[Lurking Libertarian]

Putin is to be commended for this.

...because we trust Putin's government (any government, actually, but Putin's less than most) to decide when scriptural commentary is "distorted." Not.

And anyone who thinks this has to do with stopping anti-semitism is smoking something. This is going to turn out to be another ploy by Putin to destroy any political opposition.

[af_vet_1981]

...because we trust Putin's government (any government, actually, but Putin's less than most) to decide when scriptural commentary is "distorted." Not.

And anyone who thinks this has to do with stopping anti-semitism is smoking something. This is going to turn out to be another ploy by Putin to destroy any political opposition.

Rabbi Berel Lazar, Chief Rabbi of Russia, said that the law is truly important in the fight against Russian anti-Semitism. He publicly thanked "my friend President Putin who bodily blocks all anti-Semitic phenomena" and the members of the Duma for "proving that Russia respects the beliefs of all its citizens."

Putin's warm relations with the Jewish community in his country have long been a matter of curiosity. Some say it is because of his many Jewish friends and neighbors when he was a child. One story even has it that a Jewish family befriended him when he was a poor child in St Petersburg whose parents were barely ever home. Another story relates that years later, as Vice-Mayor of that city, Putin stuck his neck out to give permission for the opening of a Jewish school in the city, even though it was not in his authority to do so.

In 2012, Putin arrived in Israel to take part in the inauguration of the Victory Monument in the city of Netanya, commemorating the sacrifices of the Red Army on behalf of Jews during World War II. Putin said on that occasion, “I am very excited to be here today…. The Jewish Holocaust was the most shameful and dark event in human history, and the Soviet Army was the one who crushed the head of the Nazi monster… This amazing monument strengthens the respect I feel towards to the Jewish people and the State of Israel."