A new Russian bookstore opened this week in Tel Aviv, one of the many cultural initiatives that the recent wave of Russian immigrants, many from Moscow, have brought to Israel’s White City.

Many of Russian immigrants explain that they are fleeing to Israel to escape oppression in Putin’s Russia.”I like Israel, I have family and friends here, and yet immigration is a hard choice for someone whose profession is based on the Russian language,” said the owner of the new Russian bookstore, Evgeni Kogan, to Tazpit Press Service (TPS).