Baku, September 5, AZERTAC

Since May of this year, pro-Armenian activists in Israel, using funds received from Armenian organizations in the United States, have been disseminating articles of a left-liberal orientation in Israeli and Jewish-American media calling to abandon support from Azerbaijan.

As the main argument they put forward the thesis that the Jews who survived the Holocaust, now, allegedly, themselves become "accomplices in the genocide" of Armenians in Karabakh. This is an attempt to put pressure on the Israeli leadership in order to force it to abandon its military-strategic partnership with Azerbaijan.

However, the organizers of this dirty campaign won’t have any actual power to influence the leadership of Israel. The response campaign of rabbis from all over the world received much wider resonance in Israel, who published articles in the Israeli, American and French media condemning the leadership of Armenia regarding the demonization of Azerbaijan and the cynical exploitation of the Holocaust for propaganda purposes.

Well-known rabbis from many countries of the world raised their voices against the demonization of Azerbaijan and the use of the Holocaust theme by Armenian propaganda, and the speeches of rabbis who categorically disagree with such statements were announced in tens of thousands of synagogues throughout Israel.

“I join my fellow rabbis and share their opinion…,” said on his personal Facebook page Rabbi of Saxony (Germany) Zsolt Balla, who supported a group of influential rabbis around the world against the demonization of Azerbaijan and the use of the theme of the Holocaust by Armenian propaganda.

As Israel's largest Russian-language publication “Vesti” notes, 18 leading US and European Rabbis also voiced their support for Azerbaijan. “They have responded to the call of Baku Rabbi Zamir Isayev, who issued a video message highlighting documentary evidence that accusing Azerbaijan of “Armenian genocide in Karabakh” is pure fiction,” the publication says.

One of the leading media outlets of the Jewish diaspora in Latin America, the Argentinean online publication Visavisc also disseminated the video message by Baku Rabbi Isayev calling on Jews all over the world to speak out against the demonization of Azerbaijan and the use of the Holocaust theme by Armenian propaganda. The online publication described the accusations against official Baku regarding the "genocide" of Armenians in Karabakh as a "smear campaign".

Founder of the Latin American Rabbinic Conference, President of the Argentine Israeli Mutual Assistance Association (AMIA) and member of the European Conference of Rabbis Eliyahu Hamara, Chief Rabbi of Panama David Perets and Rabbi of the Sephardic community of Chile Eliahu Tamim also voiced their support against the demonization of Azerbaijan and the use of the Holocaust by Armenian propaganda.

On August 25 of this year, Baku Rabbi Zamir Isayev posted a video message on his Facebook page addressed to all the Jews around the world in Hebrew and English languages, and in the first two days, major Jewish media not only published the text of the message but also supported it.

Emphasizing that rabbis around the world condemn the Armenian propaganda, the most influential Israeli publication in English, “The Jerusalem Post”, writes: “The Azerbaijani Jewish community ... appeals to the Jewish leadership to condemn the use of the Holocaust by Iran’s allies in reference to the ongoing crisis in the Karabakh region.” According to The Jerusalem Post, this appeal has already been supported by many influential rabbis around the world.

On August 27-28, similar articles were also published by a number of other religious Jewish publications in Israel, France, and other countries, such as Israel National News, INN, Actualic, newspaper Shaharit, and Kountrass.

“The international campaign of demonization against Azerbaijan carried out by Armenia under the auspices of Iran has caused indignation among influential rabbis around the world,” Israeli religious publication Kikar mentions.

Head of the Odesa Jewish Religious Community (Ukraine) Shlomo Baksht posted on his Facebook page a link to a publication by “The Jerusalem Post” calling on Jews around the world to speak out against the demonization of Azerbaijan and the use of the Holocaust theme by Armenian propaganda. Any “comparisons” are an insult to the sacred memory of those victims of the Holocaust,” Baksht wrote, responding to the statements by Armenian “figures” quoted in Isayev’s address. “In an interview with AFP, Armenian Prime Minister Pashinyan accused the Azerbaijani authorities of creating a “real ghetto” in the enclave, and this is supposedly “preparation for another Holocaust.” The representative of the separatists Vardanyan even stated that "the suffering of Armenians is greater than the suffering of the victims of the Holocaust ...".

“Head of the Armenian government Pashinyan’s accusing the Azerbaijani authorities of creating a “real ghetto” for the Armenian residents of Karabakh in “preparation for the next Holocaust”, as Pashinyan put it, caused a wave of fierce condemnations among rabbis around the world ...”, the Israeli religious publication Matzav Ha-Ruah mentioned.

Last weekend, on Friday and Saturday, this edition of the newspaper was distributed free of charge throughout Israel to 80 synagogues in the country.