ABSTRACT
After the war, Dutch Jewry was consciously international in orientation, just as it had been in the beginning, four centuries earlier. Jews in the Netherlands naturally looked to Israel and the United States, but they also attached great importance to solidarity with Jews in perilous situations elsewhere. In the 1950s much attention was paid to the position of Jews in the Arab world, but by far the most successful campaign was for the millions of Jews in the Soviet Union, who were unable to practise Judaism and for whom emigration was virtually impossible. The refuseniks, Soviet Jews denied permission to emigrate to Israel, were the central focus. They were the Jewish counterparts to the dissidents who were supported everywhere in the West.
