About 500,000 Jews served in the Soviet Red Army during World War II. Today, some 7,000 veterans – most of those alive today – live in Israel. Once a year, they march in parades wearing uniforms dripping in medals. Afterward, they return home to their modest apartments, where some tick off the days in solitude and poverty. Holocaust survivors frequently speak about the horrors they experienced, but Soviet war veterans arrived in Israel as pensioners, and most never learned Hebrew. Few Israelis know their stories.
