The former chief rabbi of Moscow Pinhaas Goldschmidt, who left Russia due to the pressure of the Russian authorities, urged Jews to leave the Russian Federation while they can do this.
“If you look at Russian history, you can see that whenever the country’s political system was in danger, the government tried to redirect the anger and dissatisfaction of the masses to the Jewish community. This happened both in tsarist times and at the end of the Stalinist regime” – said the rabbi in an interview with The Guardian.
Goldshmidt left Russia shortly after the outbreak of war in Ukraine. It was originally reported that he did it because of his father’s illness who lives in Israel. However, at the beginning of June, the daughter-in-law of Rabbi Avilik-Goldshmidt wrote on her twitter that the main rabbi of Moscow left the country due to the pressure of the Russian authorities who demanded public support for the invasion of Ukraine.