The Leningrad Nine

A worldwide outcry greeted the harsh sentences meted out last winter to eleven Soviet citizens--nine of them Jews trying to get to Israel--convicted of conspiring to hijack an aircraft and fly it to Sweden. As a result, Moscow commuted the two death sentences handed down at the trial to 15-year terms in labor camps. A special section of the Ministry for Internal Affairs was set up to speed emigration to Israel, and in twelve busy weeks 2,300 Russian Jews were permitted to leave the country--more than in any year since Israel was founded in 1948.

Now Moscow's policy has shifted back from one of limited leniency to one of limited suppression. Emigration to Israel has been steadily cut back. Last week, in the Leningrad municipal court where the earlier trials were held, nine more Jews loosely linked with the group that planned the same abortive hijacking were convicted, most of them on charges stemming from Zionist activities. Two of them--Gilya Butman, 38, an engineer, and Mikhail Korenblit, 33, a physician--were convicted of treason and sentenced to ten years and seven years, respectively, of a "strict regime" in a Soviet labor camp. (In the U.S., the minimum penalty for attempted hijacking is 20 years imprisonment.)

No Chances. The other seven drew sentences ranging from one to five years in prison camp. They were convicted on lesser charges of spreading anti-Soviet propaganda and stealing "state or social ist property"--to wit, a duplicating machine, which Soviet citizens are forbidden to have. The authorities took no chances on the trial's outcome. Some defense witnesses were suddenly granted exit visas to Israel and told to depart before the court hearing. At least three others were shipped out of town on "business affairs"--two to Siberia--on pain of losing their jobs if they refused to go. The trials represent an attempt by Soviet officials to stem a rising Jewish nationalism. Israel has not exactly discouraged the nationalistic upsurge, since it looks to Russia, with its 3.5 million mostly skilled and educated Jews, as one of the last remaining sources of a sorely needed aliyah--literally, ascent--or wave of immigrants. The Soviets take the position that none of their citizens may depart, and Jews should be no exception.

Protest Marches. Jewish nationalism in Russia draws its prime stimulus from discrimination at almost every level--including an undeclared quota system in universities and ostracism from key posts within the Communist Party. Activist, pro-Israeli Jews are frequently fired from their jobs and occasionally sent to mental hospitals, as are other dissenters. Often their homes are searched, their relatives interrogated, and their neighbors brought together in "spontaneous condemnation" of the militant's life, character and beliefs.

The Soviets were sufficiently disturbed by such profound allegiance to a foreign power that several hundred Jews who openly avowed their loyalty to Israel were arrested in a police dragnet last June--immediately after the would-be skyjackers were picked up at Leningrad's Smolny airport. If other Soviet citizens had similarly supported another country, very probably the same would have happened. An unknown number were released after months in prison. But five are scheduled to be tried soon in Riga, another nine in Kishinev, and one in Odessa. The trials, however, are apparently not having the effect that the Kremlin intended. After the sentences were announced last week, a dozen or so Jews in Leningrad and several other cities marched around the main streets in protest.

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