This is a 1988 black and white photograph of US Secretary of State George Shultz and his wife, Helena, with their official guest to Washington: former Soviet Union Prisoners of Zion Ida Nudel and Natan Sharansky. As US secretary of state, George Shultz used his influence with President Ronald Reagan and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev to advocate on behalf of Soviet Jewry. Shultz met Ida Nudel several times in Moscow. He reported that the highlight of his career was phone call from Nudel after her release saying, “This is Ida Nudel. I am in Jerusalem. I’m home.” Shultz also expressed deep respect for Natan Sharansky. He reported that an offer was made to swap Sharansky, who was imprisoned in the USSR, for a Soviet spy held by the United States. When Sharansky heard that he was to be swapped with a spy, he refused the deal saying that it would imply that he, too, was a spy. In recalling the events, Shultz remembered saying to himself, “What integrity the man has. He chose to stay rather than get out under pretenses that he didn’t consider to be right.” Looking back on the lesson of the Soviet Jewry movement, Shultz said, “I think you learn the lesson, first of all, ‘never give up.’ Even if something looks very, very difficult, if it’s important, you keep working at it.”
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George Shultz – George Shultz is an American statesman who served under three presidents in four different cabinet positions. During Ronald Reagan’s presidency, Shultz served as secretary of state from 1982–1989 and encouraged Reagan to establish relations with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev when he came to power in 1985. Shultz and Reagan brought up the subject of Soviet Jewry each time they met with their Soviet counterparts. Shultz took particular interest in the plight of Ida Nudel, a leader of the refusenik community, who was denied permission to leave the USSR to join her sister in Israel. Shultz was also involved in the negotiations to secure the release of the most prominent refusenik, Natan Sharansky.
Ida Nudel - Ida Nudel was one of the most famous refuseniks in the Soviet Union. In 1971, Nudel and her sister, her only relative, applied to leave the USSR to move to Israel. Her sister was granted permission while Nudel was not, on the false grounds that she had been exposed to Soviet secrets at her work. As a refusenik, Nudel lost her job and began working to help her fellow refuseniks and was known as the “guardian angel” for the work that she did supporting other refusenik families. During this period of time she was arrested and harassed on many occasions. In 1978, Nudel hung a banner from her balcony saying, “KGB - GIVE ME MY EXIT VISA”. As a result, she was arrested and sentence to four years of exile in Siberia. After being released from Siberia in 1982, Nudel was not allowed to live in a large city although this did not prevent her from being known in the Western world. Jewish people from around the world and International leaders and celebrities such as Secretary of State George Shultz and actresses Jane Fonda and Liv Ullman worked on behalf of Nudel’s release. In 1987, Nudel was given permission to leave the USSR and move to Israel where she made her home near her sister. Since moving to Israel, Nudel has been involved with the organization “Mother to Mother” which works with at-risk youth from the Former Soviet Union who have moved to Israel.
Natan (Anatoly) Sharansky – Anatoly Sharansky was born in the Soviet Union in 1948. As a child he was a chess prodigy and studied applied mathematics in Moscow. In the 1970s, Anatoly became interested in Judaism and Zionism and applied for an exit visa to immigrate to Israel in 1973. The application was denied, and he was subsequently dismissed from his job. He became a human rights activist, the main spokesman for the Prisoners of Zion and refuseniks, and worked for the famous activist, Andrei Sakharov. In 1974 he married Avital, who immigrated to Israel shortly after in hope that Anatoly would soon join her. In 1977 he was arrested for high treason and sentenced to forced labour, spending much time in solitary confinement. He later wrote that he kept sane by playing chess in his head and by reading tehilim (psalms) from a small book that he had smuggled into the prison. During this time, Avital Sharansky launched a worldwide campaign to release her husband. She petitioned world leaders and led demonstrations of Jews and non-Jews around the world. Finally, in 1986, Anatoly was released as part of a larger exchange of detainees. He immediately immigrated to Israel, where he was greeted as a hero. After his arrival in Israel in 1987 – where he took the Hebrew name Natan – he worked tirelessly to help Soviet Jews, both those still in the Soviet Union and those already in Israel. He later served in the Knesset for many years and held a variety of ministerial positions, such as minister of internal affairs. Since 2009 Sharansky has served as chair of the executive of the Jewish Agency. He has won many awards including the Israel Prize, the Congressional Gold Medal, and the Ronald Reagan Freedom Award.
Refuseniks – During the communist rule of the Soviet Union, it was very difficult for Jews to obtain visas to leave the country, and only a small quota of Jews was allowed to leave each year. The Jews who were refused an exit permit were unofficially named “refuseniks” and were considered either traitors or a security liability. Jews who applied for an exit visa were subjected to KGB (secret police) surveillance, were often denied employment, and, as a result, would either face imprisonment or find a menial job. Famous refuseniks included Natan Sharansky, Ida Nudel, Yosef Mendelevitch, Israel and Sylva Zalmensov, and Yuli Edelstein, who later became the speaker of the Knesset (Israeli parliament). In the 1970s the plight of the Soviet refuseniks became known, and Jews from around the world placed international pressure on the USSR to allow Jews to leave the country. In 1990s, with political changes in the USSR Jews were allowed to leave freely.