The conflict wrenching apart Ukraine is opening schisms among the nation’s emigres in Brooklyn — but they seem to agree on one point: Russia needs to stay out.
In the aftermath of a pro-European uprising in the Ukrainian capital Kiev that drove out pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych, Russian President Vladimir Putin is threatening to annex the country’s Crimea region by force — to the chagrin of Brooklynites born in Ukraine.
“I believe it is awful. I believe Putin is a criminal,” said Kiev native Yelena Makhnin, director of the business improvement district in Brighton Beach — nicknamed “Little Odessa,” after the Ukrainian city. “Whatever is going on in a country should be decided in a country, not by any military coming into a country.”
Like many Russian-speaking Ukrainian immigrants who came to Brooklyn following the fall of the Soviet Union, Makhnin is Jewish. But she brushed off Russian reports that the faction now in control of Ukraine is anti-ethnic Russian and anti-Semitic.
“I was never ever discriminated against for speaking Russian. I was never called bad names for being Jewish,” said Makhnin. “For Putin to say he is promoting the interests of Russians and Jews, it is a joke.”
Other Ukrainian-born Brooklynites said they initially sympathized with the anti-Russian protestors in Kiev, but have become increasingly frightened of their allegedly pro-Nazi and anti-Semitic tendencies.
“We all know who these people are. They were the ones burning Jewish villages to the ground during the war, and they were the ones beating gays in the streets before they found Molotov cocktails to toss at the Russian tanks,” said Lena Tsodikovich, a 26-year-old community organizer. “I’m so torn on this — glad that they’re fighting back, but afraid of the inevitability of both their loss and their rise to power.”
Tsodikovich’s family moved to Coney Island when she was eight years old on refugee visas granted to Jews fleeing persecution. She said her Jewish relatives in the old country haven’t reported any problems so far, but Tsodikovich still suspects the Western press has whitewashed the nastier aspects of the nationalist movement in order to advance a pro-American agenda.
“I’m getting the sense that this is like any other seemingly unrelated conflict — for America, it is an opportunity to supply the rebellion, build alliances, and have a hand in the next administration,” said Tsodikovich. “I’m so sad that my home country is just another battleground of an opportunity to expand American imperialism.”
Still, Tsodikovich doesn’t want Russia intervening in Ukraine.
“When our land was rich with resources — wheat, infrastructure, skilled labor — Russia took it all,” she said.
Some shared Tsodokovich’s fears of anti-Jewish sentiments in the new Ukrainian government — but were still overjoyed to see Yanukovych deposed, noting the ex-leader’s past convictions for robbery and assault, and claims that he embezzled money and abused protestors.
“He’s a criminal. He stole billions of dollars from the country, from the public funds. The people were suffering,” said Michael Belogorodsky, a Gravesend resident. “But he didn’t have any fascist or nationalistic views.”
Belogorodsky was born in the Simferopol, the Crimea’s provincial capital, and came to America in 1995 at age 11. Today, he is an NYPD sergeant and president of the Russian-American Officers Association. Belogorodsky recalls enduring anti-Semitic taunts as a boy, and said he never identified himself as a Ukrainian.
He has stayed in contact with friends throughout the country of his birth, and has tried to sort out what is really happening on the ground.
“I’ve tried to dissect the facts. Russian media has a lot of propaganda, but what they show is true,” Belogorodsky said. “But the selection of what they show appears to have a purpose.”
Belogorodsky said he believed Crimea, which has a majority of ethnic Russians and was part of Russia until 1965, should be allowed to decide if it wants to break away from Ukraine — but he was resolute in his condemnation of Russia’s military intervention.
“What Russia is doing is politically, is ethically, is legally wrong,” Belogorodsky said. “I don’t support Russia, but I can tell you I support the people in the Crimea.”
