Even before the presidential plane of Russian leader Vladimir Putin landed at Ben Gurion Airport on Jan. 23, everyone in Israel knew he was the most powerful and influential leader invited to attend the stately event to mark 75 years since the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp by the Russian Red Army. It was no wonder that as far as Israelis were concerned, Putin overshadowed any other leader to grace the Fifth World Holocaust Forum with his presence.

Everyone knew that Putin not only holds the key to the fate of the young Israeli Naama Issachar, who received a disproportionate prison sentence in Russia for smuggling drugs. He also has a say in Israel’s activity in the skies over Syria. Nevertheless, very few Israelis were aware of or had dwelt on one important point: Putin had come to Israel to participate in an event initiated, funded and produced by his close friend and confidante Viatcheslav Moshe Kantor, a Russian Jewish oligarch and chairman of the European Jewish Congress. Nothing about this event, which could easily be called a “Russian event,” happened by chance.

Every year on Jan. 27, the international anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, Poland hosts memorial events that include Holocaust survivors, dignitaries, world leaders and senior delegations from Israel. In 2014, for example, four years before the so-called Holocaust Law sparked controversy in Israel and Poland by making it a criminal offense to accuse Poland of complicity in Nazi war crimes, an Israeli delegation of 60 Knesset members and dozens of Holocaust survivors had taken part in a ceremony in Auschwitz. The two countries have had a rocky relationship since then because of the problematic law as well as a series of statements by senior Polish and Israeli officials. Similarly, the relationship between Poland and Russia devolved to a low point as a result of a dispute between the two countries' leaders over their historical narratives of World War II.

In January 2015, when the World Jewish Congress, then headed by Ron Lauder, held an event to mark the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, the Russian president did not participate. His office claimed that he had not been invited. At around the same time as the event at the death camp, the European Jewish Congress, led by Kantor, held an alternative event also devoted to liberation, but few national leaders took part.