I discuss the possibility of a mass deportation of the Jews at
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/vphfMFXwZ7g/hytNAoRUqyMJ
***
"According to Rubinstein, after Ehrenburg's letter was sent, no more
signatures were collected; the organizers of the campaign understood that
they could not proceed further until Stalin made some sort of response. He
concludes that it is unclear whether Ehrenburg's letter made Stalin
reconsider or at least hesitate--and whether this hesitation coupled with
Stalin's death, saved the Soviet Jews. In his footnote 60 on page 434
Rubinstein writes that Alexander Yakovlev--the famed "liberal" adviser to
Gorbachev, and a man who would not seem to have any motive to whitewash
Stalin--concluded, based on research into secret Kremlin archives, that
Stalin was not directly behind the plan to exile the country's Jews.
Yakovlev believes that Stalin put an end to the scheme before he died, and
that Ehrenburg's letter may have played a role. Rubinstein also notes that
"Nikita Khrushchev once provided a completely different view of what
happened. He claimed that Mikoyan and Molotov objected to the deportation
plan and that even Voroshilov said it would be criminal and resemble the
acts of Hitler. Khrushchev claimed that Stalin grew furious in the face of
their objections and that he suffered his fatal stroke a few days later;
see *Le Monde*, April 17, 1956, p. 3."
"In short, there definitely was an organized campaign to get Soviet Jews to
urge their own deportation, and it is difficult to imagine people as
prominent as the campaign's organizers proposing such a radical measure
unless they were at least led to believe it had Stalin's support.
Nevertheless, it is possible it was a "trial balloon" that Stalin would have
reconsidered had he lived longer--or that he already had reconsidered
before his death in OTL. OTOH, it is perfectly possible he would have gone
through with it."