Russians Russians ( ) are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group native to Eastern Europe. Their mother tongue is Russian language, Russian, the most spoken Slavic languages, Slavic language. The majority of Russians adhere to Eastern Orthodox Church ...

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

or Russian Israelis are post-

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

Russian citizens who immigrated to

and their descendants. As of 2022, Russian-speakers number around 1,300,000 people, or 15% of the Israeli population. This number, however, also includes immigrants from the Soviet Union and post-Soviet states other than Russia proper. Some of the immigrants are not considered Jewish according to the

Halacha ''Halakha'' ( ; , ), also transliterated as ''halacha'', ''halakhah'', and ''halocho'' ( ), is the collective body of Jewish religious laws that are derived from the Written and Oral Torah. ''Halakha'' is based on biblical commandments ('' mi ...

, which defines a Jew if their mother is Jewish or they formally

converted to Judaism Conversion to Judaism ( or ) is the process by which non-Jews adopt the Jewish religion and become members of the Jewish ethnoreligious community. It thus resembles both conversion to other religions and naturalization. "Thus, by convertin ...

. This makes it difficult for many of those Russian Israelis who are not recognised as Jewish by the chief rabbinate to get married or buried in Israel. According to the

Law of Return The Law of Return (, ''ḥok ha-shvūt'') is an Israeli law, passed on 5 July 1950, which gives Jews, people with one or more Jewish grandparent, and their spouses the right to Aliyah, relocate to Israel and acquire Israeli nationality law, Isra ...

, anybody with at least one Jewish grandparent is eligible to become an Israeli citizen. Because of the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

's policy of

state atheism State atheism or atheist state is the incorporation of hard atheism or non-theism into Forms of government, political regimes. It is considered the opposite of theocracy and may also refer to large-scale secularization attempts by governments ...

and Russia's historically large Jewish population, there were some mixed marriages between Russian Jews and ethnic Russians during the Communist period. Some Russian Israelis have Israeli citizenship by marriage, as the Law of Return also allows the non-Jewish spouses of Jews to claim Israeli citizenship. A few Russian Israelis are instead descended from Russian Subbotnik families, who have migrated to Israel over the past century. Most Russians in Israel have full Israeli citizenship. Israeli Russians are involved in the country's economy on all levels and have made invaluable contributions to Israeli society, particularly in the cultural, scientific, high-tech, medical, and education fields. One in four staff members at Israel’s universities now are native Russian speakers. Many Russian Israelis choose to preserve their language and culture, There are Russian language newspapers, television stations, schools, and social media outlets based in Israel such as Channel 9, Pervoe radio, Vesty and others. Many Russian Israelis also celebrate Russian holidays like

Novy God ''Novy God'' or ''Noviy God'' () is a New Year celebration observed in Russia, in post-Soviet states, and globally by the diasporas of post-Soviet states. The holiday was promoted by the Soviet Union as a secular holiday that would supplant ...

and Victory Day.

History

The

1922 census of Palestine The 1922 census of Palestine was the first census carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine, on 23 October 1922. The reported population was 757,182, including the military and persons of foreign nationality. The divis ...

lists 877 Russian language speakers in

Mandatory Palestine Mandatory Palestine was a British Empire, British geopolitical entity that existed between 1920 and 1948 in the Palestine (region), region of Palestine, and after 1922, under the terms of the League of Nations's Mandate for Palestine. After ...

(10 in the Southern District, 772 in Jerusalem-Jaffa, 4 in Samaria, and 91 in the Northern District), including 571 in municipal areas (407 in

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

, 63 in

Jaffa Jaffa (, ; , ), also called Japho, Joppa or Joppe in English, is an ancient Levantine Sea, Levantine port city which is part of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, located in its southern part. The city sits atop a naturally elevated outcrop on ...

, 74 in

Haifa Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...

, 2 in Gaza, 1 in

Nablus Nablus ( ; , ) is a State of Palestine, Palestinian city in the West Bank, located approximately north of Jerusalem, with a population of 156,906. Located between Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim, it is the capital of the Nablus Governorate and a ...

, 2 in

Nazareth Nazareth is the largest Cities in Israel, city in the Northern District (Israel), Northern District of Israel. In its population was . Known as "the Arab capital of Israel", Nazareth serves as a cultural, political, religious, economic and ...

, 4 in

Tiberias Tiberias ( ; , ; ) is a city on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee in northern Israel. A major Jewish center during Late Antiquity, it has been considered since the 16th century one of Judaism's Four Holy Cities, along with Jerusalem, Heb ...

, 2 in

Bethlehem Bethlehem is a city in the West Bank, Palestine, located about south of Jerusalem, and the capital of the Bethlehem Governorate. It had a population of people, as of . The city's economy is strongly linked to Tourism in the State of Palesti ...

, 2 in Tulkarem, 8 in Beit Jala, 5 in

Beersheba Beersheba ( / ; ), officially Be'er-Sheva, is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. Often referred to as the "Capital of the Negev", it is the centre of the fourth-most populous metropolitan area in Israel, the eighth-most p ...

