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The Soviet Jewry movement was an international human rights campaign that advocated for the right of Jews in the Soviet Union to emigrate. The movement's participants were most active in the United States and in the Soviet Union. Those who were denied permission to emigrate were often referred to by the term Refusenik.
Iosif Ziselovich Begun, sometimes spelled Yosef, whose last name is pronounced "bee-goon" and in Russian literally means "runner," is a former Soviet refusenik, prisoner of conscience, human rights activist, author and translator. Over the course of 17 years, Begun was imprisoned three times and spent over eight years in prisons and labor camps as a political prisoner. He was pardoned and freed in 1987 after political pressure from Jewish political organizations and the U.S. Government.
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Morey Schapira is a Silicon Valley High Tech executive and Soviet Jewry activist leader.
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Louis Rosenblum was a pioneer in the movement for freedom of emigration for the Jews in the Soviet Union, was a founder of the first organization to advocate for the freedom of Soviet Jews, the Cleveland Council on Soviet Anti-Semitism, founding president of the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews, and a research scientist at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Lewis Research Center.
Cleveland Council on Soviet Anti-Semitism was founded in 1963 as a grassroots human rights campaign to alleviate the growing oppression of the Jewish community inside the Soviet Union and the other Soviet bloc countries. The Cleveland Council was the first organization of the American Soviet Jewry Movement, a human rights campaign of the 1960s, 70s and 80s.
Alexander Smukler is the chairman of the board of Agroterminal LTD and the chairman of the board of Century 21: Russia, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine. He is a former managing partner of Ariel Investment Group, which develops commercial enterprises and civil engineering projects in Russia.
References
- ↑ Soviet Jewry Movement
- ↑ Guide to the Records of National Conference on Soviet Jewry at the American Jewish Historical Society.
- ↑ "Soviet Jewry Group Director Resigns After 17 Years". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. 1988-02-01. Retrieved 2016-09-23.
- ↑ NCSJ Executive Committee
