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The Soviet National Daily Pravda has expressed confidence that decisions taken by the Soviet Communist Party Central Committee at its full-scale session in January will further create changes to make up his life and promote democratization and openness. - This is Moscow.

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Wrapped up against the savage Russian winter, Muscovites go about their city. Among them, there are some who seem like ordinary Soviet citizens.

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And so, in a sense, they are. They include professors, housewives, musicians, and their children. Yet they are marked out for a special and terrible destiny.

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For they are Jews, which in the Soviet Union is a separate nationality. Some 380,000 of them have indicated that they want to leave their country and live in the Jewish state, Israel. Their right to do so is enshrined in Soviet law and also in the Helsinki agreements which

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the Soviet Union signed. But their exercise of that right is arbitrarily, illegally, and unjustly refused. These people are the ones who have taken the next step and formally asked for an exit visa and been refused.

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They are among the bravest 12,000 of this tragic army. The bravest. But why do they need to be brave? This program is designed to answer that question.

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(dog barking) My name is Bernard Levin. I'm a Jew, but that is not the reason for my interest in this subject.

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It would be a wretched world if people campaigned against injustice only on behalf of their own kind. But for some 15 years, in my column in the Times, I have returned again and again

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to the plight of these people called refuseniks, a word which has passed into the Russian language and into most of the languages of the world. The emigration campaign started some 20 years ago,

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and for a long time, substantial numbers were allowed to leave, perhaps in all, a quarter of a million. But in the early '80s, that river dried up

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to a feeble trickle. And last year, fewer than 1,000 were let out. Over here. I feel I know many of you personally,

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and it feels strange for me to be sitting in London, wishing that I could embrace you, but at any rate knowing that you can see and hear me, because this film is going to be smuggled

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to the Soviet Union, and your answers to my questions recorded and smuggled out again. And the questions I shall ask you will be very obvious to you, but not so obvious to us. So your answers will help us to understand better the nature of your struggle and what

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impels you to undertake it. Alexander Ioffe. Hello and shalom. Hello Bernard.

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Nice to hear you. Let's start with the most obvious question of all. What exactly is a refusenik? What does refusenik mean?

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Very little and very much at the same time. Very little because you don't have any documents that confirm that you are a refusenik. The refusal that you receive, the answer that you receive, is never in a written form. It is always vocal.

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So you don't... you are unable to prove to anybody that you are a refusenik. So in this respect, from your appearance, as it were, you are quite a normal Soviet citizen. You may look like ordinary Soviet citizens, but you aren't, if only because you want to

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leave the country. When did you first begin to feel that you had no place in the Soviet Union? Shortly after the Six-Day War. The Jews and we among them, of course, just discovered Israel for them for the first time.

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It practically never occurred before to us that such a country existed, that Jewish people lived there. And for me it is a question of culture, of history, of nationality. Of course, I'm not religious, but of course religion is also something that we discovered later. The importance of such thing and the respect to it that was developed.

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It's also quite a new feeling. I'm Tanya Zonshain, the wife of the Jewish political prisoner, Zahar Zonshain, who is a Jew of 35 years old. In 1981 we lodged our application to the Uvir office asking for the permission to leave

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this country, but we were refused. And from this moment our story began. Zakhar was arrested three years ago and he was sentenced to three years of labor camp imprisonment. He's very handsome, look at his picture, he's very handsome, he's very interesting. He's very, he's tall, he's, he's one meter ninety centimeters tall, that's more than

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six feet. When your request for permission to leave was refused, you wouldn't accept that decision, you risked everything to protest. What did the authorities do? They tried first to stop his activity, to stop by different means. It was the shadowing of us during all day long, the provocations on the street after which Zakhar was accused of hooliganism, different

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kinds of persecution. He was dismissed from his job. The first thing that may change the moment you enter, you started this way, is your job. Very often you are either just fired or lowered or transferred to another position. When I applied ten years ago, I was a kind of associate professor of mathematics in the

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Polytechnic Institute, and the first words that my director told me when I handed him over my application, my statement that I want to apply, he said, "Well, you have to understand that since moment I cannot afford, I cannot allow you to meet any students any longer." Vladimir Shlepak is the dvojan of refuseniks. He first applied to leave in 1970. He's a

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distinguished man, and indeed he had every incentive to stay where he was. He was the the head of a large laboratory in the Moscow Institute of Television Research. And now, Volodya, what do you do now? And now I'm working as a dispatcher in a hospital.

