Ceausescu valued his Chabadnik chief rabbi Rosen as dictator facilitated selling Soviet Jews to Israel
Why did the Romanian rabbi go to Israel in 1989?
In 1979, he asked the Rebbe if he could leave his post, since he was already an elderly man and it became difficult for him to work. Rebe replied that he himself was even older, but he had plans for ten years ahead.
When Nikita Khrushchev visited Romania in 1958, he advised to introduce a commodity exchange instead of receiving money. In exchange for permission to emigrate 500 Jews, Jacober built an automated factory in Romania, the products of which were exported.
When Nicolae Ceausescu came to power in Romania in 1965, he decided to change this seemingly ineffective way of "selling Jews". He said that he wanted to receive only cash in dollars: "We want to receive a certain amount of cash per head, the amount of which depends on the age, education, profession and marital status of each Jew who wants to emigrate."
In 1978, the ransom amount reached five thousand dollars per person. Assessing the results of foreign trade, Ceausescu said: "Jews and oil are our best export goods."
It is important to note that Romania was the only country of the Soviet bloc that did not break diplomatic relations with Israel after the Six-Day War.
From the first years of his reign, Nicolae Ceausescu pursued a foreign policy aimed at reducing Romania's dependence on the Soviet Union. Thanks to informal contacts with the United States in 1967, it was possible to achieve what was impossible in the USSR: the Romanian authorities officially authorized the activities of the charitable Jewish organization "Joint". With his attitude towards Israel and Romanian Jews, Ceausescu sought to show Western countries that his government is independent of the Soviet Union and more liberal than the regimes of other countries of the Soviet bloc.
The preservation of community life in Romania was largely possible thanks to the activities of Chief Rabbi David-Moshe Rosen (1912-1994). The Romanian dictator valued him as a man who completely controlled the Jewish community. Rav Rosen often acted as a mediator in Romania's contacts with the West.
Rav Rosen (whose father was a rabbi in the CHABAD synagogue) had close ties with the Rebbe King Moshiach. They say that he could go to Reba bypassing the secretaries. In 1979, he asked the Rebbe if he could leave his post, since he was already an elderly man and it became difficult for him to work. The head of HABAD replied that although he himself is even older, he has plans for ten years ahead. The Rebbe advised him to stay in his post for another ten years, and then ask him again.
10 years have passed. In 1989, when Rabbi Rosen was in New York, he went to Rebba and asked what to do now. Rebe told him to move to Israel, but before that he sold his house in Romania so that there would be nothing left there. Rabbi Rosen did so, and a couple of months later, in December 1989, there was an anti-communist uprising in Romania, which led to the overthrow of the government. Ceausescu and his wife were shot, and their property was confiscated.
The rebels searched all over the country for sympathizers of the old regime and dealt with them. They were looking for a rabbi, but not finding him, they destroyed his house. Thus, we see how the Rebbe saved him from imminent death.