As a result, the Cossacks and Greek Orthodox Ukrainians rose again. Bogdan Khmelnitzki entered into negotiations with the Russian Tzar Alexis Michaelovich, looking to the incorporation, with the rights of an autonomous province, of the Greek Orthodox portion of the Ukraina, under the name of Little Russia, into the Muscovite Empire. In 1654 this incorporation took place, and in the same year the Russian army marched upon White Russia and Lithuania to wage war on Poland. Now came the turn of the Jews of the northwestern region to endure their share of suffering. 3. THE RUSSIAN AND SWEDISH INVASIONS (1654-1658) The alliance of their enemies, the Cossacks, with the rulers of Muscovy, a country which had always felt a superstitious dread of the people of other lands and religions, was fraught with untold misery for the Jews. It was now the turn of the inhabitants of White Russia and Lithuania to face the hordes of southern and northern Scythians, who invaded the regions hitherto spared by them, devastating them uninterruptedly for two years (1654-1656). The capture of the principal Polish cities by the combined hosts of the Muscovites and Cossacks was accompanied by the extermination or expulsion of the Jews. When Moghilev on the Dnieper[130] surrendered to Russian arms, Tzar Alexis Michaelovich complied with the request of the local Russian inhabitants, and gave orders to expel the Jews and divide their houses between the magistracy and the Russian authorities (1654). The Jews, however, who were hoping for a speedy termination of hostilities, failed to leave the city at once, and had to pay severely for it. Towards the end of the summer of 1655 the commander of the Russian garrison in Moghilev, Colonel Poklonski, learned of the approach of a Polish army under the command of Radziwill. Prompted by the fear that the Jewish residents might join the approaching enemy, Poklonski ordered the Jews to leave the boundaries of the city, and, on the ground of their being Polish subjects, promised to have them transferred to the camp of Radziwill. Scarcely had the Jews, accompanied by their wives and children, and carrying with them their property, left the town behind them when the Russian soldiers, at the command of the same Poklonski, fell upon them and killed nearly all of them, plundering their property at the same time. In Vitebsk the Jews took an active part in defending the town against the besieging Russian army. They dug trenches around the fortified castle, strengthened the walls, supplied the soldiers with arms, powder, and horses, and acted as scouts. When the city was finally taken by the Russians, the Jews were completely robbed by the Zaporozhian Cossacks, while many of them were taken captive, forcibly baptized, or exiled to Pskov, Novgorod, and Kazan.