Stalin, Sadat, Mao Zedong & More: Good or Bad for the Jews Quiz

Good

Rasputin may have been painted as the bad guy in Russian history because he came from poverty and thus clashed with the Russian Aristocracy. Nicolas II’s inner circle had a deep aversion to Jews, but despite this, Rasputin’s progressive ideas lead him to advocate for equal rights for peasants, the impoverished, and the Jews. Though Rasputin was regarded as a wise mystic, he was uneducated and may have even been illiterate. However, he had some help in his position of power. Jewish business manager Aron Simanovich handled many of his affairs as his secretary. In Simanovich’s memoirs, he reveals that Rasputin’s views for social and economic change clashed with the nobility.

But social equality wasn’t his only contribution to Jewish society. Rasputin spoke out against the pogroms and lambasted those seeking to make Jews into scapegoats. He was even known to warn Jewish communities of impending attacks. In 1910, 307 Jewish dentists had been charged with only becoming dentists so they could obtain domicile rights to live outside the Pale of Settlement. Rasputin spoke on their behalf, saving them from execution.

In 1913, Rasputin stood up for Mendel Beilis when he was put on trial for killing Christians to make Passover matzah (the quintessential Blood Libel.) Rasputin also petitioned the Tsarina to allow Jewish students to attend school and Universities despite quotas, and helped free a Jewish doctor from captivity in Germany during the first World War.

Some accounts paint Rasputin almost as a saint, claiming he never took a penny for his services. But Simanovich’s account mentions Rasputin would frequently take bribes from wealthy Jews to speak to Tzar Nicholas on their behalf. Either way, he left the Jews in a better place than had he not been in the Tzar’s circle.

Good

Sadat’s attack on Israel was never intended to win the Yom Kippur War. He was actually playing the long game. After establishing Egypt in a much stronger position of power, Sadat was now set up to make a bold move. Sadat believed that if he could make peace with Israel, it would pay tremendous "dividends."

After Menachem Begin was elected Prime Minister, he made the unusual declaration that he was open to negotiating peace with any Arab nation who would reciprocate. Sadat responded unexpectedly while addressing the Egyptian parliament in 1977. It was there he announced a willingness to negotiate with the Israelis, even going so far as to speak in front of the Israeli Knesset.

Eight days later, Sadat stood in Israel addressing the Knesset and shook Begin’s hand. A year later, at the 1978 Camp David accords, the two sides negotiated for peace resulting in Israel returning the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt, but Sadat let up on pressuring Israel to give back the West Bank. The final treaty was signed with Jimmy Carter in 1979, but not before Sadat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize along with Menachem Begin.

The treaty was a turning point in Israeli foreign relations. For a nation born into almost perpetual war on all borders, the importance of Egypt becoming an ally cannot be overstated. Unfortunately, Sadat’s actions would come with a price. In 1981, Sadat was assassinated by Muslim fundamentalists.

Bad

For the most part, Mao had very little interaction with the Jewish People as an entity. However, strangely enough, Jews seemed to have more interaction with him. For centuries some Jews had escaped European persecution by fleeing to China and building a modest Jewish community in Shanghai. But during the communist takeover in 1949 most left. However, a few foreign nationals found themselves in China, but serving in Mao’s government and even his inner circle. Jakob Rosenfeld was the commanding officer of the Communists 4th Army’s medical unit; Israel Epstein served as the head of international public relations; David Crook was the dean of the Beijing Foreign Languages University, and Sidney Rittenberg who was a personal advisor to Mao and other leaders. It turns out that almost 90% of non-Chinese citizens helping the Communist party come to power in China were Jewish.

Unfortunately, many of these nationals fell from grace, as Rittenberg found himself jailed twice. David Crook was jailed in 1967, Epstein was imprisoned and put in solitary confinement. So things didn’t work out very well for these Jewish members of Mao’s government. But how was Mao himself?

In the early 1950s, it seemed that China and Israel were ready to establish diplomatic relations. But when the Korean War broke out, any hope for negotiations came to a screeching halt and China practically ghosted Israel. After that, China decided to seek relations with the Arab world. As Mao’s number two man Chou En-lai said in 1964, “We are ready to help the Arab nations regain Palestine. We are willing to give you anything and everything, arms, and volunteers.” In the 1960s, Prime Minister Levi Eshkol would try to establish relations via correspondence regarding the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, but neither Mao or Chou ever responded.

Bad

Early on, Stalin regarded the Jews rather well. He instituted Russian policy which promoted Yiddish cultural activities (i.e. with the Habimah repertory theater in Moscow). However, he did not tolerate Zionism and worried the sentiment might infect the next generation of Soviet Jews.

Stalin frequently addressed the “Jewish Question.” In 1913, he denied that Jews were ethnically a singular national entity and supported Lenin’s aim for progressive assimilation, pushing for the disappearance of Jewish culture. Almost 25 years later, during the Great Purge, he eradicated Yiddish school, publications, and other cultural institutions. Jewish victims of the purge – the Zinovievs, Kamenevs, and Radeks – were dishonored, but interestingly enough not specifically as Jews, but instead as Western agents.

During the Soviet alliance with Germany, Stalin extradited German communists who had sought refuge to the Soviet Union back to the Nazis, many of whom were Jewish. After the war, Stalin was given a plan recommending the resettlement of many returning Jewish refugees in Crimea. He refused the plan, seeing it as a step towards Zionism and a security risk for the Soviet Union.

Stalin’s distaste for Zionism unexpectedly seemed to diminish with the founding of the modern State of Israel. He was resolute and energetic in his support during 1947-48, as he sent weapons from Czechoslovakian arms factories to the fledgling country. But seemingly overnight, his support waned and his attitude turned violently hostile. The final remaining Jewish institutions in Russia became the targets of complete liquidation. Mass arrests of Jewish artists, writers, intellectuals, and professionals were conducted as the dictator’s obsession with Jewish conspiracies overwhelmed the country.

Good

Many in the suffrage movement were documented as using pejorative terms for Jews, even bordering on antisemitic rhetoric. But Susan B. Anthony was not one of them. Why not?

One of the figures Anthony drew inspiration from was a woman named Ernestine Rose. A predecessor to Anthony in the women’s rights movement, Rose was an outspoken orator for not only feminism, but free thought and abolition. The daughter of a Rabbi, Rose was an immigrant from Poland who had been taught Talmud by her father. Ironically, Rose declared herself an atheist, but couldn’t escape her Jewish roots, frequently being introduced as “of the Jewish faith.”

When suffragist Lucy Stone complained to Anthony that Rose’s “face [was] so essentially Jewish”, insisting she wasn’t fit to represent the movement, Anthony proudly hung a portrait of Rose in her office among her other models of inspiration. Rose’s influence on Anthony is unquestionable.

Anthony also allied herself with Jewish feminists Hannah Greenebaum Solomon and Fannie Rosenberg Bigelow. Anthony included Jews in her pursuit of universal human rights, forming bonds and speaking before the local Jewish Council and Sisterhood of Berith Kodesh, and Congregation Emanu-El of San Francisco. It’s clear that Anthony cared as much about her Jewish sisters as anyone else she fought for.