By Rabbi Jonny Roodyn
Separated from his wife after just one day of marriage, convicted on trumped up charges in a show trial and imprisoned in Soviet prisons under the harshest of conditions, freedom seemed impossible.
Thirty years ago today a remarkable event took place. A prisoner of Zion, perhaps the world’s most famous refusenik, crossed the Glienicke Bridge to freedom and a new life. He boarded an airplane to his beloved Israel and his darling wife who had waited patiently and campaigned restlessly for over ten years for his release.
As a young child in a Jewish school in London, I distinctly remember writing letters of support to Anatoly Sharansky and his wife Avital during his time in prison. Although I didn’t fully grasp the enormity of the events at the time, it was clear from the mood that something historic was occurring. The images broadcast around the world of Anatoly, now Natan, thanking G-d at the Kotel quickly became iconic. The message to the world was clear, ‘Am Yisrael Chai!’ The man who together with a motley crew of fellow refuseniks had resisted and defied one of the world‘s greatest powers was thanking the Almighty for his salvation at the place which represents the eternity of the Jewish nation.
Natan’s life story could have been so different. At any number of junctures he could have resigned himself to his fate. Freedom was nigh impossible for those on the KGB’s lists of dissidents. But Natan and his comrades refused to accept this. They painstakingly chronicled Soviet abuses of human rights and somehow managed to make these facts known in the West. Their resilience and tenacity was a source of inspiration to people worldwide as they risked their lives to attend Synagogue, study Hebrew and campaign to return to their homeland. They knew that to do so would place themselves in mortal danger, but they, like Mordechai in the Purim story, refused to bow down and accept the unacceptable.
His wife Avital is no less a hero in this story. Undeterred by naysayers, she travelled the world to meet with anyone who would listen to the story her husband’s plight. She met with heads of state, influential individuals and communities the world over to garner support for his freedom. She was fully aware that her campaign was not just for her beloved husband, but for the right of millions of Jews imprisoned behind the Iron Curtain to practice their religion and return to Zion.
On February 11 1986, Anatoly was suddenly transferred to West Germany in a surprise prisoner swap that had been orchestrated at the highest diplomatic level. The Soviet Union fell just a few years later and the struggle for Soviet Jewry transformed into the challenge of absorbing Russian immigrants to Israel and the West as well as caring and educating those who chose to remain. A community of millions of people who had been subjected to seventy years of religious persecution experienced a modern day miracle.
Their story is now history, but their legacy is forever relevant. A legacy of those who held firm in the face of adversity, of those who held on to whatever Jewish identity they could get their hands on. Theirs is a story of normal people who became heroes through their commitment to hold on to their history and ensure their destiny at all costs.
We, who live in the free world, have so much to learn from Natan and his fellow prisoners of Zion. Perhaps, most importantly not to take our liberty, culture, religion, and homeland for granted.
Click here to view original footage of Sharansky’s remarkable story.
