Petition in Russia to ban all Jewish organizations

About 5,000 persons have petitioned the Russian government to impose a ban on Jewish organizations because they claim a basic Judaic book professes religious hatred. The signatories, who include former world chess champion Boris Spassky, claim that "Kizur Shulkhan Arukh", an abbreviated version of a 16th-century book of daily rules for Jews, teaches hatred toward non-Jews, the English-language "Moscow Times" has reported.  One of Russia's two main rabbis, Adolf Shayevich, condemned the letter as a way for "a number of ambitious politicians" to "earn cheap popularity." Boruch Gorin, a spokesman for the Russian Federation of Jewish Communities, called for an investigation into manifestations of anti-Semitism. "People who have achieved success in life and have certain authority in society must understand that they cover their names with indelible shame by signing such documents", Gorin said in an apparent reference to Spassky.