Source: commons.wikimedia.org
Jews as enemies of socialist Czechoslovakia
Within the socialist bloc, Czechoslovakia adopted a strongly anti‑Israeli, portraying Zionism as a hostile ideology aligned with Western imperialism. This rhetoric was part of a broader campaign across Eastern Europe following the Six‑Day War of 1967. In 1971, the Czechoslovakian State Security (StB) launched the Spider project, a covert operation designed to systematically monitor citizens of Jewish origin or faith under the pretext of combating “Zionist influence.” By the mid‑1980s, the surveillance apparatus had computerized lists of Jews through a program tellingly named Zionists. Many were subjected to political persecution, harassment, or restrictions on professional and cultural life. These practices also contributed to the broader Cold War tensions, as the targeting of Jewish communities was linked to the regime’s efforts to align with Soviet foreign policy and to present itself as a staunch opponent of Israel.
„In Czechoslovakia, there are pro-Zionist-oriented individuals whose solidarity is based on the awareness of a common ethnic origin and religion and who are carriers of the ideology of Jewish bourgeois nationalism.“
State Security (Stb)
Information for the First Deputy Minister of the Interior of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic. 1987
Further Reading / Sources
Re-Negotiating Czechoslovakia. The State and the Jews in Communist Central Europe: The Czech Lands, 1945-1989
Labendz, Jacob Ari (2014). All Theses and Dissertations (ETDs)
Akce „Pavouk“. Evidování židovského obyvatelstva Státní bezpečností za normalizace
Koutek, Ondřej (2017). Paměť a dějiny, Vol 11, No. 1, pp. 40−54
Projekt Pavouk – evidování osob židovského původu a vyznání Státní bezpečností v sedmdesátých a osmdesátých letech 20. století
Suchánek, Marek – Nosek, Miroslav (2024), Semper Partus. No. 7, pp. 65-76