When Izabella Tabarovsky immigrated to the United States from Siberia in 1989, she was overwhelmed by the sheer variety of food at the supermarket. There were 25 types of cheese to choose from and a nice selection of breads, while back home, there was just one of each. The choices were endless — and they were everywhere she went. At university, hundreds of courses were offered. It was mind-boggling.
“It really blew all our Soviet immigrants’ minds,” she recalled. “When you come from a society where everything is prescribed and choices are minimal, you just follow a certain path. Here you had to take charge of your life. It’s destabilizing, but it’s also, of course, incredibly freeing once you get adjusted.”
Another thing that impressed her 19-year-old mind was the freedom of speech. Journalists criticized the government, people with different political views debated openly. Nobody worried about being canceled, that term didn’t even exist then. Back in the USSR, that would have been unthinkable.
“I remember thinking, wow! It takes a really confident country to air these kinds of disagreements and criticism out there,” she said.
But today, the landscape has shifted. On many college campuses, only one point of view is widely accepted, and it is often fiercely antizionist and critical of Israel. Students are afraid to speak openly or share opinions that deviate from the prevailing ideology.
“Universities today often expose students to only one set of ideas and everything else is demonized,” Tabarovsky said. “Young people aren’t given the chance to explore different perspectives and decide for themselves what they agree with.”
The first time she noticed the shift was at the start of the COVID pandemic in 2020.
“People were scared to say something wrong, and the social pressure alone could ruin you. You could lose your job. It was the same fear I thought I had left behind in the USSR.”
Unlike in the Soviet Union, where propaganda and censorship came directly from the government, in America today the pressure comes from society itself. On campuses, both students and professors enforce a rigid ideological conformity, creating an environment where Jewish students — or anyone who identifies as Zionist — often feel the need to stay silent, and keep their belief “in the closet.”
Tabarovsky, a pioneering scholar of Soviet antizionism and contemporary antisemitism, explores these issues in her new book, “Be a Refusenik: A Jewish Student’s Survival Guide.” Drawing a parallel between the propaganda she witnessed growing up in Siberia and the pressures faced by Jewish and Zionist students on today’s college campuses, she argues that young people must reclaim the courage to speak out without fear.
“I think the book serves multiple purposes. One is to give young people examples of how to stand firm when they disagree with society, showing that it’s both powerful and morally clear,” said Tabarovsky. “Dissidents, in the Soviet sense, are people who hold a position of honor. I want readers to see the lineage of Jewish dissidents before them — they faced noble struggles similar to today’s challenges, and they won.”
Tabarovsky spoke with The Journal from her home in Jerusalem, where she has lived since making Aliyah five years ago, after living many years in Washington, D.C. This week, she is returning to the U.S. for a series of lectures, including one at Valley Beth Shalom.
Tabarovsky draws inspiration from the Jewish refuseniks of the Soviet era — those who fought to make Aliyah despite government restrictions. “I portray stories of refuseniks alongside young students today,” she said.
“It’s about relentless reclaiming — reclaiming Zionism, reclaiming your Jewish identity. Young people need to take charge themselves because often, the adults in their lives haven’t prepared them for the challenges they’ll face.”
Tabarovsky emphasizes the importance of role models and moral clarity. The book highlights heroes and leaders, like Natan Sharansky, who wrote the foreword to the book. Sharansky is perhaps the most well-known refusenik. Born in Ukraine, he spent nine years in prison for his efforts to emigrate and fight for Jewish rights.
She also critiques superficial “talking points” approaches. “In this war of ideas, young people need profound knowledge about who we are, what it means to be Jewish and Zionist, not just the right phrases to say. Once they have that, they’ll know what to do from experience, not reaction.”
Growing up in Siberia in the 1970s and 80s, Tabarovsky said she glimpsed freedom through packages of clothes and photographs sent back by friends and family who had emigrated to the U.S.
“They sent us photos of supermarkets that are fully stocked with a multitude of goods. It helps you understand that something works differently in that society,” she said. “We were being told that socialism and communism is the best system in the world, then why do we have to wait 20 years to get a new car?”
Seeing how people lived beyond the Iron Curtain made Tabarovsky dream of immigrating — an aspiration shared by many Jews in the Soviet Union. Even as a child, she sensed the vast gap between life under Soviet communism and the freedoms people enjoyed in the West. The propaganda she encountered at school and in the media did little to convince her of the government’s message.
“I was fortunate to have a father who understood the depth of brainwashing and hated Soviet power,” she said. “He always gave us counter-propaganda at home, and that helped me see that much of what we were told was just propaganda. I understood there was a better world out there, but the gap between the two systems was so vast and the Iron Curtain was so thick that you couldn’t really understand what it was like.”
Tabarovsky believes the response must begin with education — both at home and in Jewish schools. Parents, she said, need to help their children understand Jewish identity, Israel and Zionism in a deeper way, so that young people will not feel intimidated or pressured to hide their views once they arrive on campus. They also lack the knowledge and tools to respond when Israel is accused of being an occupier or committing genocide.
In her book, she pairs the stories of Soviet Jewish dissidents with those of contemporary Jewish students, drawing inspiration from the refuseniks who challenged the Soviet regime.
She argues that many Jewish students today feel pressure to distance themselves from Israel because they lack the knowledge and confidence to defend their identity.
“In many Jewish schools there isn’t enough deep learning about Israel,” she said. “Not in a formulaic way, but in a way that grapples with the complexity and teaches the stories of heroism that are missing.”
Tabarovsky also believes the Jewish community needs to move away from defining itself primarily through victimhood.
“We don’t need to compete in the ‘victimhood Olympics,’” she said.
Instead, she hopes the stories in the book will offer young people examples of courage and moral clarity — much like the Soviet refuseniks who refused to give up their identity and fight for freedom despite intense pressure.
