In 1953 a student of the Gnessin State Institute of Music and Pedagogy, Kogan, wrote a sinfonietta as his diploma piece, and on examination it emerged that it was built upon the national anthem of Israel

In 1953 a student of the Gnessin State Institute of Music and Pedagogy, Kogan, wrote a sinfonietta as his diploma piece, and on examination it emerged that it was built upon the national anthem of Israel. This became the occasion for a further investigation, in the course of which it was established that Kogan himself knew no Hebrew and was not acquainted with the Israeli anthem, and had, moreover, lived in Baku for twenty years, while the theme of the sinfonietta had been suggested to him by Mikhail Fabianovich Gnesin, head of his class and brother of the founder of the musical complex. Gnesin, for his part, had by then twice visited Palestine, and it is known that his musical work was bound up with Jewish melodies and Jewish themes. The case was described in detail in a letter to Khrushchev from the Department of Literature and Art of the Central Committee of the CPSU on the «clogging» of the institute's staff named after Gnessin. Khrushchev instructed the former Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, Panteleimon Ponomarenko, to settle the matter.

Soon after this affair Mikhail Gnesin ceased to teach and went into academic retirement.