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What it means, I sit in a room with two phones, and they call me from all the departments of this hospital if they need a plumber or to fix the electric line or to change the broken glass in the window.

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And I write the order to carpenter, to plumber, and send them to fix what is broken there. This is my job now. It is important to have a job,

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just to be registered as a person having a job. Having a job. But in the Soviet Union, some jobs are less equal than others. Natasha Magarik and her husband, Alexei, a cellist,

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kept going by teaching Hebrew. But that is treated as a criminal offence. He was arrested and sent to a Siberian labour camp, where he still remains.

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We are Hebrew teachers since probably 1980, And this is not strictly forbidden, not exactly forbidden in this country, but it's living in the underground, you know,

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so we cannot register as Hebrew teachers. And if we don't have any other job, we can be sent to the camps for parasitism, as it happened to my friend.

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- Ah yes, parasitism, the Soviet Union's favorite conjuring trick. They make it impossible for refuseniks to get work and then prosecute them for not working. My name is Nadia. I'm half Jewish and half Russian. I'm from Leningrad. I was from Leningrad.

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Now I am from nowhere because I am released from the labour camp and now I have got no place to live in. Imprisonment. To us that means going to prison and coming out when the sentence has been served. But for a Soviet refusing it, it can mean a great deal more.

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They simply arrested me and delivered to the hospital. It was really a psychological torture being there because I was alone among all these people who were dying, who were really dying and these KGB men were really trying to do their best to make me to be out of the do their best to make me to be out of my mind.

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They really said extremely disgusting things to me and they were using their hands and so on. There were three KGB men and three policemen and me, I was alone.

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Then... They arrested him in the airport. They planted drugs, six grams of ashish, in his bag in the airport on his way back to Moscow.

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They tried from the very beginning, from the first day, to break him by any possible and impossible means if not morally as they tried putting him into their special cells where as he wrote the zonderkommand was kept. The people named as zonderkommand who made the beatings and all other terrible things in the prison.

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For them, for the camp administration, he was not, well, a drug addict and not a person sentenced for drugs. For them he was an anti-Soviet person and they declared it. They declared it. They said it to him. He was an anti-Soviet person who wants to emigrate a Jew with a father in Israel and for them it was his main crime and

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they tried, they pressed him real hard, they tried to make him change his convictions and they said your motherland is here you have to understand that and they punished him in all the possible ways. So I have seen, I have seen everything.

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His broken ribs, the steps of blood on his body, the bruises all over the body. I remember very well that it was very hard for him to move and even to breathe without pain.

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Sometimes it's a month that I don't hear anything from him and the only thing I can be sure of is that he's still alive because they said to me that in case of his death, you would, you will be informed. And this state, and this is my sincere conviction, was criminal in respect to me.

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But the state may consider my statement, this statement, as a slander. But I feel so. I'm quite sincere. Some of the refuseniks have grown old in waiting. And for some, soon, it will be too late.

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Take Lazar Feigin. He is a distinguished composer. He was a friend of Shostakovich and a pupil of the great Soviet violinist, David Oistrakh.

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He wrote the music for a very successful ballet, Don Juan. He has three symphonies and much other music to his credit. His wife is a virtuoso pianist. You may think you are watching him composing.

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You are not. There would be no point in his writing music, for as a refusenik he would have no hope of ever hearing it performed. What you see is him trying to earn something of a living as a copyist.

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[Music] This dance is when Jews get tipsy and are dancing upon the table. Curtis Yushchuk. He's at my place about 30 years. And my friends, composers, know him.

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Is he a musical cat? Yes, yes. When I play bad, he's sitting so... And when you play well? He's very proud.

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I can remember three most important things in my life. It was my marriage. It was this edition by a great publishing house in Germany, Peters. And third, the first night of Don Juan.

