"Russia is now in stages of isolation," Goldschmidt said. "Putin thought he would win in Ukraine within three days, and next month we'll mark four years of war – longer than the war between Russia and Nazi Germany. He has isolated himself from the West." This isolation, he said, directly affects Jews. "In the Soviet Union, Jews were isolated; they were forbidden from being in contact with relatives in Israel or the West. Now it's returning. When everything outside Russia is perceived as invalid, the discourse toward Jews has become one that casts doubt on their loyalty to the state. There is more antisemitism; it's harder to be Jewish officially."

His advice to Russian Jews is clear: "Those who can – it's better to build their future elsewhere." According to him, approximately 100,000 Jews have already left Russia since the start of the war, and most will not return. "The future I see for Russian Jewry is a future of poverty, loneliness, and decline. A community with far less power and money. Already now, Jews are donating less to synagogues and community centers – they understand they have no future there."

Goldschmidt has a long acquaintance with Putin, and he emphasizes: "Putin himself is not antisemitic, but there are people around him who are – and the threat of antisemitism under his regime is only growing. The fear is that when the regime in Russia is under threat, it uses antisemitism to defend itself. We saw this in the past – at the end of the Tsarist period, the regime said, 'Don't be angry at the Tsar, be angry at the Jews,' and this led to pogroms. This also happened at the end of Stalin's period."

In his book, Goldschmidt describes a period of flourishing that reached its peak, then came the fall. "In the early years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, almost all the Jewish leaders left. There were Jews in the country, but there was no community – Stalin destroyed it. There were two synagogues in Moscow, and no one knew what a community was. There was also a huge difference among Jews: some still hid their Judaism, while others who yesterday rode the subway modestly – became oligarchs the next day with bodyguards and private flights."

In 1996, the Russian Jewish Congress was established, uniting the Jewish elite that remained and establishing schools, yeshivas, and community institutions.

"With Putin's rise to power in 2000, the situation changed gradually," Goldschmidt recounted. "He determined that the major businessmen would not interfere in politics, and as time passed, we saw Russia becoming a dictatorship. Interference in Jewish life became routine – the government determined who could be chief rabbi and who couldn't, and expelled dozens of rabbis from the country. What comes with Putin is the return of power to the heirs of the KGB, and hatred of the foreigner and the West that is an integral part of the people who grow up in that body."

The political use of the Jewish community, according to Goldschmidt, became particularly problematic in the Ukraine war. "The government uses the Jewish community for political purposes. In recent years, they have promoted in Russia the theory that neo-Nazism has returned to Ukraine and the Baltic states, so the war in the Russian narrative is supposedly a continuation of the war against Nazi Germany. Unfortunately, the leaders of the Jewish community in Russia support this saga – this is using the community for propaganda purposes."

Goldschmidt, who has served since 2011 as president of the Conference of European Rabbis – an organization that includes more than 700 rabbis – has moved to live in Israel in recent years, but remains in close contact with communities on the continent. "The picture in Europe is complex," he said. "Murder cases against Jews, like the murder spree at the synagogue in Manchester on Yom Kippur last year, are still rare – because governments do a lot to protect and communities invest huge sums in security. But antisemitism has become acceptable in an alarming way, part of the legitimate discourse in too many places."

One issue particularly concerning Goldschmidt is the growing gap between Europe and the US, with Israel left in the middle. "There is now a clash between Europe and the US on six fronts: world order, support for the far right, limiting social networks, NATO, Ukraine, and Greenland. In all of them, Israel is on the American side, and this distancing is not good for Jews."

He gives examples: "The Polish president once held a Hanukkah candle lighting in his office – now he doesn't do it. Latvia is again trying to rehabilitate the name of Herberts Cukurs, 'the Butcher of Riga,' who murdered tens of thousands of Jews in the Holocaust and was eliminated by the Mossad. In the past, with American influence, this wouldn't have happened. For decades, Jews knew they could rely on the US, but its detachment from the world reduces its ability to influence – and this harms Jews and Israel."

Another process affecting European Jews is related to the rise of the far right. While the far left is defined as an enemy of Israel, on the far right, there are quite a few Israel supporters, and Israel conducts political dialogue with some of them through the Ministry of Diaspora Affairs. "Jewish communities don't want to be identified in these political disputes," Goldschmidt explained. "These communities are important to the far right as a stamp of approval – because if Jews are in contact with them, they can't be accused of antisemitism. But from the moment the Jewish community validates these parties, it turns the moderate right against itself – and that's even before the moderate left."

The problem, according to Goldschmidt, is exacerbated by a change in the political landscape. "Once the moderate left, the social democrats, supported Israel – but today a large part of these parties has moved to the anti-Israel side. The left in Israel disappeared with the disappearance of the dream of achieving peace, and the only ones who continued relations with the European left are the Palestinians, Arab states, and Iran. Gradually, they adopted the views of those who continued the dialogue with them – and here Israel is absent."

This week, the 33rd Conference of European Rabbis will open in Jerusalem, with approximately 300 rabbis in attendance. The conference was supposed to be held last year in Baku, Azerbaijan, but security warnings forced its cancellation just days before the opening. "We want to strengthen the connection between Israelis and the diaspora," Goldschmidt said. "We're also convening to discuss the challenges facing European Jews. In many countries, there is an attack on Jewish customs – bans on circumcision and kosher slaughter that started as a response to Muslim immigration, but also challenge Jewish life on the continent."