doing so any more than a Georgian who participates in the Revolution has a Georgian motivation for doing so, unless of course they tell you they do, my friend. This is essentialist racism which needs no answer.<\/p>\n Lindemann\u2019s\u00a0Esau\u2019s Tears: Anti-Semitism and the Rise of the Jews,\u00a0<\/em>in the matter of opposition to Heinrich Graetz, talks about the intellectual conflict between German idealism and philosophy preferred by Jewish writers. I am not sure what the relevance is, but if you have a point, please make it.<\/p>\n I have told you why I believe Solzhenitsyn\u2019s work is tainted by antisemitism. I have not appealed to the authority of Richard Pipes; though I said I agreed with him on the matter. I made the case for why inventing\u00a0demonising\u00a0figures about a particular group\u2019s participation in a crime is prejudicial, and you have not responded to it. If someone told you that 85% of mass shooters are black, it would be a deeply prejudicial statement about blacks. If you disagree, tell me why. You move on with this comment: \u201cIf a person\u2014say, Jonas E. Alexis\u2014attempts to [note the divergence of opinion in a scholar\u2019s work], then you would condemn him for \u201cblithely\u201d ignoring your comment. Brilliant!\u201d<\/p>\n If you would like to note a divergence of opinion in a scholar\u2019s work, then please do so. This has nothing to do with you ignoring the comments. You do that anyway. A running list of ignored points is included below. You go on to dodge the argument by introducing a new one; this time about Israel. If you disagree with Solzhenitsyn, that is perfectly in order. Tell me why you do, my friend. None of these books says anything about genocide; some make the argument for ethnic cleansing. You are welcome to do so too.<\/p>\n Perhaps it was a waste of time speaking with a conspiracy theorist. Some conspiracy theorists are more capable than others, and it\u2019s becoming clear to me which camp you fall into. But it\u2019s not my label, my friend. There are few people in the academic world who would not describe you as a conspiracy theorist.<\/p>\n I can only imagine what comfort it must be for you\u2014if I had to guess, a creepy, unmarried middle-aged man, living out in Korea somewhere with no family, having been rejected by the establishment all his life; no published papers\u2014to believe that everyone else is wrong about you, and that someday you will be vindicated when the establishment fades and Christ comes down to take you off the cross, but spare me your dreams, my friend. Just e-mail Slezkine, or Finkelstein, or any of the other people whose work you exploit and misconstrue, and ask them for their opinions of your piece.<\/p>\n You are an unsalaried, unproductive tenth-rate writer for a site whose own editor has openly admitted to making up false headlines. Why would you believe that you are anything else, my friend?<\/p>\n Here is an updated list of all the points you have ignored:<\/p>\n 1) What do you make of Putin\u2019s close political relationship to Jewish oligarchs (and to the wealthiest man in Israel)?<\/p>\n 2) What do you make of the strong and improving relationship between Israel and Putin\u2019s Russia, and of Putin\u2019s statements on Israel?<\/p>\n 3) What do make of Putin\u2019s memorialization of the Red Army and its victory against Nazism?<\/p>\n 4) What is the relevance of Lenin\u2019s Jewish ancestry? What is the relevance of the Jewish ancestry of other Jewish Bolsheviks? Why is Yagoda\u2019s Jewish background any more relevant than Stalins\u2019 Georgian background, for example? Mass murderers come in all colours and ethnicities.<\/p>\n 5) Do you have any primary data to suggest that the Bolsheviks were largely Jewish? What is your private definition of \u2018largely Jewish\u2019?<\/p>\n 6) What do you make of Solzhenitsyn\u2019s condemnation of your statement as \u201csuperstititious\u201d and as a conspiracy?<\/p>\n 7) Why was the Soviet government anti-Zionist if it was the result of a Jewish movement?<\/p>\n Alexis:<\/strong>\u00a0You are getting more ridiculous, and it sounds like you don\u2019t want to read carefully at all. I said very plainly that I am not going to get into an endless debate about Putin with you when we cannot even get around the issue that the Bolshevik Revolution was largely Jewish. If you cannot understand this simple statement and continue to bring in Putin, then I can\u2019t help you.<\/p>\n You make this silly statement: \u201cYou begin by stating that statistics make you [me] laugh.\u201d Is that what I said? Why did you have to build this straw man? Was that necessary? And you really wanted to know what I believe about Putin? Here\u2019s what I said in plain English: \u201cYour insistence that you cited \u2018primary data (i.e. Soviet statistics!)\u2019 made me laugh a bit.\u201d Do you mean to tell me that this very sentence has the same meaning as \u201cstatistics makes me laugh\u201d? How absurd can it get?<\/p>\n And your citation of academic sources is really embarrassing: \u201cSoviet census is government statistics from the archives of the very bodies you are so interested in. It is extensively cited in the academic literature, and a simple search on JSTOR will lead to over one thousand journal articles and books which have made use of these extensive Soviet archives made available\u201d? This is how scholarly sources are cited? It is just plain silly. So JSTOR is now \u201cprimary source\u201d? This is not to denigrate JSTOR, but your statement is just beyond comprehension.<\/p>\n The interesting thing of all this is that you move on to propound one ad hominem attack after another by saying: \u201cI can only imagine what comfort it must be for you\u2014if I had to guess, a creepy, unmarried middle-aged man, living out in Korea somewhere with no family, having been rejected by the establishment all his life.\u201d That\u2019s not insulting or crazy or even \u201cconspiracy theory,\u201d but you feel insulted if someone happens to say that the Russian Revolution was largely Jewish. Are you serious?