Rabbi is back from Russia, with love

It’s hard to imagine Rabbi Charles Klein, spiritual leader of the Merrick Jewish Centre, as a rebel. He is as friendly and mild-mannered as they come, with a smile perpetually etched across his face. The father of four and grandfather of six dresses in smart suits and is a fierce adherent of Jewish tradition. But, for a cause, he has risked arrest and even been arrested more than once.

In the fall of 1981, Klein “invaded” the Tass News Agency’s New York City bureau, taking part in a sit-in to protest the Soviet Union’s treatment of Jews in the then communist nation, which officially banned all religions. Klein said he simply walked into the Soviet agency’s office and sat down with a group of other metropolitan-area Jews, refusing to budge, and hoping not to get shot. “Only lies came out of this office,” Klein said.

New York City police were called, and the protesters, including Klein, were hauled off in handcuffs. Klein also handcuffed himself to the Soviet mission on 67th Street in Manhattan –– twice.

“For many of us, we made this part of our life calling” to free Russian Jews living under the Soviet regime, said Klein, 60, in a recent interview at his Merrick office.

And so, for many years Klein was barred from entering the Soviet Union, even after it opened up to the West in the mid-1980s and the communist government lost power in 1991, leading to a free Russia. Last summer, however, Klein finally got the opportunity to visit Russia –– and the Russian Jews –– he had risked so much for more than three decades ago.

Last July, Klein joined a 10-day rabbinic mission to Russia, sponsored by the United Jewish Appeal Federation of New York, a nonprofit organization that aids poor Jews around the globe and promotes “a passion for Jewish life and learning.” The rabbis visited emerging Jewish communities in Moscow and St. Petersburg that were decimated under the Soviet Union.

Rebuilding a Jewish community

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, Russia boasted the largest Jewish population in the world. The Russian census of 1897 counted more than 5 million Jews. Following the Russian Revolution in 1917, which overthrew Russia’s monarchy and installed a communist government, religion was outlawed.