Leonid Smilovitsky is chief researcher at The Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Center, Tel Aviv University.

"For many years, historians largely assumed that the Jews who survived the war either sought complete assimilation into Soviet society or were too cowed by governmental persecution to assert their Jewish identities. Only a few brave refuseniks and dissidents continued to identify as Jews. Newer research, however, has shown that at least outside of Moscow and St. Petersburg, ordinary Soviet citizens of Jewish heritage continued to express their Jewish identities in the decades after the war in a variety of ways. Smilovitsky’s book adds to our understanding of how Jews presented themselves in postwar Belarus. The book is a useful resource for scholars of Eastern European Jewish life."

• List of Abbreviations, List of Tables, Preface, Introduction: Belarusian Jewry Prior to the Revolution and Until World War II, 1 The Demography of the Jews of Belarus, 2 Soviet Policy Toward the Practice of Judaism in the Postwar Period, 3 The Decline of the Synagogue, 4 Religious Life, 5 In the Aftermath of the Holocaust, 6 Cultural Life, 7 Jews in the Reconstruction of the Economy and Cultural Life, 8 International Contacts, 9 The Policy of State Anti-Semitism, Conclusion, Appendix 1: Documents, Appendix 2: Tables, Glossary, Bibliography, Index