Anyone watching the state STV channel in Belarus in the last few days has had to pinch himself to make sure he was viewing a television program in modern-day Belarus rather than in the 1948 Soviet Union at the peak of Joseph Stalin's persecution of the Jews.
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Last week, television personality and known pro-regime activist Ryhor Azaryonok delivered a speech that carried a thinly-veiled antisemitic message. In it, he criticized opposition supporter Andrey Zeltser, who has a Jewish last name, for being disloyal to the state by living in Belarus but working for American software engineering company EPAM.
Let us begin with some background information. A day earlier, Belarusian KGB officers stormed Zeltser's apartment in Minsk, in which he and his girlfriend were at the time. While Zeltser managed to alert the police about the intruders, he was shot shortly after. KGB officer Dmitry Pedosiuk was also killed in the raid, possibly by friendly fire.
The KGB agent was hailed a hero, while Zeltser was declared a "terrorist," a common propaganda move by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko who has been cracking down on all opposition ever since he fraudulently won a sixth term as president.
"They [KGB officers] went to this bastard's apartment! Zeltser! The IT guy from EPAM, who according to some reports, is an American citizen," Azaryonok said, beginning his rant. "A cosmopolite to whom the [Belarusian] state has granted benefits and he only lined his pockets while living in two countries, collecting money here and spending it there."
It seems that Azaryonok did not omit a single antisemitic stereotype about the Jews. "Cosmopolite" alludes to the common pejorative that was used in the Soviet Union ("rootless cosmopolite") as an accusation of the Jews' lack of allegiance to the state.
"Living in two countries" alludes to another common accusation, that of Jewish disloyalty to the country, and "collecting money here and spending it there" is another hint that Jews might be taking advantage of Belarus.
Azaryonok went on to compare Zeltser to various opposition leaders, including Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who many consider to be the real winner of the latest elections.
A teacher by profession, Tikhanovskaya never intended to go into politics. She only ran for president after her husband, Sergei Tikhanovsky, was arrested by the regime for his activism against Lukashenko.
Unfortunately, Azaryonok was not the first to use the "antisemitic card" when criticizing protesters. Another supporter of the long-serving president, columnist Andrei Mukovozchik, has often lambasted opponents of the regime, drawing attention to the many among them with "non-Belarusian last names." At one point, there were even rumors that Tikhanovskaya herself was Jewish and had Israeli citizenship.
According to a journalist who used to work at a Belarusian television channel, Azaryonok was not merely expressing his opinion but was speaking on behalf of the state.
"Azaryonok himself is consumed with hatred, but I am sure he also received an order to give this speech," said the journalist who, for obvious reasons, wished to remain anonymous. "Most likely, the KGB or the president's spokesperson wrote up a few paragraphs for him, which he had to incorporate into his monologue."
To make matters worse, the day after Azaryonok's speech, Lukashenko spoke about the raid, saying that after receiving a "distress call" KGB officers – like "good Slavs" – rushed to Zeltser's apartment, where he had set a trap for them.
"In this entire Zeltser affair, authorities cannot resist but act as antisemites," Dr. Alexander Friedman from the Humboldt University of Berlin said. Friedman is an expert on Eastern European history and the Holocaust.
"We don't know for sure whether he [Zeltser] is Jewish. There have only been rumors that he is indeed of Jewish descent."
On Tuesday, Zeltser was laid to rest in a Christian ceremony.
"Without this information, the regime presents Zeltser as a Jew – indirectly, but in a determined manner – until the penny drops. It doesn't say "Jew" out loud but words its statements in a way that makes the message clear to the listener: the Jews are not part of us, and aren't like us. This is the classic "the Jew is a stranger" claim. It seems that this was the directive – to point out the differences for as many people as possible without mentioning the word "Jew" explicitly."
Q: Why do they refrain from saying the word "Jew"?
"Because they do not want Israel and Jewish organizations in the United States to accuse them of antisemitism again," Friedman said. "If they emphasized the fact that he was Jewish, Israel would have to respond. They are dabbling in antisemitism, but in the meantime, they haven't crossed that line. But that can change at any moment. These people see nothing wrong in antisemitism, and will have no problem doing it."
Perhaps, Lukashenko has given an order to refrain from directly mentioning and blaming Jews, because he himself has been criticized before for doing so. In October 2007, while visiting the Belarusian city of Babruysk, he noted the city was filthy and attributed it to the fact that Jews lived there. Naturally, he was immediately condemned by Israel. Also, in the summer of 2021, his controversial statement about the Holocaust led to the Israeli Foreign Ministry summoning the Belarusian ambassador to Jerusalem for a reprimand.
In a speech about raising awareness of Nazi war crimes against Belarusian citizens, Lukashenko said his country should follow the example of the Jews, who got the world "to grovel before them."
According to Friedman, regime officials have also come up with a manipulative tactic in which immediately following an antisemitic incident or statement they go out of their way to praise Israel.
"They glorify Israel," he said. "For example, immediately after his monologue, Azaryonok posted a photograph online of him standing next to a former Israeli government official."
Sometimes, they also give Israel backhanded compliments.
"They praise the Mossad saying their operatives can go to any location, and kidnap and kill people – and then add how much Belarus should also be like 'little Israel.' Obviously, this too is antisemitic."
Ever since the mass anti-government demonstrations that followed the latest elections, the Jewish communities of Belarus have kept a low profile. Currently, there are approximately 13,500 Jews in the country. The number might be higher in reality, but even so, it doesn't come close to the number of Jews Belarus had at the beginning of the 20th century.
"This is antisemitism without the Jews," Friedman said. "Jews that live in Belarus are so few and so invisible, they are not a factor. But such preoccupation [on behalf of the government] could negatively impact the few Jews that do live in the country. The regime has begun to play around with antisemitism when the goal is clearly not the Jews of Belarus. In any case, the demon of antisemitism has been released."
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