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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/israel-helps-ukraine-whitewash-its-nazis/36911">electronicintifada.net</a>
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<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Israel helps Ukraine whitewash its Nazis</h1>
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<p class="gmail-node__submitted">
<span class="gmail-field"><span class="gmail-field-author"><a href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/asa-winstanley">Asa Winstanley</a> and </span><span class="gmail-field-author"><a href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/ali-abunimah">Ali Abunimah</a></span></span>
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-publisher"><a href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/electronic-intifada">The Electronic Intifada</a></span>
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-publication-date"><span class="gmail-date-display-single">23 December 2022</span></span> </p>
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<span><img src="https://electronicintifada.net/sites/default/files/styles/original_800w/public/2022-12/illia-samoilenko-masada.jpeg?itok=A55PNu6V×tamp=1671798627" alt="A man in military uniform overlooks a desert" title="" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;" width="392" height="290"></span><p>Wearing
the “Wollfsangel” symbol used by Hitler’s fighters in World War II,
Ukrainian Azov fighter Illia Samoilenko vists the Masada archelogical
site in Israel. (AzovstalFam/Twitter)</p><p>Representatives of Ukraine’s neo-Nazi <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/azov-battalion">Azov Battalion</a>
have been touring Israel to drum up support for the unit’s imprisoned
fighters. They have been meeting with Israeli politicians and soldiers.</p>
<p>Azov intelligence officer Illia Samoilenko was released in a prisoner exchange with Russia in September.</p>
<p>He had been one of the hundreds of Azov fighters who surrendered in
May at the end of the long Russian siege of the eastern city of
Mariupol.</p>
<p>“Israel values freedom, values strength, Israel values honor. It’s the same things that we also value,” he <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/europe/2022-12-20/ty-article/.premium/downplaying-far-right-ties-ukrainian-war-hero-goes-on-israeli-publicity-binge/00000185-306c-dcac-a185-b8efb39e0000">told</a> Israeli newspaper <em>Haaretz</em> this week.</p>
<p>Samoilenko also <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/after-4-months-in-russian-solitary-ukrainian-officer-visits-israel-tells-his-story/">told</a> <em>The Times of Israel</em>
that “he sees Israel and Ukraine on the same side, the civilized
battling the uncivilized in a struggle for the future of humanity,” the
outlet summarized.</p>
<p>“We have prosperity, beautiful, prosperous, beautiful civilization,
and they have medieval cavemen,” he said. It seems the “they” in this
case are the Palestinians and the Russians, who Samoilenko regards as
“uncivilized.”</p>
<p>Along for the Israeli tour with Samoilenko is Yulia Fedosiuk, the
wife of an imprisoned Azov fighter and a far-right activist in her own
right.</p>
<p>Both were on a charm offensive this week, as part of a wider push to whitewash Azov’s image in the West.</p>
<span><img src="https://electronicintifada.net/sites/default/files/styles/original_800w/public/2022-12/samoilenko-fedosiuk-lazimi.jpeg?itok=z6zuu3tu×tamp=1671798627" alt="Three people in suits pose for a photo" title="" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;" width="392" height="302"></span><p>Azov members Illia Samoilenko and Yulia Fedosiuk met with Naama Lazimi of Israel’s Labor Party. (AzovstalFam/Twitter)</p><p>Before Russia invaded Ukraine in February, it was widely acknowledged that the Azov Battalion promoted Nazi ideology.</p>
<p>The Anti-Defamation League, a major Jewish communal and Israel lobby group, for instance, <a href="https://mobile.twitter.com/adl/status/1176238081688702981">warned in 2019</a> that Azov was a “Ukrainian extremist group” with “ties to neo-Nazis and white supremacists.”</p>
<p>But now with Western governments arming Ukraine, including the Azov
Battalion, in a proxy war against Russia, there is a concerted effort to
hide this ugly reality from public view.</p>
<p>Consequently – with help from the media and now Israel and its lobby – Azov has in recent months attempted to rebrand itself.</p>
<p>Seeking a stamp of approval from Israel is a time-honored strategy of
European and American far-right extremists seeking to gain mainstream
legitimacy.</p>
<p>In May <em>The Times</em> of London <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/azov-battalion-drops-neo-nazi-symbol-exploited-by-russian-propagandists-lpjnsp7qg">reported</a>
that Azov was planning to change its symbol from the wolfsangel – a
far-right symbol associated with a division of the German army during
Hitler’s Nazi regime.</p>
<p>But even that surface-level whitewash seems to have been too much of a
change for Azov to endure. The symbol remains visible in all of Azov’s
online outlets.</p>
<p><a href="https://twitter.com/Polk_Azov/status/1587834642681544707">Recent</a> Azov social media <a href="https://twitter.com/Polk_Azov/status/1585288556884512770">postings</a> show their fighters still using the wolfsangel.
