October 4, 2006 Kiev, Ukraine. Israeli right-wing group SamsonBlinded takes responsibility for protests against the World Holocaust Forum in the Ukraine, cites whitewashing of Ukrainian genocide of Jews.

The second World Holocaust Forum, in Kiev, Ukraine, on September 26-27 was accompanied by massive protests. Crowds led by the Ukrainian anarchist party chanted, “Khmelnitsky—Petlyura—Babi Yar!” a slogan connected with Babi Yar, the infamous place on the outskirts of Kiev where dozens of thousands of Jews were massacred in 1941-43, and with Ukrainian national heroes Bogdan Khmelnitsky (1595-1657) and Simon Petlyura (1879-1926), who massacred a similar numbers of Jews. In Kiev and other cities, the protesters distributed about a million leaflets detailing Ukrainian crimes against Jews.

Protesters demanded an end to state honors for Khmelnitsky and Petlyura, an extensive school program on the Holocaust, and an official investigation of Ukrainian participation in the genocides of 1918-21 and 1941-43. Ukrainian anarchists are historically close to the Jews; the anarchist army of Nestor Makhno executed hundreds for carrying out pogroms.

SamsonBlinded’s founder Obadiah Shoher said, “The President of Ukraine promotes ultra-nationalist values which have led to genocide before. Ukraine is the only European country without a Holocaust program in schools. Common Ukrainians don’t know that most of the murderers at Babi Yar were their compatriots or that the Ukrainians cheered as the Jews left their cities. Hardly anyone knows of the genocide perpetrated by the national heroes Khmelnitsky and Petlyura. Ukrainians still hold plenty of confiscated Jewish property.” Shoher also blasted the Jewish establishment for allowing the Ukraine, Poland, and Latvia—the countries most implicated in World War II massacres of Jews—to sponsor the Holocaust Forum. He called the forum’s name, Let my people live, a tasteless parody of Louis Armstrong’s song, Let my people go.

SamsonBlinded was formed around Shoher’s manifesto, Samson Blinded: A Machiavellian Perspective on the Middle East Conflict. The group, in particular, aims at providing physical security for diaspora Jews, restitution of confiscated Jewish property, and raising consciousness of state-sponsored anti-semitism worldwide.