Jewish Elderly Victims in the Former Soviet Union: Ongoing Needs and Comparison to Conditions in Europe, Israel, and the United States

Publication Date: December 2007

Publisher: Maurice and Marilyn Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies; Steinhardt Social Research Institute

Author(s): Elizabeth Tighe; Leonard Saxe; Fern Chertok

Research Area: Culture and religion; Population and demographics; Social conditions

Keywords: Holocaust; Elderly; FSU

Type: Report

Abstract:

More than sixty years since the end of the scourge of Nazism, victims of Nazi persecution are mostly elderly and are dispersed around the world, with the largest numbers living in the countries of the Former Soviet Union (FSU), as well as Israel, the United States, and Europe. Victims in the FSU are sometimes characterized as doubly victimized, having survived the Holocaust only to be subjected to the anti-Semitic policies of the Soviets post-Nazism. Further, while the Federal Republic of Germany recognized and accepted the need to provide compensation to survivors, those residing in the Eastern Bloc were left uncompensated. The present report is designed to describe the status of victims in the FSU.