OZET was public
Society for Settling Toiling Jews on the Land in the
Soviet UnionThe Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. The name is a translation of the , tr. Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, abbreviated СССР, SSSR. The common short name is Soviet Union, from , Sovetskiy Soyuz...
in the period from 1925 to 1938. Some English sources use the word "Working" instead of "Toiling".
Background
The principal sources of livelihood of the Jews in the
Russian EmpireThe Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia, and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
were trade and small crafts. After the
October RevolutionTheOctober Revolution , also known as the Soviet Revolution or Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution. It began with an armed insurrection in Petrograd traditionally dated to 25 October 1917 Julian calendar...
, the
Russian Civil WarThe Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed and the Soviets under the domination of the Bolshevik party assumed power, first in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a multi-party war that...
and instability and devastation that followed, these traditional occupations withered. Dictatorship of proletariat,
War CommunismWar communism or military communism was the economic and political system that existed in the Soviet Russia during the Russian Civil War, from 1918 to 1921...
and command economy were accompanied by persecution of those deemed class enemies or exploiters. As a result, in the early 1920s more than a third of the Jewish population of the USSR were officially counted as
lishenetsA lishenets , from Russian word лишение, "deprivation", properly translated in this context as a disenfranchised, was a person stripped of the right of voting in the Soviet Union of 1918 — 1936...
. Significant part of the population of
schtetls in former
Pale of SettlementThe Pale of Settlement was the term given to a region of Imperial Russia, along its western border, in which permanent residence of Jews was allowed, and beyond which Jewish residence was generally prohibited...
moved to big cities.
Tasks and leadership
In order to resolve socio-economic difficulties of the Russian Jews and promote agricultural labor among them, on January 17, 1925 the CPSU formally created a government committee, the
KomzetKomzet was the Committee for the Settlement of Toiling Jews on the Land in the Soviet Union. The primary goal of the Komzet was to help impoverished and persecuted Jewish population of the former Pale of Settlement to adopt agricultural labor...
, and a complementary public society, the OZET.
While the land for new
kolkhozA kolkhoz , plural kolkhozy, was a form of collective farming in the Soviet Union that existed along with state farms . The word is a contraction of коллекти́вное хозя́йство, or "collective farm", while sovkhoz is a contraction of советское хозяйство...
es was contributed and distributed by the Soviet government via the Komzet, the job of the OZET was assisting in moving settlers to a new location, housebuilding, irrigation, training, providing them with cattle and agricultural tools, education, medical and cultural service. The funds were to be provided by private donations, charities and
lotteriesA lottery is a form of gambling which involves the drawing of lots for a prize. Some governments outlaw it, while others endorse it to the extent of organizing a national or state lottery...
.
The OZET was headed by respected
Old BolshevikOld Bolshevik, old Bolshevik Guard of old Party guard is an unofficial designation for members of the Bolshevik party before the Russian Revolution of 1917, many of whom were either tried and executed by the NKVD during Stalin's purges or died under suspicious circumstances.In 1922 there were...
s, not all of them Jewish: Yuri Larin, later
Semyon DimansteinSemyon DimansteinSemyon DimansteinSemyon Dimanstein( (1886(uncertain)- August 1938) was a Soviet state activist, publisher, theorist of national issue in the USSR, one of the founders of the Soviet Oriental studies. He was considered to be a representative of Soviet Jews....
, and its board included such figures as
Solomon MikhoelsSolomon Mikhoels ; was a Soviet Jewish actor and the artistic director of the Moscow State Jewish Theater. Mikhoels served as the chairman of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee during the Second World War...
and
Vladimir MayakovskyVladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky was a Russian and Soviet poet and playwright, among the foremost representatives of early-20th century Russian Futurism.- Early life :...
.
Geography and membership
Unlike many Soviet organizations of the time, there was no requirement for a member to be of proletarian ancestry. By the time of its first assembly in Moscow in 1926, the OZET counted over 60,000 members. At its height in the 1930s, it reached 300,000, but in many cases the membership was mandatory and/or formal.
By the end of 1920s, there were 160 Jewish selsovets (rural councils) in
UkraineUkraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east; Belarus to the north; Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary to the west; Romania and Moldova to the southwest; and the Black Sea and Sea of Azov to the south. The city of Kiev is both the capital and the largest city of...
, 29 in the Crimean peninsula (Crimea did not belong to Ukraine at the time), and 27 in
BelarusBelarus is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered by Russia to the north and east, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the north. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel , Mahilyow and Vitebsk...
. In Ukraine, three Jewish national regions were created: Kalinindorf, Stalindorf and Novo-Zlatopol. Crimea had two: Freidorf and Larindorf.
The Jewish settlers were given around 5,000 square kilometres of land (not counting Birobidzhan). The plan was to settle 500,000 "toiling Jews" in 10 years. In reality, from 1925 to 1937 only 126,000 were resettled, and only 53,000 of them stayed.
