USSR

MIDDLE ISRAEL: For Russian President Vladimir Putin, the USSR’s downfall 'was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century.'

Born in Ukraine, Svetlana made aliyah with her mother and maternal grandparents when she was three years old.

Putin, who served in the Soviet-era KGB, has previously described the collapse of the Soviet Union, which was ruled from Moscow, as the "greatest geopolitical catastrophe" of the 20th century.

The killing of Soviet Jewish poets was seen as a crackdown against the Jewish Anti-fascist Committee and part of Stalin's increasingly antisemitic policies before his death.

David immigrated to Israel as a child from Moscow, but his parents fought their way here as refuseniks in the USSR. The circumcision of their grandson took place in Jerusalem.

In 2016, the UN General Assembly designated April 26 as International Chernobyl Disaster Remembrance Day, recalling the long-term consequences of the disaster that continue to this day.

Since the early 2000s, two Miami businessmen have run a "commercial empire," as Radio Free Europe report puts it, answering to the Ukranian-Israeli billionaire oligarch Ihor Kolomoyskyy.

Protesters gathered near the Russian embassy in Tel Aviv, carrying signs in Hebrew, English, and Russian reading "Free Navalny."

Limmud Labs is designed to find young people like Brin, and “empower them to be active in their local and greater Jewish communities,” Omer Yankelevich, Israel’s minister of Diaspora Affairs said

Natan Sharansky's memoir explores his struggles within the USSR, and during his Israeli political career.