Less than two weeks had passed since the appearance in the Rus Pravoslavnaya newspaper of a letter from deputies to the Prosecutor General calling for “to ban Jews,” when supervisory authorities warned the editors that “they cannot leave the fact of publication without consequences.” The newspaper has long had a bad reputation, and Patriarch Alexy II has repeatedly stated that the publication “discredits the church.” But, who knows, if it weren’t for Putin’s need to go to Auschwitz, would the service’s reaction have been as prompt and would it have followed at all?