Natan Sharansky’s Fourth of July, and His Long Road to Freedom

On July 4, 1974, Natan (then Anatoly) Sharansky—who had spent the previous fifteen days in a Soviet prison—married Avital (then Natalia Stieglitz) in Moscow. The next day, Avital departed for Israel, but Natan was denied permission to leave the country and scant years later would be arrested on fictitious charges of espionage. It was not until 1986 that he was released, thanks to sustained pressure on the Soviet government from President Reagan, various members of Congress, and the American Jewish community. In a powerful interview with David Samuels, Sharansky describes his role in the refusenik movement and his wife’s activism during his imprisonment. He begins by explaining how he formed his sense of Jewish identity: