On 11 February 1986, Soviet Jewish refusenik Natan Sharansky arrived in Israel under the terms of a prisoner exchange, after spending nearly a decade in prison in the Soviet Union.
While the Soviet Union supported the creation of the State of Israel in the United Nations General Assembly, its support for Israel declined for several reasons, including the Israeli Law of Return. Soviet Union leadership did not believe that Jews in the country were oppressed and therefore did not need an independent Jewish state as a continuous safe haven. In fact, the Soviet Union state newspaper Pravda declared, "The State of Israel has nothing to do with the Jews of the Soviet Union, where there is no Jewish problem, and therefore no need for Israel." While Soviet Jewry felt a strong connection to the Jewish State, Stalin made it his policy to ban Jews from emigrating to Israel and instituted the antisemitic Doctor's Plot.
While Sharansky attempted to leave the Soviet Union in 1973, his exit visa to Israel was rejected on “security” grounds. Following the denial of his request, Sharansky became increasingly active in Jewish refusenik activities until his arrest in 1977, following allegations that he collaborated with the CIA. While every level of the U.S. government and Sharansky himself denied the charges, Sharansky was convicted of treason and espionage and sentenced to 13 years in prison. Prior to the announcement of his verdict, Sharansky told the court, “I have nothing to say – to my wife and the Jewish people I say, “Next Year in Jerusalem.”
Finally, in 1986, Sharansky became the first political prisoner in the USSR released by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, following intense pressure from United States President Ronald Reagan. Sharansky’s wife, Avital, who emigrated to Israel immediately following their wedding in 1974, was a key leader in the international campaign for her husband’s freedom. She met with activists and political leaders across the United States, culminating in a statement signed by over 2,400 American scientists, including 13 Nobel laureates, pledging not to cooperate with the Soviet Union until Sharansky was free. Following his release, Sharansky became a symbol of Soviet Jewry’s yearning to escape antisemitism and oppression, as well as for human rights across the world. His release galvanized the moment to free Soviet Jewry.
Sharansky was freed on the border of the then still-divided Germany, where he met an Israeli ambassador who presented him with his new Israeli passport. Greeting Sharansky when he landed in Israel were his wife and several senior government officials, including then-Prime Minister Shimon Peres.
Following his arrival in Israel, Sharansky would continue to fight on behalf of Soviet Jewry, working to obtain the freedom of the millions of Soviet Jews still in the Soviet Union, and a key organizer and speaker for the Freedom Sunday for Soviet Jews rally in 1987. Two years following the landmark rally, Gorbachev approved measures allowing Soviet Jews to leave the Soviet Union.
Sharansky would go to serve several terms in the Knesset, as well as the Chairman of the Executive of the Jewish Agency from 2009 to 2018. In 2020, he won the Genesis Prize Laureate, often dubbed “The Jewish Nobel Prize”, honoring his struggle for human rights, political freedom, and his service to the Jewish people and the State of Israel.
