Summary. Jewish organizations and/or community-supported public, academic, media and culture institutions occasionally became involved in aspects of such conflicts and at the first glance have very little if anything to do with Jews.  Is it good for them in general, and post-Soviet Jewry in particular?

The statement of the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center on the situation in the Armenian-populated Azerbaijani area of Karabakh became another trigger for this discussion.  In the Jewish circles there are those, who normally legitimize the stance similar to the Museum statement; their opponents, like a group of prominent figures in the Russian-speaking Jewish diaspora in the United States, on the contrary believe that the deliberate politicization of Jewish educational, cultural and other community structures, especially  those dedicated to Holocaust research and remembrance should not become a tribune or platform for any political debate, Jewish or non-Jewish. According to them, this downplays the significance of the Holocaust, maintaining the anti-Semitic stereotype that the Jews have nothing sacred that cannot be sold for a “worthy price”.

Any military conflict is not limited with clashes in a battlefield, but normally include a complicated diplomatic game between and beyond involved parties as well as a diverse propagandistic entourage, which in some cases also includes visible Jewish subjects.    This is especially trough in concern of the most recent ones – a new round of Azerbaijan and Armenia clash and Russian-Ukrainian war. Some of these issues, such as traditional and “instrumental” Antisemitism and the fight for historical memory in the context of these conflicts, that were discussed in an article that was published by EAJ Policy Papers in December 2022, attracted attention of Jewish umbrella and communal structures.

However, there are also cases that Jewish organizations and/or community-supported public, academic, media and culture institutions became involved in aspects of such conflicts and at the first glance have very little if anything to do with Jews.  So, is it good for them in general, and post-Soviet Jewry in particular?

This was a question asked by a group of prominent representatives of the Russian-speaking Jewish community in the USA. Their wish to rase this important both for Israel and the Jewish Diaspora (including its Russian-speaking segment) issue had a special reason: the statement of the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center (IHM&EC) on the situation in the Armenian-populated Azerbaijani area of Karabakh (in official Yerevan terminology – Artsakh). In this statement, issued on the official IHM&EC site, as a “second Genocide”, echoing the atrocities against them by the Ottoman Empire during the First World War and called for sanctions on Azerbaijan. In other words, an important and authoritative Jewish institution took a side in the Azerbaijan-Armenia military conflict.

Concerned by this, New York State Assemblyman Alec Brook-Krasny, Director for Russian and Eurasian Affairs of the American Jewish Committee Dr. Sam Kliger; President of the Cultural Center of Caucasus Jews in USA Yakov Abramov; Founder and Co-chairman of the Assembly of the World Diasporas Leonid Bard;  President, Brooklyn Baku Friendship Association (NY) Marietta Rozental and Editor in Chief of Bukharian Times newspaper (Quins, New York) Rafael Nektalov in their letter to IHM&EC CEO Bernard Cherkasov and the Board of Directors Chair Jordan Lamm criticized an unjustified, to their opinion, call for sanctions on Azerbaijan.

Is this true? Authors of the letter request to clarify inaccuracies and bias, regarding the Armenian-populated “Autonomous Republic of Artsakh”, an unrecognized enclave that covers 15% of UN-recognized Azerbaijani territory. The first issue with the statement is the name of the region in the Caucasus where the “crisis” takes place. The document claims that it is called “Artsakh”, but was “formerly known as Nagorno Karabakh”. However, “Artsakh” and “Nagorno Karabakh” are two names for the same territory, except one is of Armenian origin and the other is Soviet. The real name of the region is “Karabakh” (Nagorny means “mountain area” in Russian). This is what it is called by the rightful owners, Azerbaijanis, and it means “black garden” in the Azeri language. It has no meaning in other languages.

According to critiques, the second problematic point in the Illinois HM& EC statement, was inaccuracies with presenting the facts: the statement mentions how Azerbaijan has “surrounded” the region since the latest war (in 2020). Nevertheless, Azerbaijan has had claim on the territory since the formation of the republic, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. As of 1994, following the first Karabakh war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the region had been occupied by Armenian forces (heavily assisted by the Russian military), due to which most of the Azerbaijani population living there was forced to leave.

In 2020, border conflicts between Azerbaijan and the self-proclaimed Republic of Artsakh, backed by Armenia, escalated into a full-scale war, which Azerbaijan won, regaining most of its occupied territory, with the exception for the above enclave. However, as the signatories of the letter noted, the heads of the museum did not devote a single word to the history of the region and its belonging to Azerbaijan before the 2020 war.

In fact, if the whole story would have been limited with these erroneous and largely biased points, American Russian-speaking thought leaders might have refrained from publicly discussing the Museum’s statement. However, there were also a few problematic positions, which, in the opinion of the signatories of the letter, required a significantly tougher reaction.

