Israeli Publicist Says Israel’s Pro-Russian Stance Problematic for US, UK

MOSCOW, January 30 (Sputnik) – Israel is refusing to adopt the position that is being promoted by the US and UK: it does not want to support more anti-Russian sanctions and does not want to rewrite the results of the Second World War, Israeli publicist and political analyst Avigdor Eskin told Radio Sputnik.

Recently, Israel's Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, reiterated that his country won’t support any list of anti-Russian sanctions.

"The state of Israel is kind of a problematic place for Great Britain, because Israel doesn’t take any anti-Russian position today," Avigdor Eskin told Radio Sputnik.

"Israel was the victim of different international smear campaigns," he said. "As you remember, in the 1970s when the UN voted for the resolution 'Zionism is Racism', later this resolution was changed, but this rehabilitation took more than 15 years. Sometimes a certain international trend becomes fashionable and Israel is the last country which will forget what Russia did for our people to save the lives of the remnants of the Jewish community during WWII, and also in creating the state of Israel in 1948. Israel in principle will not support any sanctions of this sort, especially when it comes to Russia. It is absolutely final."

Avigdor Eskin also commented on the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp and the recent announcements of Polish politicians who downplayed Russia's role in this process.

"Although the Prime Minister of Israel didn’t want to enter this controversy and to take sides, and to create a new political scandal for Israel, he could not accept the fact that the country which carries all the moral benefits of liberating Auschwitz will not be really represented there by President Putin," he said. "I mean, he (Putin) is the one who represents the liberation army of the Soviet Union of that time. And it is not just that he didn’t go there, even our Foreign Minister Lieberman didn’t go to Warsaw. So, Israel was represented by very low-level officials. And I know that the Israeli officials were very skeptical about any Jewish organization participating there, as you can see from the facts which I'm bringing to you."

"It is also very important to mention that Poland didn’t want to be exposed as a country, which was the first one to sign the pact with Hitler, Poland was not interested to be exposed as a country which committed terrible Jewish pogroms after WWII when the people returned from Auschwitz to their homes," he added. "We are talking about at least 351 Jews killed there by the Poles. All these facts they were trying to hide during the generations, and now this new controversy could bring it up. I mean, the Polish side was really showing this low behavior in order to cover all these things from the past. It is not something which Israel could cooperate with. So, the Israelis were just absent and did not go there."

"But by the very absence of our ministers there the message was conveyed to the Polish Government very strongly, and to the government of Russia as well, I think," Eskin concluded.