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If I will go to my sister, it will be fourth important thing. She is in Jerusalem. Lazar, yours must be one of the most senseless cases of refusal. You're not young, you're not a scientist.

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You've never taken part in any demonstrations. Why won't they let you go? I don't know. Maybe I am musician, I don't know some secret.

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I am not criminal. The old may die in the world of refusal. The young are born into it. Katya and Laza Yusifovich have four such children,

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Menachem, Miriam, Ilana, and Ilarion, and there is another on the way. Israel, to make clear the nature of the refuseniks' suffering, has made a number of them full Israeli citizens.

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The Yusifoviches are among these, among these and they have responded by insisting on a complete Jewish life despite all the difficulties and dangers. At home they speak only Hebrew. The children are children but they are nervous and my daughter has headaches

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Nights are afraid. Our life is very nervous because all our life is waiting. Maybe in other countries it's difficult to understand our troubles, troubles, but we live in prison because our life is life in prison. My parents, they are

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in Jerusalem. My mother is not so young and maybe that we will not see each other again. My mother has never seen R.L. She has seen only Menachem and Miriam when she was born. Maybe my mother will see this film.

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How do you do? All my life is in the movies. All my life is in my children. I wasn't taught how to pray.

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But if he can help me, let him do. Me, to see my children. I'm not a politician, I'm a woman. That's all I wanted to say.

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The cruelty of the refusals is obvious. The madness, perhaps less so. For the only result of the treatment of the refuseniks is to generate support for them in the outside world

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and to show up the evil in the Soviet state. So that next year, the people will be able to see that the people are not the only ones who are suffering. And that's the only way to get rid of the refuseniks.

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And that's the only way to get rid of the refuseniks. And that's the only way to get rid of the refuseniks. And that's the only way to get rid of the refuseniks. And that's the only way to get rid of the refuseniks.

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the people of the Jewish community of the Soviet Union will be let go. We hear a lot in the West about Glasnost, the new openness, and the great reformer Gorbachev. But from the other end, what does it look like to you? The new policy of glasnost is, according to the words, is a very good policy.

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But until now we heard only words. We see now in Russian newspapers more openness, more real facts. But up till now it's only in newspapers and not in our real life. Here in Moscow, every Monday over tea, a group of refusenik women come together.

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So, you see, this is a group of women. We call ourselves the Jewish Women Against Refusal. Please be quiet. And this group was organised about three months ago. We wanted to make our life in refusal more active.

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The most extreme form of protest a refusenik can take, the most extreme and by far the most dangerous, is a hunger strike. Alex, all the while we were talking,

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I knew that you are on a hunger strike and that this is the 19th day of it. What are you trying to do, kill yourself? I don't want to kill myself. I don't want to kill myself.

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I remember that one Canadian journalist asked me whether I'm going to hunger strike till death. And that time I just laughed, but to be serious, I must tell that, of course, this hunger strike is just to get

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to get an opportunity for my children to go on with their lives. So, I'm hunger striking for life. I'm going to hunger strike till life. When we applied, my son was 13 years old.

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He was a boy and we actually thought that he would become a man in Israel. But he's 23 now, he's quite a man already, he's a father and a husband, and they recently applied and they were refused with the inconceivable explanation that they don't have any reason to go because their parents are here.

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So how do you go about preparing for a hunger strike? And what qualities do you need? I must tell that there is no special heroism, no special qualities are needed, everybody. Oh, excuse me.

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We learned later that that call was from Akheta Mission's Skriabin, Alexander's boss. Alex was told to be at Skriabin's office within half an hour. That's something. Until now, the Soviet authorities have given no sign that they're even aware of his action. Perhaps they are now afraid that he may die and bring down upon them the condemnation of the outside world, and in particular, the scientific community.

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It seems to be a very important call, and if you'll excuse me, we'll have to interrupt our conversation now, because I have to go to meet an important person who is inviting me. We had a conversation for about 15-20 minutes, and the serious thing that he told me was that

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The president of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and he, for working for my son, and he is 100% sure that this case is going to be solved. Dima, this may be good news for you and Tanya and little Ilana. So now I can ask you this question.