One of them was flagrant claim in the Museum statement that the Azerbaijani government is committing “genocide” as it allegedly “blockaded” the enclave, “cutting off the electricity and stopping nearly all movement of people and goods either into or out of Artsakh”, and has also “cut off the natural gas pipeline into the region, further eroding the ability of the populace to stay safe in the middle of winter”. However, according to the decision of the International court of Justice from February 22nd 2023, “Armenia has not placed before it sufficient evidence that Azerbaijan is disrupting the supply of natural gas and other utilities”. Not even talking that would it were true, to compare the blockade of the region to the methodical mass murder of people of a certain ethnicity is beyond any logic and moral norm.

In more general terms, the cardinal sin of the museum’s statement, however, is the political stance and call to action of a center dedicated to the study and teaching of the Holocaust. An establishment with such an important objective undoubtedly attracts many visitors seeking to learn about one of humanity’s lowest points, if not the all-time lowest. If such an establishment uses their platform to spread misinformation, calling for political actions on a subject completely unrelated to the Holocaust and any genocide in general, this, according to critiques of such stance, can certainly draw wrong parallels in readers’ minds.

For example, this sort of allusions may be immediately imposed by illustration at the top of the page depicts Armenian women protesting with a poster in front of a checkpoint in the Lachin corridor, the picture harkens back to the 1940s, mimicking photos of Nazi soldiers standing guard with barbed wire between them and Jewish women. Without explanation, that this and other similar checkpoints are guarded by Russian military peacekeepers, rather than not Azerbaijani troops (which, in fact, are not allowed to control the corridor supplying the enclave from Armenia, looks misleading.

However, even if we leave this silence aside, it is difficult to agree with such attempts to manipulate public opinion, invoking one of the most tragic events of Jewish past.

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Let’s try to draw some conclusions from the narratives described above. The willingness of Jewish organizations, activists and institutes to accept a point of view in the domestic political discourse of their countries, as well as in relation to their foreign policy – in cases where this is related to the Jews of the Diaspora or the State of Israel – is understandable and natural. Much more controversial are the situations in which such Jewish entities intervene in entirely foreign conflicts, putting their authority and status on the altar of the interests of one of the parties, and especially using and thereby trivializing the events of the unique historical experience of the Jewish people.

 Opinions in Jewish circles differ on this topic, and, as you can see, the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center, on the one hand, and a group of prominent figures in the Russian-speaking Jewish diaspora in the United States, presented radically opposite positions in this dispute. The position of the Museum is clearly close to the beliefs popular in progressive and post-Zionist circles, emanating, firstly, from the willingness to downplay the Holocaust to the same level, or at least discuss this option, as the recognized tragedies of other peoples – real (like the Armenian genocide during the First World War or the Ukrainian Holodomor) or strained and manipulative, such as the official doctrine of the Palestinian Arabs, who consider the creation of the State of Israel as the “Holocaust of the Palestinian people”. A natural consequence of this approach is the readiness demonstrated in this case by the leadership of IHM&EC to take a side in a foreign conflict, based on a relativistic interpretation of the events of a subjective understanding of morality and justice, regardless of what consequences such steps may have for Jews and Israel.

Their opponents, in turn, not unreasonably believe that the blatant and deliberate politicization of Jewish educational, cultural and other community structures leads to the fact that, as is the case here, of a museum and an educational center of the Holocaust, such entities begin to broadcast certain prejudices that serve a foreign agenda which have nothing to do with the history of the Holocaust and the Jewish people. Especially if such “ideological sensitivity” becomes visibly selective. (Co-Chairman of the Assembly of the World Diasporas Leonid Bard illustrated this selective policy  by the 2022 feedback of Illinois HM& EC to Bard’s request for information support to the project of the Memorial honoring Israeli athletes murdered by Palestinian terrorist attack at the 1972 Munich Olympics. The Museum refused to do that due to their vision of the project, commemorating the murder of Jews by terrorists “falls outside the HM& EC mission”, probably, contrary to the willingness to support pro-Armenian narrative).

Even more problematic, according to the same opinion, such actions look, in the case when such endorsement is expressed, in favor of a country that is today a strategic ally of Iran – a state whose official policy is the destruction of Israel and whose propaganda fills the information space of its allies using the most odious anti-Semitic clichés. And, concurrently, against such a country as Azerbaijan, where this sort of propaganda has practically no effect, and which is one of the main allies of Israel in its staunch opposition to the Iranian regime.

 Let’s draw a line: a unanimous opinion on the issue of whether Jewish organizations should intervene in someone else’s conflict has not yet been formulated by either Jewish leaders or the general public. Regardless of the final conclusion, it is hard to doubt that before taking any steps or making binding statements, individuals and organizations acting on behalf of the Jewish people, in all cases, should require careful verification of the facts.

And one more point seems clear: Jewish institutions dedicated to Holocaust research and remembrance should not become a tribune or platform for any political debate, Jewish or non-Jewish. The Holocaust of the Jewish people should never be used to gain support for any other issue or reason. This downplays the significance of the Holocaust, maintaining the anti-Semitic stereotype that the Jews have nothing sacred that cannot be sold for a “worthy price”.