Jerusalem Creates a Safe Haven for Russian-Language LGBTQ Books Banned by Putin

A Jerusalem preservation library is collecting Russian-language LGBTQ books that were banned, censored, or nearly erased in Russia and Ukraine, turning reading into an act of cultural resistance. The project, based at the Open House in Jerusalem and run with Kesher Israel, gives a home to material that activists say the Russian state has tried to eliminate.

Mikhail Kiryev, a member of Jerusalem’s LGBTQ community who moved to Israel in 2022 after Russia’s war with Ukraine and the persecution she experienced, says she even returned to Russia to smuggle out banned books. She is now studying for Reform rabbinical ordination and works at the National Library. “For the Russian law now, there is a list of banned terrorist organizations, Hamas is not included, but LGBTQ organizations are,” she said, adding that even wearing a pride T-shirt can lead to prison. She described the first censored book as a young author’s translated story about a summer-camp love affair.

Ola Weinstein, a Reform rabbi and CEO of Kesher Israel, said the organization began 18 years ago as a feminist group for Russian-speaking women, then expanded after the Ukraine war to serve Russian-speaking LGBTQ newcomers. She said about 200,000 immigrants and refugees from Russia and Ukraine arrived, and that the group created 10 women’s groups and seven LGBTQ groups in the past four years, along with Hebrew ulpan classes and local coordinators working with gay centers and municipalities.

Social worker and activist Anna Talisman, who leads the center’s “Kesher” project, said many arrivals are doubly traumatized as Jews, dissidents and LGBTQ people. She said some were arrested for a blog, an Instagram page, or even having a pride flag at home, and that Russian culture has been driven into self-censorship. The library now holds dozens of books, including some with blacked-out passages, on queer history, fiction, poetry, film, and critical theory, in Russian, Ukrainian, English and Hebrew, and Talisman said it also helps bridge Russian and Ukrainian-speaking refugees.