</p><div id="gmail-file-127466">
<blockquote><p dir="ltr" lang="en">1/2 Lieutenant
colonel Denys "Redis" Prokopenko, the commander of the AZOV RGT and the
Hero of Ukraine, is absolutely selfless. Redis, as an older brother,
cares about the warriors of the RGT and will fight side by side with
each one against the enemy. <a href="https://t.co/ymc7XQc2ne">pic.twitter.com/ymc7XQc2ne</a></p>— AZOV Regiment (@Polk_Azov) <a href="https://twitter.com/Polk_Azov/status/1587834642681544707?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 2, 2022</a></blockquote>
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<div id="gmail-file-127471">
<blockquote><p dir="ltr" lang="en">The street dedicated to the Heroes of the AZOV Regiment was presented in Kyiv.<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/AZOV_Regiment_news?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#AZOV_Regiment_news</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/loyalty?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#loyalty</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/heroism?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#heroism</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/pride?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#pride</a> <a href="https://t.co/YGIcJ9p560">pic.twitter.com/YGIcJ9p560</a></p>— AZOV Regiment (@Polk_Azov) <a href="https://twitter.com/Polk_Azov/status/1585288556884512770?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 26, 2022</a></blockquote>
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And photos posted by a pro-Azov Twitter account, the “Association of
Families of the Defenders of Azovstal” show that Samoilenko and Fedosiuk
visited Masada, where Samoilenko wore the Nazi-linked symbol on his
uniform.
<p>Masada is the site of a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/22/israel-masada-myth-doubts">mythical</a>
last stand by Jewish fighters against Roman forces. Today, Israel holds
swearing-in ceremonies for its new soldiers there, and they pledge that
“Masada shall not fall again.”
</p><div id="gmail-file-127441">
<blockquote>— Асоціація родин захисників «Азовсталі» (@AzovstalFam) <a href="https://twitter.com/AzovstalFam/status/1604132679221334016?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 17, 2022</a></blockquote>
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The Azovstal association’s Telegram account <a href="https://t.me/AzovstalFamilies/1158">posted</a>
photos of the Azov members at Masada and stated, “When today in Israel
we talk about the defense of Mariupol, the Israelis … constantly repeat:
‘Mariupol is your Masada.’”
<p>As well as Masada, the tweets show that the two Ukrainian militants also met with <a href="https://twitter.com/AzovstalFam/status/1604852420605054982">reservist</a> Israeli soldiers, <a href="https://twitter.com/AzovstalFam/status/1605560188005601280">attended</a> a film screening and met with Naama Lazimi – a <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/2022-08-11/ty-article-opinion/.premium/a-symbolic-choice-in-labor-primary-that-could-push-longtime-voters-away/00000182-8d67-d68b-a3e2-ff67a63f0000">leading</a> Israeli politician in the Labor Party, which is part of the outgoing coalition government.