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How did you feel when your own father went on indefinite hunger strike for you? I am very grateful and I am very proud that I have such a father who can do it for me. Well, let's hope that the authorities do keep their word. But what will you do then? Then I hope that they'll give permission to my father, to the rest, to all of us.

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I would very much like to say to Bernard Levin and to all friends, Shana, Ehshana B'ah Yerushalayim, next year in Jerusalem. And hope it will happen one day. [music]

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[music] (upbeat music) [music] [music]

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Death is fast, the future is bright We say "Peace" We want peace For years, years of peace

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We do peace [MUSIC PLAYING] Dima. Hi.

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Dina? Oh, hello. Nice to meet you. Nice to see you face to face, huh?

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What do you think of it? Oh, it's beautiful. Well, here you are. Now, how did it happen?

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How-- it worked, obviously. But tell us how it worked. What happened? In two weeks, I had a phone call from my viran.

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They gave me information. What were your first impressions? You've only been here such a short time, but-- so it hasn't worn off.

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What was the most extraordinary thing, the biggest shock when you came here? What was so different? - You see that I've been for so many years

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in refuge that I have no shocks just going here. I found it very logical after so many years. But in general, you see, I knew some general things about freedom,

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about the Jewish state and about Yerushalayim, but I never expected little things like this. There are so many green trees here. The buildings are so beautiful compared to Moscow.

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- Here the life is changing so quickly and the weather is changing and you have so different faces here. It doesn't exist as a typical Jewish face.

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It doesn't exist. There are different people, Arabs and Christians and Jews from all over the world. It's very, it's exciting.

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- People, which I knew in Moscow seven years ago, eight years ago, I remember the tension which was on their faces. Now they're relaxed and people here are relaxed also.

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They have to work on just human problems, I was not of such kind that I had in Soviet Union. And I'm just happy. - And I came without money, without friends,

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without language, without apartment, without understanding of meaning of life, how to live here. So suddenly I felt myself like a baby,

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you know, between adults. They live by their own laws, which I don't know and don't understand. I don't know through which door to get into a bus.

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I don't know. In Russia it is back and here it is first. I don't know how to get to the barber shop and how to tell him that I want my hair cut,

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this or that. I don't know what to do. - The main problems are, first of all, the language. - How's your Hebrew?

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(speaking in foreign language) - Better than mine. (speaking in foreign language) - It's no problem, I just enjoy studying Hebrew.

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I dreamt of this. (speaking in foreign language) - I can't say that I belong, you know, in spite of my Hebrew

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and understanding of life now, and I know what to do in different situations, I don't belong. I am a lost generation, you know,

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and my children here, they are all right. And I knew that what I do, I do mainly for them. The only thing which I remember every moment is my father and my sister and my mother,

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or so it's you know. (speaking in foreign language) - Hello? Hello? Hello? Hello?

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Rosalia Borisovna, what are you saying? How are you? Yes, yes, just a moment. - Talk to her, say hello.

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- Oleg. Oleg. I feel that there has to be a fight for every person. There is no reason to wait when the gates will open.

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They won't open without our help. Maybe my mother will see this film. My sister Miriam wants to sing a song that I wrote. Song for Jerusalem.

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Our program is finished. But the story of the refuseniks of the Soviet Union is not. In all the long, tormented history of the Jews, I think this episode is the strangest.

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Not the most terrible, it obviously doesn't compare to the great slaughters, but the strangest. Because consider this,

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The Jews in the Soviet Union are harassed, oppressed, persecuted, reviled, slandered. The whole weight and apparatus of the state is thrown against them. They live, many of them, in fear and in misery. And the only thing they ask, the only boon, the only gift, the only privilege,

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is to leave the country and go somewhere which they can call home. Thousands of years ago, Moses said to Egypt, "Let my people go." In the Soviet Union, there are thousands upon thousands of Jews who wait in hope ever diminishing, but never entirely extinguished,

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for the day when they will find their Moses to lead them out of Pharaoh's bondage towards the Promised Land. ♪ (ominous music) [Music]