The senior editor of The Atlantic, Gal Beckerman, writes about the "Jewish question" that Russia has been manipulating for decades ― and now again Putin is using the Jews for his geopolitical interests. Last week, the Russian president threatened to close the offices of the Jewish Agency for Israel in Russia, an organization that aims to help Jews return to their homeland, Israel. These threats were probably Putinʼs response to the words of Israelʼs interim prime minister, Yaïr Lapid, who called Russiaʼs actions in Ukraine a war crime. Before that, Sergey Lavrov openly declared that the Jewish president of Ukraine was in charge of the Nazi government, and that Hitler himself had Jewish blood. It seems that after this, despite long-term diplomatic relations with the Russian Federation, Israel still chose a side in the conflict, Beckerman writes. That is probably why Putin switched to strengthening the alliance with those friends he has left. Including Iran, "Israelʼs number one enemy," the article says. Russia has used Jewish emigration as a weapon before, Beckerman notes, and cites examples from the Cold War, when Brezhnev and later Gorbachev opened and closed windows of opportunity for Jews depending on their geopolitical goals. Putin is simply continuing on this path, this time shutting down emigration opportunities to please anti-Israel allies. The state takes away the right to leave it only when it realizes that it has become an undesirable place of residence, writes the author, summing up: "We have already seen it. Jews pay first. But they are not the last ones who suffer."
The US and Russia should start a dialogue before itʼs too late, political scientist Samuel Charap and researcher Jeremy Shapiro write in a column for The New York Times. According to the authors, although the West provides limited support to Ukraine and, in particular, does not supply missiles capable of hitting targets on the territory of the Russian Federation, this support nevertheless strengthens the spiral of escalation. The more weapons the West provides to Ukraine, the more death and destruction Russia brings, write Shapiro and Charap. The only way to break this cycle is to start negotiations, which, although they will be difficult, risky and will require significant diplomatic efforts, but will be able to identify possible compromises. Otherwise, the war will go beyond the borders of Ukraine and has every chance to turn into an open conflict between the Russian Federation and NATO, the authors believe.
The Conversation published a column by the research director of the African Center for Strategic Studies, Joseph Siegel, about Russian influence on African countries. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrovʼs recent tour of the African continent is designed to win allies who will help Russia fight against the West. At the current meetings, Lavrov is likely to present the agreement on the unblocking of Ukrainian grain as a gesture of goodwill on the part of the Kremlin, despite the fact that it is Russia that is to blame for the world food crisis. Although the volume of Russian direct investment in Africa in total does not exceed 1%, its geopolitical influence is considerable: 25 out of 54 African countries abstained or did not vote to condemn Russiaʼs full-scale invasion of Ukraine at the UN General Assembly in March. Such an influence can be attributed to the deployment of Russian mercenaries who suppress the rebellion, large-scale disinformation campaigns, trade in weapons and precious metals, the publication writes. It is interesting that Russia establishes these partnerships not with states ― but, rather, with specific leaders, often of dubious legitimacy. They receive political and financial benefits from friendship with Moscow. From a global point of view, Russia offers African states to join a world order in which human rights and democracy mean nothing, and the only thing that has meaning is force. This is dangerous for Africans, because investments in the continent also come from Western democracies that value the rule of law. By turning away from the West towards the Russian Federation, African leaders are at least harming the flow of investments, Sigl writes.