Section: Jewish Telegraphic Agency (USA)
En route to Lugansk, lies, bribes and high fives
A guard outside the home of Rabbi Shalom Gopin, Chabad’s emissary in Lugansk who fled the flighting and is now in Israel. In the backseat of a car headed to the rebel-held city of Lugansk, I was feeling confident about my plan for getting in and out safely to report an article about how the city’s Jewish community is coping with the...
In Lugansk, an icy Ukraine winter tests a war-torn community
Members of the Lugansk Jewish community standing in front of their synagogue’s Torah ark, Dec. 11, 2014. (Cnaan Liphshiz/JTA) LUGANSK, Ukraine (JTA) — In an unheated synagogue with no running water, a dozen Jews are trying to keep warm as temperatures here veer toward the single digits. Not moving too much helps keep the warmth under their...
Israel speeds up aliyah procedures for residents of eastern Ukraine
KIEV, Ukraine (JTA) — Israel implemented special procedures to speed up the immigration process for people with Jewish origins from Ukraine’s conflict zones. The new procedures were implemented earlier this month and formulated in a new executive directive issued by the headquarters of Israel’s Population and Immigration Authority to...
Hundreds of Ukrainian Jews receive aid packages in Lugansk’s synagogue
DNEPROPETROVSK, Ukraine (JTA) — Several hundred Jews braved sub-freezing temperatures to receive aid packages at the synagogue of the besieged city of Lugansk. The distribution of basic necessities on Wednesday by administrators from the east Ukrainian city’s Jewish community drew approximately 300 recipients, who stood in line for over an...
Ukrainian Jewish fighter touted as ‘hero, symbol of resistance’ to Russia
Asher Joseph Cherkassky in Dneproperovsk in 2014. (Courtesy of http://evreiskiy.kiev.ua) With his gray beard, AK-47 assault rifle and camouflage fatigues, Asher Joseph Cherkassky looks like an Eastern European version of Fidel Castro. But Cherkassky’s look is no attempt to emulate the Cuban revolutionary or any of his bearded associates....
Kharkiv Jewish philanthropist dies of gunshot head wound
(JTA) — Vadim Vishnevsky, a prominent member of the Jewish community of Kharkiv in Ukraine, died of a gunshot wound to the head. Vishnevsky was rushed to hospital on Nov. 20 from his office, the Ukrainian Vesti newspaper reported. Police are investigating the shooting, which according to some accounts may have been self-inflicted, Vesti reported....
Ukraine rabbi: U.S. Jews helped us beat Russia’s anti-Semitism propaganda
(JTA) – Jewish communities in the Ukraine and U.S. conducted a coordinated effort to refute Russian claims that Ukraine’s revolution unleashed a wave of anti-Semitic acts, a chief Ukrainian rabbi said. “We’ve been working very closely with the organized Jewish community to counter the propaganda that is coming out of Russia about...
Swastikas painted on Babi Yar memorial, Jewish school
(JTA) – Swastikas were painted on the Holocaust memorial monument at Babi Yar in Kiev. It is the second time that the monument has been vandalized in two months. The graffiti was found Monday during a tour at the site for schoolchildren, The Jerusalem Post reported. A swastika was painted on the monument, located at the site where Nazi troops...
In Lviv, a Holocaust survival story gets lifted from the gutter
Limmud FSU founder Chaim Chesler in Lviv, Nov. 7, 2014. (Courtesy of Limmud FSU) Armed with an Israeli attitude toward problem solving and 30 years’ worth of experience in working in Eastern Europe, Chaim Chesler doesn’t back down easily from a work-related dispute. But even Chesler, founder of the Limmud FSU Jewish learning...
Russian rabbi slams demand that Jews condemn Ukrainian oligarch
(JTA) — A senior Russian rabbi accused the country’s communist party of “vulgar and primitive anti-Semitism” after it demanded Russian Jews condemn a Ukrainian Jewish oligarch. The condemnation Wednesday by Rabbi Boruch Gorin, an advisor to Chief Russian Rabbi Berel Lazar and Lazar’s spokesperson, followed a letter that two communist...
