Israeli intelligence organisation starts Operation Germany

Israeli migration agents target German Jews

· Soviet migrants in Nativ agency's sights
· Germany's Jewish council condemns 'offensive' plan

Kate Connolly in Berlin
Wednesday November 28, 2007
The Guardian


An Israeli intelligence organisation is to send agents to Germany in an effort to persuade tens of thousands of Jews from the former Soviet Union to settle in Israel.
Representatives of the organisation Nativ are soon to operate on the approval of the Israeli government to "counter the dangerous assimilation of former Soviet Jews in Germany", according to the wording of a decision recently passed by the cabinet of prime minister Ehud Olmert.

Around 200,000 Jews from the former Soviet Union, about 70% of the total community, are currently living in Germany having begun arriving at the invitation of the government in the early 1990s. But their assimilation into what is now the fastest growing Jewish community in the world has been problematic, largely due to linguistic and cultural differences, including varying approaches to defining Jewishness and even sometimes a lack of knowledge about the Holocaust.

The Israeli embassy in Berlin has confirmed that two emissaries from Nativ are due to arrive in Berlin within the next few weeks to start their work, which includes trying to encourage emigration to Israel among the Jews from the former Soviet Union, and offering help with their move on issues such as bureaucratic matters.

The German press has referred to the operation as being "James Bond-like".

The Central Council of Jews, the organisation representing Jews in Germany, has expressed its fury that Israel is trying to effectively steal its members. In a recent letter to Mr Olmert, the council described the decision as a "sign of mistrust which we find personally offensive".

Stephan Kramer, the council's general secretary said that it gave the impression that the "connection to Israel" and "imparting Jewish values" was not important to Jewish community leaders, when it in fact belonged to the "foundations of Jewish existence".

He added: "If you read the cabinet decision, you get the impression that Jewish Germans need to be evacuated. That sends a fatal signal."

The German government has joined the row, insisting that it should be up to individuals to decide where they live.

"Whether someone wants to live in Germany or Israel is a decision that only they can reach themselves," said Germany's foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, on a recent visit to Israel.

Nativ was set up in the 1950s as an independent intelligence agency to build up contact with Jewish activists in the Soviet Union and to encourage Jewish immigration, or aliya, to the state of Israel.

But following the collapse of the Soviet bloc, the organisation lost its raison d'etre, until earlier this year when Avigdor Lieberman, Israeli's strategic affairs minister, became its new head and was given the task of leading the so-called Operation Germany on a budget of £1m a year.

Lieberman has accused the Central Council of Jews of poorly representing the 100,000 Jews from the former Soviet Union who are registered with it, and favouring instead veteran German Jews who make up only a small portion of the total Jewish community in Germany.

"There's a huge potential here for expanding aliya," he has said.

The council has said it fears the existence of Nativ will further deepen the rift between the older community and the former Soviet Jews, at a time when the revival of Jewish life in Germany is being widely celebrated. New synagogues are being built and old ones painstakingly renovated around the country, such as the Ryke Strasse synagogue in Berlin.

But rows about "how Jewish" members are abound. "Often when there are arguments you hear the cry 'You're not a proper Jew'," said Moishe Waks of the Ryke Strasse synagogue. "Even though they would have been persecuted under Nazi racial laws, many immigrants from the Soviet Union are not considered proper Jews by the rest of the community."