In Feb. 1928, the OZET's activity in the European part of the USSR was put on hold in favor to implementing the Birobidzhan project in the
Russian Far EastRussian Far East is a term that refers to the Russian part of the Far East, i.e., extreme east parts of Russia, between Siberia and the Pacific Ocean...
and JAO was created.
Propaganda and funding
In order to mobilize public opinion, the OZET undertook significant
propagandaPropaganda is communication aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position. As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience...
efforts on the West. Almost uniquely in the history of the USSR, it officially declared that it was not politically or ideologically affiliated. In November 1925 it even passed a resolution declaring its neutrality towards
ZionismZionism is the international political movement that originally supported the reestablishment of a homeland for the Jewish People in Palestine. The area was the Jewish Biblical homeland, called the Land of Israel...
, officially branded as
bourgeois nationalistBourgeois nationalism is a term from Marxist phraseology. It refers to the practice of dividing people by nationality, race, ethnicity, or religion, which were alleged to deflect them from class warfare...
movement.
Until the 1930s, OZET was often represented in Soviet pavilions at international exhibitions and fairs. This won the USSR many supporters in the West. One particular success was the film
A Jew on the Land («Еврей на земле») directed by
Abram RoomAbram Room was aRussian film director.Room's best known film is Bed and Sofa . In the film, a woman who is married to a construction worker has an affair with their lodger. The film tracks the evolution of a housewife into a strong liberated woman, which was very unusual for its time....
and authored by Mayakovsky and
Viktor ShklovskyViktor Borisovich Shklovsky was a Russian and Soviet critic, writer, and pamphleteer.-Life and work:He was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, and attended St. Petersburg University...
.
The
American Jewish Joint Distribution CommitteeThe American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee is a worldwide Jewish relief organization. It was established in 1914 and is active in more than 70 countries....
(Joint) alone contributed $25 million to the OZET, and established Agro-Joint, an organization specifically dedicated to the project. It is unclear how much of the collected funds was spent on further
public relationsPublic relations is the practice of managing the communication between an organization and its publics. Public relations gains an organization or individual exposure to their audiences using topics of public interest and news items that do not require direct payment...
campaigns, diverted to other projects, or pocketed by the government bureaucracy in the USSR, but the settlers were frequently left without necessities and had to survive by improvising.
Birobidzhan project
The Birobidzhan project appeared in 1928. By 1932, out of 20,000 settlers only 7,000 remained and by 1938 the Jewish Autonomous Oblast (JAO) hosted 20,000 Jews constituting 25% of total population.
To increase the prestige of settling the Far East, the Soviet government raised the status of the autonomy and in 1934 JAO was declared an autonomous republic; the city of
BirobidzhanBirobidzhan is a town and the administrative center of the Jewish Autonomous Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Trans-Siberian railway, close to the border with the People's Republic of China, and is the home of two synagogues, including the Birobidzhan Synagogue, and the Jewish religious...
became its capital and was to become the center of Jewish culture.
Demise
The first
five year planThe Five-Year Plans for the National Economy of the USSR were a series of nation-wide centralized exercises in rapid economic development in the Soviet Union. The plans were developed by the Gosplan based on the Theory of Productive Forces that was part of the general guidelines of the Communist...
s, intensive industrialization and militarization programs in the USSR required educated human resources and many Jews were able to find employment. On the other hand, collectivization in the USSR resulted in failure of the Soviet agriculture and many starving peasants of all ethnic backgrounds found escape in cities.
By mid-1930, the OZET lost its uses. In the 1937, its leadership and ranks were decimated in the
Great PurgeGreat Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin in 1937–1938. It involved a large-scale purge of the Communist Party and Government officials, repression of peasants, Red Army leadership, and the persecution of...
and in May 1938 the agency was liquidated by special order by the Central Committee of the CPSU as a "corner of various counter-revolutionary Bundist elements, turncoats and spies". International contacts, including the Agro-Joint, were discontinued. During 1938, Jewish national regions, councils, schools were shut down.
See also
- Organization for Jewish Colonisation in the Soviet Union (IKOR)
The Organization for Jewish Colonization in Russia , known by its transliterated acronym as the ICOR was a Jewish Communist organization in North America devoted to supporting settlement in the Jewish socialist republic of Birobidzhan in the Soviet Union...
- Jews and Judaism in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast
The Jewish history of the Jewish Autonomous Oblast began with the early settlements of 1928. Yiddish, along with Russian, is one of two official languages in the JAO.-Early settlement:...
Further reading
- Robert Weinberg. Stalin's Forgotten Zion. Birobidzhan and the Making of a Soviet Jewish Homeland: An Illustrated History, 1928-1996 (University of California Press, 1998)) ISBN 978-0-520-20990-9
- Jonathan L. Dekel-Chen. Farming the Red Land: Jewish Agricultural Colonization and Local Soviet Power, 1924-1941 (Yale University Press, 2005) ISBN 978-0-300-10331-1
External links