</p><div id="gmail-file-127446">
<blockquote>— Асоціація родин захисників «Азовсталі» (@AzovstalFam) <a href="https://twitter.com/AzovstalFam/status/1603370265206931457?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 15, 2022</a></blockquote>
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<h2>Documented ties to Nazism</h2>
<p>During the meeting with Lazimi, Samoilenko “debunked the myths
created by Russian propaganda about the Azov regiment,” the Azovstal
association <a href="https://t.me/AzovstalFamilies/1147">claimed</a> on its Telegram channel.</p>
<p>This seems to be a reference to the Russian government’s accurate
claim since the start of its invasion of Ukraine in February that the
Azov Battalion is a Nazi organization.</p>
<p>But recall that this wasn’t only a claim from Russia, it was widely
acknowledged and reported in Western media, including by the <a href="https://www.bellingcat.com/about/">EU-funded</a> “investigative” website Bellingcat.</p>
<p>In 2019, Bellingcat <a href="https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2019/02/15/defend-the-white-race-american-extremists-being-co-opted-by-ukraines-far-right/">extensively documented</a>
the battalion’s international outreach to white supremacist groups,
noting that “Azov’s interest in reaching American extremists and the
Ukrainian group’s comfort in cooperating with neo-Nazis in the US and
West was on display” until at least 2018 – four years after the Azov
battalion was integrated into Ukraine’s national guard.</p>
<p>But as the US, UK and EU wage their proxy war against Russia in
Ukraine, Western media have largely fallen in line, portraying Azov
sympathetically as the “defenders of Mariupol,” as misunderstood
nationalists and as the victims of “Putin’s propaganda.”</p>
<p>Even the Anti-Defamation League, which previously condemned Azov’s Nazi ties, is falling into line.</p>
<p>After the Russian invasion, the ADL <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/israel-lobby-group-adl-rehabilitates-hitlers-accomplices-ukraine/35021">engaged in blatant Holocaust revisionism</a>
in order to whitewash Hitler’s wartime collaborators who are today
venerated as national heroes in Ukraine even though they helped the
German leader murder hundreds of thousands of Poles and Jews during
World War II.</p>
<p>The ADL is now also helping to airbrush Azov. Recently, the Israel lobby group <a href="https://thegrayzone.com/2022/12/08/adl-ukraines-azov-battalion-far-right/">claimed</a>
that the Azov Battalion’s 2014 integration into Ukraine’s national
guard meant that the Azov military unit had split from the broader
far-right Azov political movement and from the movement’s founder Andriy
Biletsky.</p>
<p>As a consequence, the ADL now says that it “does not see Azov Regiment as the far-right group it once was.”</p>
<p>But in 2019, Bellingcat had already reported on “newly uncovered
statements by a senior law-enforcement official” in Ukraine that
“suggest that incorporation of the Azov Regiment into the National Guard
of Ukraine didn’t affect the far-right ideology espoused by the
former’s members – and instead allowed Azov to obtain sophisticated
weaponry and build their own political party.”</p>
<h2>“Restore the honor of the white race”</h2>
<p>In recent months, the Azov Battalion appears to have renamed itself
the “Azov Regiment,” another apparent attempt to legitimize itself as a
normal element of the Ukrainian state and whitewash its Nazi image while
maintaining all the same policies.</p>
<p>This name change was played up in <a href="https://www.jpost.com/international/article-725351">a puff piece by <em>The Jerusalem Post</em> this week</a>, which claimed that “the Azov Battalion [is] the predecessor of the Azov Regiment.”</p>
<p>But just as when the US and its allies have repeatedly <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/rania-khalek/questions-al-qaidas-rebranded-syria-affiliate-wont-answer">attempted to rebrand</a> the Syrian branch of al-Qaida <a href="https://thegrayzone.com/2021/06/09/washington-positioning-syrian-al-qaeda-mohammad-jolani-asset/">as “moderate rebels,” such</a> cosmetic changes are unlikely to fool anyone outside the ranks of spineless mainstream media journalists.</p>
<p>And despite Samoilenko and Fedosiuk’s charming of the Israeli press
this week, there’s absolutely no reason to think that Azov has moved
away from its racist, anti-Semitic roots.</p>
<p>As well as still using the Nazi wolfsangel symbol, <a href="https://twitter.com/Polk_Azov/status/1585288556884512770">recent Azov social media postings</a> show that the group’s founder Andriy Biletsky is still a regular presence at Azov parades.</p>
<p><a href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/israel-arming-neo-nazis-ukraine/24876">Biletsky has</a> “pledged to restore the honor of the white race” and when he was in parliament he advanced laws forbidding “race mixing.”
</p><div id="gmail-file-127451">
<blockquote>— Асоціація родин захисників «Азовсталі» (@AzovstalFam) <a href="https://twitter.com/AzovstalFam/status/1604852420605054982?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 19, 2022</a></blockquote>
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In 2014 he wrote that “the historic mission of our nation in this
critical moment is to lead the white races of the world in a final
crusade for their survival. A crusade against the Semite-led
untermenschen.”