<\/p>\n You need some help. Really. Now I see why you were incestuously asking about Putin. Our conversation is over.<\/p>\n Gessen:<\/strong>\u00a0I wrote to you about Putin; you have not addressed the issues that were raised to you. This is obvious diversion. Nobody is going to \u201cget around\u201d the issue that the Bolshevik Revolution was \u2018largely Jewish\u2019 if you don\u2019t tell them why it was. I have repeatedly asked you for primary data suggesting that it was. You have obstinately refused.\u00a0You wrote to me that the primary source I provided was \u201crisible\u201d, without providing any primary sources of your own. JSTOR is not a primary source, but it gives over one thousand examples of where the 1922 Bolshevik census has been cited as a primary source.<\/p>\n The 1922 Bolshevik census is primary data; Soviet government archives which have been extensively cited in the academic literature. JSTOR is a directory of that literature. What do you find risible or unreliable about it, my friend? You haven\u2019t told me. Analyze the data critically, and express your suspicions. You do not seem to be getting the point that telling someone that something is \u201c[insert nonsensical adverb here] risible\u201d is not an argument in itself; you do need to explain why it is that it makes you laugh. You also need to cite sources that don\u2019t make you laugh. You have not yet done either.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t feel insulted by claims that the Russian Revolution was \u2018largely Jewish\u2019. Much greater men than you have said it, so it isn\u2019t something I haven\u2019t heard before. But I asked you for evidence that it was.\u00a0If you believe that the majority of revolutionaries were Jewish, tell me why it is that you believe that.\u00a0You have not even attempted to do so. You, on the other hand, are evidently insulted.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a sad state to spend your life in, and I pity you, my friend, I really do. Marginalized, ridiculed, alone; obsessed with sex, Jews, and conspiracy theories. I\u2019m sorry for whatever happened in your life that got you to where you are; it can\u2019t have been easy. But at this point in your life, it\u2019s no one\u2019s fault but your own. You are welcome to publish our interactions; I look forward to reading. The best litmus test for your personal integrity (and cowardice) will be how much of the exchange appears in its original, unedited form.<\/p>\n Incidentally, what does it mean\u00a0to ask \u201cincestuously\u201d about Putin? It\u2019s quite a strange word to use, my friend. It\u2019s a bit like \u201chistorically risible\u201d. Out of place and deeply weird. Something can be \u201chistorically risible\u201d if it\u2019s historically made you laugh (maybe). But that would be strange given that you just read it. Maybe \u201crisible in the light of history\u201d or something. But as it is, you just write like a bloody moron. So your status isn\u2019t really any mystery.<\/p>\n Alexis (Appendix)<\/strong>: I am certainly not going to lower my standard and follow this ad hominem attack, which is like a rotten fish. As the old saying goes, there are none so blind than those who refuse to see. Even the Jerusalem Post didn\u2019t hesitate to report in 2017:<\/p>\n \u201cThe role of Jews in the Russian Revolution, and by extension Communism writ large, has always been a sensitive subject because antisemitic voices often painted Soviet Communism as a Jewish plot, or \u2018Jewish Bolshevism.\u2019 When Alexander Solzhenitsyn began work on a book called\u00a0200 Years Together<\/em>, he was criticized for what touching this taboo issue. His own comments to the press didn\u2019t help the matter, claiming two-thirds of the Cheka (secret police) in Ukraine were Jewish\u2026.<\/p>\n \u201cThe large number of Jews in leading parts of the party was not lost on those non-Jews around them. V.M. Molotov, the powerful foreign minister of the Soviet Union under Stalin, made many remarks about Jews to Felix Chuev in a series of conversations between 1969 to 1986 that became the basis for the 1991 book Molotov Remembers. He recalled that as Lenin lay dying \u2018at the time Jews occupied many leading positions, though they made up only a small percentage of the country\u2019s population.\u2019 Of Zinoviev, he recalled, \u201cHe didn\u2019t even look like a Jew.<\/p>\n \u201c\u2018Almost all the Mensheviks were Jews. Even among the Bolsheviks, among the leaders there were many Jews. Generally, Jews are the most oppositional nation. But they were inclined to support the Mensheviks.\u2019 Molotov also claimed that many of the men around Stalin had Jewish wives. \u2018There is an explanation. Oppositionist and revolutionary elements formed a higher percentage among Jews than among Russians. Insulted, injured and oppressed, they were more versatile. They penetrated everywhere, so to speak.\u2019 He claimed that Jews were more \u2018active\u2019 than average Russians. \u2018Biding their time, they sniff around, stir things up, but are always prepared\u2026\u2019 According to Leonard Schapiro, who authored\u00a0The Role of the Jews in the Russian Revolutionary Movement\u00a0<\/em>in 1961, [Theodore] Herzl found that \u201850% of the membership of the revolutionary parties was Jewish.\u2019 Herzl asked Witte why.\u201d[1]<\/a><\/p>\n First published on April 24, 2021.<\/em><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.veteranstoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/solzhenitsy--320x205.jpg\")
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![https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/8\/84\/2018_Moscow_Victory_Day_Parade_07.jpg<\/a>. Here he is meeting with Jewish veterans of the Red Army in Israel:\u00a0](\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/8\/84\/2018_Moscow_Victory_Day_Parade_07.jpg\"){kind=link}