Советские евреи пишут Илье Эренбургу, 1943-1966

A selection of the letters sent by Jews from all over the USSR to Ehrenburg and of some of Ehrenburg's replies. Correspondents in 1943-45 wrote mainly about the Nazi genocide of Jews in their towns. They describe events in Odessa, in the former Jewish agricultural colonies in the Crimea and southern Ukraine, in Khmelnik, Vinkovtsy, Lugansk (Voroshilovgrad), the Mineralnye Vody area, and other places. They also complain about growing antisemitism and difficulties in restitution of the Jewish property left behind by evacuated Jews who returned to their towns. Letters of 1945-53 complain about official and popular antisemitism - distrust of Jewish survivors, lack of respect for the victims, the myth of the Jew evading the front during the war, a numerus clausus in higher education, etc. Letters of 1953-66 also complain about the impunity of antisemitic acts, discrimination against Jews, and the silence on the Jews' contribution to the Soviet economy and culture. Pp. 9-105 contain an article by Altshuler, "Erenburg i yevrei (nabrosok portreta)" ["Ehrenburg and the Jews (a Draft of a Portrait)"], which, inter alia, discusses Ehrenburg's struggle against antisemitism in the USSR; the text of his letter to Stalin protesting against the plans to deport the Soviet Jews is included. (From the Bibliography of the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism - The Hebrew University of Jerusalem)