Russian Antisemitism, Pamyat, and the Demonology of Zionism

First Published in 1995. The emergence in Russia of the antisemitic chauvinist movement, Pamyat, has started Western society even as it has stirred deep fears and anxiety among Jews and democratic forces within Russia. How could supposedly Communist society, whose founder V.I. Lenin had railed against the racism and bigotry, give birth to a proto-fascist idealogy and organisation? This study seeks to respond to this understandable, if provocative query. The roots of Pamyat's idealogy can be traced to the tsarist Black Hundreds in the really part of the twentieth century to certain aspects of Stalinism, and especially to the Soviet 'anti-Zionist' campaign of 1967-86. Although the antisemitic campaign was officially halted at state level by Mikhail Gorbachev, the merging Pamyat groups took advantage of the freer atmosphere of glasnost to continue to foster anti-Jewish hatred.