The book Consider My Inmost Thoughts by Joseph Zissels—a prominent public figure, member of the Ukrainian Helsinki Group, and participant in the “First of December” Initiative Group—is the English translation of the original Ukrainian text, first published in 2021. The title comes from Psalm 5, verse 2 of the Complete Jewish Bible: “Hear my words, O God. Judge my thoughts” (7). Drawing on his own research and long-standing involvement in the dissident movement, Zissels presents a framework for understanding modern Ukraine through the lens of values fundamental to the European tradition.
The volume primarily consists of speeches, essays, conference and seminar presentations, supplemented by television and radio interviews. Together, these texts address a wide range of issues, including civil society, civilizational identity, tolerance, xenophobia, antisemitism, reconciliation, Polish-Ukrainian and Jewish-Ukrainian relations, the Holodomor, the Holocaust, and the Russian war in Donbas. Zissels’s style throughout is forthright yet balanced.
The book is organized into six sections. The opening section, “Dissidence,” traces his family background, formative years, and entry into the dissident milieu. It then turns to Jewish life, the evolution of Jewish-Ukrainian relations, and the work of Jewish organizations. The second section, “Civil Society,” addresses issues of social integration, the volunteer movement, and societal tolerance, with particular attention to the exaggerated threat of right-wing radicalism employed by Russian propagandists to discredit Ukraine. Zissels supports his arguments with evidence from sociological surveys and Freedom House reports on the domestic political views of Ukrainians. He underscores the significance of the 2004 Orange Revolution and the 2014 Revolution of Dignity in shaping Ukraine as a modern political nation.
The third section, “Identity and Tolerance,” examines the concept of civilizational identity, contrasting Eurasian and European value systems. Zissels also explores the phenomenon of Soviet Jewry and the Jewish diaspora, citing sociological studies and his own experience as executive vice president of the Congress of National Communities of Ukraine. Reflecting on painful historical legacies, he observes that Israelis “built their state on the opposition to the Holocaust” (182) and, therefore, refuse to view themselves as victims. His recommendation that Ukrainians learn from the experiences of other nations and overcome the “victimhood symptom” of the Holodomor, however, overlooks a crucial difference: the Holocaust served as a catalyst for the establishment of an independent Jewish state, while the Holodomor buried the idea of an independent state for the Ukrainians for decades.
The fourth section, “Jews of Ukraine,” continues the theme of “healing the wounds of the past” through education in tolerance and a commitment to truth based on the study of primary sources. Here, Zissels examines the demographics, sociology, organizational structures, and identity of Ukraine’s Jewish community. He notes that deliberate antisemitic provocations form part of Russia’s ongoing information warfare against Ukraine. He distinguishes between the factors that characterize antisemitism in western Europe, which are absent in eastern Europe.
The fifth section, “From the Speeches,” presents seventeen texts and constitutes the most substantial portion of the book. It opens with the well-known “For Our and Your Freedom!” speech delivered at the People’s Assembly (Euromaidan) on the Day of Dignity in Kyiv, December 15, 2013. Highlights of this section include Zissels’s reflections on the Minsk agreements and prospects for peace in Donbas; the role of civil society in shaping Ukraine’s ethno-national unity policy; the referendum in the Netherlands; the hidden pitfalls underlying the Ukrainian-Polish scandal; debates surrounding the design of the Holocaust Memorial Center in Kyiv; and his response to US Congressman Ro Khanna’s defamatory claims regarding Holocaust denial by Ukrainian authorities.
The final section brings together excerpts from nine interviews with American and Ukrainian radio and television journalists. This part proves especially revealing. The concluding text is a March 2019 interview with Ostap Drozdov, conducted in the context of a public letter from the “First of December” Initiative Group—of which Zissels is a member—expressing support for President Petro Poroshenko. In this interview, Zissels offers insights that shed light on Ukraine’s current predicament.
The confessions of an intellectual who has laid bare his innermost thoughts in this timeless testimony will be of lasting value to historians, sociologists, political scientists, human rights activists, and the public at large.
