Liana Degtiar with her relatives

This is me (1st from the left in the 1st row), with my relatives. This photo was taken in Rishon Le Zion in 1997 at Ella Ox's (2nd from the left), adopted daughter of my aunt Riva, birthday. You can see my aunt Gita Shtivelman (3rd in the left in the 1st row), my aunt Riva Ox (4th from the left in the 1st row), my cousin brother Boris Shtivelman ( 3rd from the left in the 1st row), my cousin brother Carl Shtivelman (5th from the left in the 2nd row).

In 1992 my husband and I went to visit his brother Moisey Rybakov in Israel. I've always sympathized with Israel. I'm certain that Jews must have their own state. I agree with Solzhenitsyn that Jews had so many problems, because they didn't have a land of their own. Now they have it. My husband and I kept listening to the radio during the Six-Day-War and the War of Judgment Day. I think they should look for a peaceful way of resolving the conflict with the Arabs. I've always respected Yitzhak Rabin: as a politician, he was a wise man and made a great contribution into the establishment of peace in Israel. His death was a tragedy for the whole of Israel. This was a wonderfully interesting trip. We traveled all over the country. In Jerusalem we were sure to visit Yad Vashem. We both lost our dear ones during World War II. We visited all our relatives in Israel. Stores in Israel had plenty of goods while here in Moldova there was such desolation after the breakup of the USSR: empty stores; if they had eggs for sale, there were queues and people bought large quantities to fill up their stock of eggs at home. There were cards to buy clothes. There were anti-Russian demonstrations in Moldova: young fascist-oriented people tore off awards from the clothes of veterans of the Great Patriotic War, and people were afraid of speaking Russian in the streets.

In 1993, Alexandr moved to Leningrad to work at the biophysical laboratory at the Academic Institute. He divorced Tatiana and left her their apartment. We keep in touch with Tatiana. She is a wonderful person. Lyonia often visits us. He is a student of the Faculty of Mathematics of Kishinev University. Alexandr remarried in Leningrad. His second wife, Olga Ivanova, is Russian. Their salaries are hardly enough to make ends meet. It's just enough to commute by metro to and from work. During that time, representatives of Israel went for a scientific conference to Leningrad. They offered Alexandr a job by his specialty at the university in Tel Aviv. Olga followed him. In 1997, their son Ilia was born. At that time I was bedridden with my leg fractured. I broke it in early 1997. Olga had to go to work and I went to Israel to look after my grandson. I retired in 1993, at the age of 60. I stayed there for three months. I walked with a stick, but I visited all my relatives: my father's sisters and nephews had moved to Israel by then.