<h2>A dedicated fascist</h2>
<p>Despite the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/10/world/europe/ukraine-mariupol-soldiers-wives.html">sympathetic treatment she has received</a>
this year from the same Western media that valorized the Azov Nazis,
Yulia Fedosiuk too, is an active part of the Ukrainian far-right.</p>
<p>“One of my best friends, he is a Jew and he is in Azov,” Fedosiuk <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/after-4-months-in-russian-solitary-ukrainian-officer-visits-israel-tells-his-story/">claimed</a> in a <em>Times of Israel</em> interview this week.</p>
<p>Samoilenko made similar claims in his <em>Haaretz</em> <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/europe/2022-12-20/ty-article/.premium/downplaying-far-right-ties-ukrainian-war-hero-goes-on-israeli-publicity-binge/00000185-306c-dcac-a185-b8efb39e0000">interview</a>, an assertion which the paper noted he was “unable to back up immediately by providing names.”</p>
<p><a href="https://medium.com/@pitt_bob/fascists-in-defence-of-democratic-values-the-whitewashing-of-the-ukrainian-far-right-continues-dc7a90ca8082">In a revealing piece on Fedosiuk</a>,
researcher Bob Pitt observes that “Azov’s propensity for double-talk
and denial is particularly notable in connection with anti-Semitism,
where assurances to western journalists that the movement welcomes
Jewish members are contradicted elsewhere by expressions of extreme
hostility towards Jews.”</p>
<p>Pitt writes that Fedosiuk is a dedicated fascist who rants against
feminism and LGBTQ rights and has valorized early 20th century Romanian
fascist leader Corneliu Codreanu.</p>
<p>Codreanu was a virulent anti-Semite <a href="https://us-holocaust-museum.medium.com/romanian-fascist-codreanu-back-in-spotlight-21273d8b590b">who once declared that</a> “The historical mission of our generation is solving the kike problem” (“kike” is an extremely derogatory term for Jews.)</p>
<p>As Pitt noted, when Fedosiuk worked for Azov’s publishing house
Plomin, it published Ukrainian translations of writings by Codreanu, the
Italian fascist Julius Evola and other notorious figures from Europe’s
fascist history.</p>
<h2>Nazis in power</h2>
<p>Israel has close ties to both Russia and Ukraine. Despite President
Volodymyr Zelensky complaining that Israel has declined to provide
Ukraine with the “Iron Dome” missile system, arms, training and fighters
from Israel have reached Ukraine – including the Azov Battalion.</p>
<p>In April, <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/mercenaries-ukraine-thank-israeli-government">video emerged of Israeli mercenaries</a> fighting in Ukraine, thanking the Israeli government for “helping us” in their war against Russia.</p>
<p>Also that month, <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/israel-still-arming-ukrainian-nazis">video posted online by Azov</a> showed that Israeli anti-tank weapons were being used by the unit.</p>
<p>The Azov Battalion began as a gang of far-right street thugs. Its activists formed the vanguard of the 2014 <a href="https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/the-hidden-origin-of-the-escalating-ukraine-russia-conflict">US-backed “Maidan” coup</a> which overthrew the elected government of Ukraine. Soon after, it was integrated into Ukraine’s armed forces, where it remains.</p>
<p>In 2018, <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/israel-arming-neo-nazis-ukraine/24876">Israeli human rights lawyer Eitay Mack wrote</a> to the Israeli government to object that the country’s aid to Ukraine was being used by neo-Nazis.</p>
<p>In response, the government confirmed that its arms licenses to
Ukraine were granted “in full coordination with the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs and other government entities” but did not deny arming Ukrainian
Nazis.</p>
<p>The Electronic Intifada’s 2018 exposé of Israel’s arming of Ukrainian Nazis <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/israel-still-arming-ukrainian-nazis">caused a minor diplomatic incident</a>, when Ukraine’s ambassador to Israel wrote a formal complaint to <em>Haaretz</em> after the newspaper echoed our reporting.</p>
<p>Mack petitioned Israel’s highest court to stop the state arming
Ukrainian Nazis. The government responded by requesting hearings be held
behind closed doors and <a href="https://www.the7eye.org.il/334249">imposing a gag order on the press</a>.</p>
<p><em>Asa Winstanley is an investigative journalist and Ali Abunimah is executive director of The Electronic Intifada.</em></p> <h3>
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