, and 1 in Baisan). In the aftermath of the Six-Day War in 1967, the Soviet Union broke off diplomatic relations with Israel and began a vicious anti-Zionist campaign. This campaign made many Soviet Jews feel that there was no place for them in the USSR. As a result, many of them applied for emigration visas to leave the Soviet Union. However, in most cases, the government denied their visa requests. In many cases, those "Refuseniks" were fired from their jobs by the government shortly after being refused exit visas from the Soviet Union. They had to accept any job offered to them, even if it was well below their expertise level, to avoid being arrested on charges of social parasitism. In 1970, a group of Refuseniks attempted to hijack a plane and fly it to Israel in what became known as the Dymshits–Kuznetsov hijacking affair. Their attempt failed, and they were subsequently charged with high treason, with some of them receiving death sentences. After the affair, international pressure caused the Soviet authorities to significantly increase the emigration quota, thus starting the 1970s Soviet Union aliyah, in which more than 150,000 Soviet Jews immigrated to Israel. In 1989, Soviet General Secretary

Mikhail Gorbachev Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (2 March 1931 – 30 August 2022) was a Soviet and Russian politician who served as the last leader of the Soviet Union from 1985 to dissolution of the Soviet Union, the country's dissolution in 1991. He served a ...

decided to lift restrictions on emigration. As a result of this decision, almost a million post-Soviet Jews immigrated from across the former Soviet Union to Israel between the years of 1989 and 2006 in what is known as the 1990s post-Soviet aliyah.

Communities

Subbotniks

Russian Subbotnik families settled in

Ottoman Syria Ottoman Syria () is a historiographical term used to describe the group of divisions of the Ottoman Empire within the region of the Levant, usually defined as being east of the Mediterranean Sea, west of the Euphrates River, north of the Ara ...

in the 1880s as part of the

First Aliyah The First Aliyah (), also known as the agriculture Aliyah, was a major wave of Jewish immigration (''aliyah'') to History of Israel#Ottoman period , Ottoman Palestine (region) , Palestine between 1881 and 1903. Jews who migrated in this wave cam ...

in order to escape oppression in the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

and later mostly intermarried with local Jews. Their descendants included

Israeli Jews Israeli Jews or Jewish Israelis ( ) comprise Israel's largest ethnic and religious community. The core of their demographic consists of those with a Jewish identity and their descendants, including ethnic Jews and religious Jews alike. Appr ...

such as Alexander Zaïd,

Rafael Eitan Rafael "Raful" Eitan (; 11 January 1929 – 23 November 2004) was an Israeli general, former Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces (Ramatkal) and later a politician, a Knesset member, and government minister. Early life Rafael Eitan was ...

Ariel Sharon Ariel Sharon ( ; also known by his diminutive Arik, ; 26 February 192811 January 2014) was an Israeli general and politician who served as the prime minister of Israel from March 2001 until April 2006. Born in Kfar Malal in Mandatory Palestin ...

and Major-General Alik Ron.Dr. Ruchama Weiss Rabbi Levi Brackman, "Russia's Subbotnik Jews get rabbi"
Ynet, 9 December 2010, accessed 22 August 2015 In 2004, the Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel Shlomo Amar ruled the Subbotniks were not defined as Jewish and would have to undergo an Orthodox conversion. The

Interior Ministry An interior ministry or ministry of the interior (also called ministry of home affairs or ministry of internal affairs) is a government department that is responsible for domestic policy, public security and law enforcement. In some states, the ...

classified the Subbotniks as a Christian sect and ineligible for aliyah to Israel, because no one knew if their ancestors had formally converted to Judaism (and there is much historic evidence that they did not). However, this ruling was abolished in 2014, with Subbotniks allowed to retain their Jewish status in Israel, with an attempt by the Interior Ministry to allow remaining Subbotnik families to immigrate to Israel.

Society

The Russian people within Israel have citizen status and are involved in the country's economy and society on all levels. Among the notable members of the community are social media star Anna Zak; actress and former MK Anastassia Michaeli; Footballer Alexander Uvarov who was naturalized in 2004; Actor Kirill Safonov; poet and composer Yuliy Kim, and many others.

Religion

Most Russian Israelis are atheists or otherwise

non-religious Irreligion is the absence or rejection of religious beliefs or practices. It encompasses a wide range of viewpoints drawn from various philosophical and intellectual perspectives, including atheism, agnosticism, religious skepticism, ration ...

, although anywhere from 56,000 to 100,000 belong to the

Russian Orthodox Church The Russian Orthodox Church (ROC; ;), also officially known as the Moscow Patriarchate (), is an autocephaly, autocephalous Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Orthodox Christian church. It has 194 dioceses inside Russia. The Primate (bishop), p ...

. It is estimated that another 10,000 are practitioners of

Messianic Judaism Messianic Judaism is a syncretic Abrahamic religious sect that combines Christian theology with select elements of Judaism. It considers itself to be a form of Judaism but is generally considered to be a form of Christianity, including by ...

, a loose term referring to those who combine elements of

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion, which states that Jesus in Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God (Christianity), Son of God and Resurrection of Jesus, rose from the dead after his Crucifixion of Jesus, crucifixion, whose ...

with elements of

Judaism Judaism () is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic, Monotheism, monotheistic, ethnic religion that comprises the collective spiritual, cultural, and legal traditions of the Jews, Jewish people. Religious Jews regard Judaism as their means of o ...

and Jewish tradition. About 100,000 Russian Israelis have also undergone conversion to

Orthodox Judaism Orthodox Judaism is a collective term for the traditionalist branches of contemporary Judaism. Theologically, it is chiefly defined by regarding the Torah, both Torah, Written and Oral Torah, Oral, as literally revelation, revealed by God in Ju ...

, most of them through the Nativ program. However, there are approximately 400,000 Russian Israelis with full citizenship who have not converted.

References