The tortured history of Jewish-Ukrainian
relations has again come to the fore. On May 25 Ukraine observed a minute of
silence in memory of Symon Petliura, a nationalist leader blamed for the murder
of some 50,000 Ukrainian Jews during the chaos of the First World War and the
Russian Revolution.
It marked the 90th anniversary of Petliura’s assassination in Paris.
A French court acquitted Sholom Schwartzbard, a Ukrainian-born Jew who had fought for France during the war, of the 1926 murder even though he admitted to it.
“I have killed a great assassin,” Schwartzbard told police during his arrest. The court found that Petliura had been involved in or knew of pogroms by members of his militia fighting for Ukrainian independence from Russia.
Pogroms against Jews occurred in 524 towns in Ukraine during the years 1917-1921, with the majority perpetrated by Putliura’s Ukrainian People’s Republic forces. Fifteen of Schwartzbard’s relatives perished in the killings.
Separately, the director of Ukraine’s Institute of National Remembrance, Vladimir Vyatrovich, said in a statement on May 31 that Kyiv will soon name a street for two other Ukrainian nationalists, Stepan Bandera, who was himself assassinated by the KGB in Munich in 1959, and Roman Shukhevych.
It marked the 90th anniversary of Petliura’s assassination in Paris.
A French court acquitted Sholom Schwartzbard, a Ukrainian-born Jew who had fought for France during the war, of the 1926 murder even though he admitted to it.
“I have killed a great assassin,” Schwartzbard told police during his arrest. The court found that Petliura had been involved in or knew of pogroms by members of his militia fighting for Ukrainian independence from Russia.
Pogroms against Jews occurred in 524 towns in Ukraine during the years 1917-1921, with the majority perpetrated by Putliura’s Ukrainian People’s Republic forces. Fifteen of Schwartzbard’s relatives perished in the killings.
Separately, the director of Ukraine’s Institute of National Remembrance, Vladimir Vyatrovich, said in a statement on May 31 that Kyiv will soon name a street for two other Ukrainian nationalists, Stepan Bandera, who was himself assassinated by the KGB in Munich in 1959, and Roman Shukhevych.
They were responsible for violence against Jews and others in Nazi-occupied Ukraine during the Second World War.
Bandera was a fascist and the two groups he led -- the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) -- engaged in atrocities against Jews as well as Poles, Russians and other Ukrainians in Nazi-occupied Ukraine during the Second World War. Shukhevych was a UPA general.
On June 22, 1941, Nazi Germany attacked the Soviet Union and soon overran Ukraine. The OUN proclaimed a Ukrainian state eight days later, followed immediately by a pogrom against Jews. It would be the first of many.
Before the Nazi invasion, Ukraine had a Jewish population of 2.3 million. Altogether, over 900,000 of them died between 1941 and 1944.
Reasons for collaboration included Ukrainian political aspirations for regaining independence, resurgent nationalism, and deep-seated anti-Semitism, as well as widespread anger and resentment against Soviet Russian rule.
Eduard Dolinsky, director of the Ukrainian Jewish Committee, has condemned the plan to name streets for Bandera and Shukhevych.
“My countrymen should know that Bandera and Shukhevych considered me and all of the Ukrainian Jews -- children, women, the elderly -- enemies of Ukrainians,” he posted on his Facebook page.
Once regarded as illegitimate to serve as national role models because of their war crimes, Bandera, Petliura and Shukhevych are now openly honoured in Ukraine.
Jews have voiced their concern about the influence of ultra-rightist groups in Ukraine, including the Svoboda (Freedom) Party led by Oleh Tyahnybok.
Tyahnybok co-signed an open letter to Ukraine’s President Viktor Yushchenko in 2005 calling for a government investigation into “criminal activities of organized Jewry in Ukraine.”
In a 2011 march organized by Svoboda to celebrate the Waffen-SS Galicia Division organized during the Second World War, participants shouted “one race, one nation, one Fatherland.” In May 2013 the World Jewish Congress described Svoboda as neo-Nazi.
However, western powers continue to turn a blind eye to creeping fascism in Ukraine. A United States-Ukrainian Security Dialogue held in Washington in late February, for instance, featured Andriy Parubiy, now the speaker of Ukraine’s parliament. He has many friends in Washington, including U.S. Senator John McCain.
Those in attendance were not told of Parubiy’s role in co-founding Svoboda and his ties to extremist right-wing groups like the paramilitary Azov Battalion, now part of the country’s National Guard.
Parubiy also visited Ottawa and met with
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Canadian soldiers are training Ukrainian troops
in western Ukraine, and the two countries are finalizing a Canada-Ukraine trade
deal.
Today’s North American politicians know very little about the crimes committed during the two world wars by those Ukrainians whom people like Parubiy admire.
Today’s North American politicians know very little about the crimes committed during the two world wars by those Ukrainians whom people like Parubiy admire.
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