In a country where anxieties about anti-Semitism are never far from the surface, Viktor Yanukovich’s victory in Ukraine’s presidential election is being welcomed with caution by Ukrainian Jews.
Yanukovich, who has close ties to the Kremlin, replaces Viktor Yushchenko, his West-leaning rival who won five years ago in a second runoff election between the candidates. Widespread protests claiming fraud in favor of Yanukovich in the original runoff spurred the rematch. The pro-democracy protests became known as the Orange Revolution.
Yanukovich’s victory, which was finalized last Saturday when his main opponent, Yulia Tymoshenko, dropped her legal challenge to the results, isn’t expected to bring significant changes for the Jews of Ukraine, some Jews say.
… In the west of the country, where ultranationalistic and anti-Semitic attitudes are traditionally stronger, some Jews welcomed the Yanukovich victory.
“Unlike Tymoshenko, he is quite predictable,” said the Chabad rabbi of the Ivano-Frankovsk community, Moshe Kolesnik.
Kolesnik said the community was glad the election was not accompanied by anti-Semitic violence.
“We are grateful this time no one threw stones through our windows. During the previous elections it was much worse,” he said.
“The local authorities here represent the whole spectrum of ultranationalists. Fortunately they mostly quarrel with each other, leaving us alone.”
The election season was not free of anti-Semitic themes, however.
Sergey Ratushnyak, the mayor of one western Ukrainian town who was running for president, engaged in smear tactics against another candidate, Front for Change leader Arseniy Yatsenyuk, over his alleged Jewish roots.
Ratushnyak garnered less than 1 percent of the vote, and Yatsenyuk, whose hypothetical Jewishness was never established, won nearly 7 percent.
