[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 89 (Thursday, May 25, 2023)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E493-E494]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           THE WAR IN UKRAINE

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. JENNIFER A. KIGGANS

                              of virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 25, 2023

  Mrs. KIGGANS of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record 
remarks submitted at the request of a Virginia Beach constituent, Rabbi 
Dr. Israel Zoberman of Temple Lev Tikvah, and are a reflection of his 
views:

       The war in Ukraine hits close to home. I was a refugee the 
     first four years of my life following my birth in Kazakhstan 
     (USSR) in 1945, and my late father was a Russian soldier 
     defending Leningrad and Moscow. My 102-year-old Israeli mom 
     who died recently in Israel was a Ukrainian Holocaust 
     survivor. My wife and I travelled in Ukraine with its vast 
     Jewish past in 1991, where we lost so many family members 
     during the Holocaust, including at Babi Yar. It is hard to 
     fathom that the historic and beautiful landscape with a 
     population yearning to be Western is being obliterated before 
     our eyes.
       These searing events--an invasion of Ukraine by Russian 
     forces who obey the absolute authority of Russian President 
     Vladimir Putin--are beyond shocking. Who would have imagined 
     that once more, following WWII and the Holocaust, we would 
     witness an eruption of such magnitude in the heart of Europe, 
     with the evil design to seize a newly democratic nation of 40 
     million people in an ill-begotten scheme to restore the 
     collapsed Soviet Union and/or revive the preceding Russian 
     Imperial Empire? What is the impetus behind Putin's plot to 
     charge forward with uncontrolled rage and reckless impunity 
     despite a dire outcome for all?
       Perhaps it is a case of over-confidence that he could 
     literally get away with mass murder with little opposition 
     from a world community, acceding to his past mischief in 
     Chechnya, Georgia, Syria (Remember Aleppo!), Crimea and 
     Donbas. He's gambled that his saber rattling with a nuclear 
     arsenal would result in finger pointing while avoiding 
     detrimental consequences to his megalomaniacal dream of 
     reordering the world order through disorder with total 
     disregard for human life and immense suffering for millions 
     of young and old, who are now homeless refugees. He, whose 
     family was personally impacted by the inhumane siege of 
     Leningrad (St. Petersburg) in WWII, shows no mercy for a vast 
     civilian population with close cultural and fraternal bonds 
     that already had experienced Adolf Hitler's similar approach. 
     Putin shows uncontrolled impulses of divine grandeur and sick 
     grandiosity. The global community hopefully apprehensively 
     watches, with the notable exception of the

[[Page E494]]

     Russians who are deprived of the truth, fed by their 
     government's fake news.
       Let us contemplate that Hitler could have been stopped 
     early on if democratic nations had the common sense and 
     necessary guts to confront him early. Jewish leaders appealed 
     to Franklin D. Roosevelt, their sainted New Deal president, 
     only to be turned away dismissively and misleadingly with 
     false promises that all would be well, but first Nazi Germany 
     had to be defeated. By the time the United States got 
     involved it was too late for 6 million Jews--two-thirds of 
     European Jewry and one-third of the total Jewish people, 
     including a million and a half children, along with millions 
     of others. Delayed response to fateful danger by democracies 
     that tend to be slow and uncertain in decision-making and 
     extra cautious about bloodletting of their own and others, 
     turns ever costly with a commensurate rising price. It is 
     humanity's tragic pitfall that dictators possess the nerve 
     and verve to launch unprovoked attacks even as democracies 
     become impotent at critical crossroads rather than calling 
     for determined and quick action to avert monumental 
     destruction.
       Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who ironically and 
     instructively happens to be Jewish and lost relatives in the 
     Holocaust, is pleading for his country's independent 
     existence and survival through more aid and we should fully 
     assist him. To claim that the United States and NATO members 
     have limitations in doing so because the victim does not 
     belong to NATO is immoral and short-sighted. I suggest that 
     Ukraine's defeat would serve to hasten another colossal 
     disaster for Europe and the democratic world, with Putin 
     further emboldened to continue violating others more 
     vulnerable than Ukraine, whose resistance to the onslaught is 
     an exemplary response we can all be inspired by. Zelenskyy 
     has emerged, despite being laughed at given his comedian's 
     background, as a world statesman with Winston Churchill's 
     heroic aura. The Jewish War Veterans of the United States 
     designated Zelenskyy as Honorary Patron. The International 
     Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Putin. Let 
     justice prevail with our indispensable help!
       Rabbi Dr. Israel Zoberman is founder of Temple Lev Tikvah 
     in Virginia Beach.

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