MYTH 2: AZOV BRIGADE FIGHTERS HAVE ANTI-SEMITIC VIEWS

From the very beginning of Azov's existence, ethnic Jews have served in its ranks. One of the most famous Azov fighters of Jewish origin is Ruslan Serbov with the call sign "David", which directly refers to the figure of the biblical King of Judea and Israel. Azov fighter "David" visited Israel in November 2022 for rehabilitation purposes due to the amputation of his leg as a result of injuries sustained in the battles for Mariupol. David also has a brother, Arthur "Ara" Serbov. He took part in combat operations in the ATO zone in Eastern Ukraine from 2014 to 2018. After that, he served in the French Foreign Legion from 2018 to 2022. Following the start of a full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation in February 2022, he returned to fight for Ukraine and joined Azov. In November 2023, he was seriously wounded.

Oleh "Simon" Krisenko, Chief Sergeant of the Azov Brigade. He joined the Azov Brigade in 2014. He defended Mariupol in 2022 and spent a year in Russian captivity. He is of Jewish descent. One of his great-great-grandfathers was a Jew from Lithuania who moved to Ukraine in the late nineteenth century. During the Second World War, Oleh's great-grandfather was sent to a prison in Odesa by the Nazis and was presumably shot. The place of his execution and burial is unknown.

Daniil "Ryba" Rybalchenko, was the chief sergeant in Azov. He had Jewish heritage on both his father's and mother's side. Several of his Jewish relatives on his mother's and father's side were killed during the Holocaust, including in the Warsaw ghetto, and his maternal grandfather, a Polish Jew, was a tank driver in the Polish army and died in a Soviet concentration camp. Daniil joined Azov in 2015. In the spring of 2017, he was severely wounded in the head in the battles near Marinka, the bullet exited in the back of his head. After being wounded, he returned to service. He died on April 9, 2022, during the defense of Mariupol.

Volodymyr Zvenyatskiy, an ethnic Jew, has been teaching Azov tactical medicine since 2014.

In 2016, Viacheslav Likhachev, a well-known political scientist of Jewish origin and researcher of the ideology and activities of modern far-right movements in Russia and Ukraine, said: "It should be clearly understood: there is no "neo-Nazi Ukrainian militia" now. "Azov" is a regular military unit subordinate to the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine. It is neither an irregular unit nor a political group. Its commanders and fighters individually may have personal political views, but as an armed unit, Azov is part of the Ukrainian Defence Forces system." He also added that it was necessary to clearly distinguish between Azov and political projects linked to its former commander (meaning Azov's first commander Andrii Biletskiy).

During the defense of Azovstal in the spring of 2022, Azov's deputy commander Sviatoslav Palamar repeatedly went live on broadcasts with various Israeli media outlets and gave comments to Israeli journalists about what was happening in Mariupol, providing accurate information about the Russians' crimes in the city.

In 2022, during the siege of the Azovstal plant by Russian troops, Chief Rabbi of Ukraine Moshe Reuven Asman appealed to the Israeli Knesset to evacuate the Azov fighters to Israel or to a third state. He has also personally met with Azov fighters on several occasions, thanking them for their service in Ukraine.

Israeli businessman and philanthropist Leonid Nevzlin publicly supports Azov and financially contributes to the unit.

The head of the United Jewish Community of Ukraine, Rabbi Yakov Dov Blaich, has said that he does not believe in the existence of neo-Nazis in Azov.

Bernard-Henri Lévy, a French philosopher of Jewish origin, has repeatedly and publicly expressed support for Azov and insisted that he knows from personal encounters with the fighters that there is no anti-Semitism within the unit. Lévy traveled to the hot spots on the frontlines in Ukraine and filmed two documentaries: "Why Ukraine?", released on June 28, 2022, and "Slava Ukraini" (Glory to Ukraine).

In December 2022, Azov Brigade officer Ilia Samoilenko visited Israel. He held a number of meetings with Israeli politicians (such as Knesset member Naama Lazimi), IDF soldiers, and local pro-Ukrainian activists.

On May 5th, 2024, the Chief Rabbi of the Brodsky Synagogue in Kyiv, the head of the All-Ukrainian Congress of Jewish Hasidic Religious Communities and Chief Rabbi of Ukraine, Moshe Reuven Azman, and Jewish chaplain Yakov Syniukov congratulated Azov on its 10th anniversary. In their video addresses, the religious leaders noted the courage and heroism of Azov’s fighters and called on the international community and those who are religious to pray for the Azov POWs and to facilitate their exchanges in every way possible.