Language:
English
Year of publication:
2006
Titel der Quelle:
Yad Vashem Studies
Angaben zur Quelle:
34 (2006) 87-124
Keywords:
Antisemitism
;
Jews History 1800-2000
;
Antisemitism
;
Jews History
Abstract:
A case study of the relations between Jews and the surrounding non-Jewish population in northeastern Belarus (mainly the Vitebsk region) in the 1920s-30s. Widespread anti-Jewish stereotypes included traditional religious, ethnic, and social prejudices that were transformed by Soviet conditions and assumed new features. Jews were seen as the epitome of "parasitism", engaging in commerce and speaking an "alien" language, and promoting one another at the expense of non-Jews. The increase in conflicts between Jews and non-Jews in the late 1920s caused the authorities to take measures against both antisemites and Jewish "chauvinists", and court trials followed. In the early 1930s the authorities tended to treat antisemitism as a kind of "chauvinism" and the struggle against it ebbed. Some events of the 1930s, e.g. the campaign against the Trotzkyites and the closing of Jewish institutes, as well as the dissatisfaction of part of the population with Soviet politics, led to a rise in anti-Jewish sentiments. Dwells on the Kolyshki affair against speculators in 1938, which had antisemitic overtones. In the 1930s antisemitism in Belarus was largely suppressed, but it survived in latent form and came to the fore during the Soviet-German war.
Note:
In Hebrew:
,
יד ושם; קובץ מחקרים לד (תשסו) 71-102
,
Appeared in Russian as "Межэтнические отношения и советская политика 20-30-х годов: пример Восточной Белоруссии" in "Яд Вашем; исследования" 1 (2009) 11-42.
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