He is relentless and outspoken. And he has paid the price. He was arrested twice for his human rights activities and served six years in prison in the Soviet gulag. But he emerged from behind prison bars to the world stage. Josef Zissels is now the head of the Association of Jewish Organizations and Communities of Ukraine. He is also Vice President of the World Jewish Congress. He is once again in the political limelight after a recent visit to North America. The sixty-eight year old Zissels set up Ukraine’s first Jewish organization in 1988. He has been a strong and consistent defender of Ukraine’s independence and democratic path. In an interview with the Toronto Star, Zissels discussed the troubles in eastern Ukraine. He told the Star that it’s a war. And Jews are suffering in the same way other Ukrainians are. Many have moved from eastern Ukraine to Kyiv and other western Ukrainian cities to escape the danger. But Ukraine’s Jewish community is largely staying put. And not only staying put. But also pitching in. Zissels told the Canadian Jewish News that Ukrainian Jews volunteer to help displaced persons. They provide the army and National Guard with money, medication, […]

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The city of Dubno is located in the Rivne Oblast, or province, in western Ukraine. It sits on the banks of the Ikva River. The current population is around 38,000. Dubno was first mentioned in a chronicle dated 1099, although it is thought to be even older. In the “Story of the Passing Years” the monk Nestor wrote of ancient Slavic tribes called Volhynians living in Dubno. In the early 14th century it was annexed by Poland and became a royal stronghold guarding that country’s eastern border. Dubno was the site of a renowned castle, built by the Ostrozhsky family. In the 15th and 16th centuries, the castle was made into a modern fortress, one of the strongest in the area. The castle stood until it was destroyed in 1915 during World War I. Granted city rights in 1498, the town attracted many foreign settlers, most notably Jewish and Armenian. The Jewish community of Dubno is first mentioned in documents of 1532 in connection with the ownership of cattle. The oldest tombstone inscription in the Jewish cemetery dates from 1581. During the Khmelnytsky Uprising of 1648-49, Dubno Castle was the scene of heavy fighting. Some of it was described by […]

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A grandfather taught his grandson the Jewish alphabet and read him poems in Yiddish. Shortly before his death, he tied all the Jewish books into a pile, and threw them onto the very top shelf of a cabinet. He believed that nobody would ever need them. But the grandson took down this pile and started to read the books. This is a story of a language lost and regained. And this is also a story of one man’s determination to honor his heritage with an extraordinary contribution to help revive a language of dreamers. “My interest for Yiddish was born in my family,” says Dr. Dmytro Tyshchenko. “My ancestors spoke this language; it was as natural as breathing.” Tyshchenko is the son of a Jewish mother and a Ukrainian father from Donbas. He is the creator of a massive new Yiddish-Ukrainian dictionary, produced with the assistance of the Ukrainian Jewish encounter. The 945-page tome is being acclaimed in Jerusalem, Kyiv and elsewhere. The Holocaust nearly destroyed Yiddish in Eastern Europe. Further damage was inflicted by Stalin’s executions of Yiddish-language writers, and Soviet government policies. The language lost its vitality and languished on the margins of society. But the language refused […]

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Passover is a festival of freedom. It commemorates the exodus of Jews from Egypt over 3000 years ago. The timeless and universal message of this holiday is that slaves can go free, and the future can be better than the present. Passover, or Pesach, as it is called in Hebrew, begins in the middle of the Hebrew month of Nisan, the first month on the Jewish liturgical calendar. It lasts for seven days in Israel, eight in the diaspora. On the Gregorian calendar, Passover generally corresponds with late March or early April. This year, 2015, Passover begins Friday evening April 3rd, and ends Saturday evening, April 11th. Passover is known as the Feast of Unleavened Bread. In preparing for Pesach, Jews clean their homes and vehicles, removing every trace of leaven (or chametz, in Hebrew). This act symbolizes the haste with which the Jews left Egypt. They did not even have time to let the bread rise. It is also a symbolic purification ritual— removing the puffiness of arrogance and pride, which separates us from one another, and our Creator. The eating of matzo, or unleavened bread, is very important to Jews during this time. The scrupulous ritual avoidance of […]

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Download: UJH-2014-0803-Tisha B’Av Tisha B’Av is a fast day that commemorates the destruction of the two Temples in ancient times, as well as more recent tragedies befalling the Jewish people. It is sometimes referred to as “The Ninth of Av, since it falls on the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av. On the secular calendar it usually coincides with late July or mid-August. Tisha B’Av vividly recalls devastating tragedies in Jewish history, so it is known as the saddest day on the Jewish calendar. The first great tragedy occurred in 586 B.C.E. when the Babylonians sacked Jerusalem and destroyed the First Temple built by King Solomon, the most important place in ancient Judaism. The Temple was re-built on the site of the First Temple, and completed in 516 B.C.E. This second temple was destroyed during the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 C.E. The destruction of the two Temples took place on the same day — the ninth of Av — about 656 years apart. These two events were so devastating that the ancient rabbis declared the anniversary of the Temples’ destruction a day of mourning. This is the origin of Tisha B’Av. Other tragedies have occurred on this […]

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Babyn Yar is a ravine on the outskirts of Kyiv that has become a symbol of the Holocaust. There more than 100 thousand perished during the Nazi occupation, including 40,000 Jews. Babyn Yar was first mentioned in historical accounts in 1401, in connection with its sale by a “baba” (which means an old woman), to the Dominican Monastery. Over the course of several centuries, the site was used for various purposes including military camps and at least two cemeteries, among them an Orthodox Christian cemetery and a Jewish cemetery. The latter was officially closed in 1937. On September 19, 1941 the Nazis occupied Kyiv. Ten days later, on Yom Kippur, they began the mass murder of Jews at Babiy Yar. The city’s Jews obeyed a Nazi order to assemble there, expecting to be deported, as Nazi propaganda intended. According to German records, in just two days nearly thirty four thousand Jews were killed. The killing continued for months. The majestic ravine quickly became a mass burial site of Jews, Gypsies, Ukrainians, Russians, Hungarians, and others …civilian hostages, prisoners of war, patriots and partisans, including Ukrainian Nationalists. The Nazis spared no one … not children, the elderly, nor pregnant women. Patients […]

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«If you believe that you can damage, then believe that you can fix.» Those are the words of Rebbe Nachman, founder of the Breslov Hasidic movement. In his short life, Rebbe Nachman achieved much acclaim as a teacher and spiritual leader, and is considered a seminal figure in the history of Hasidism. He was born in 1772 in the village Medzhybizh, Ukraine. His great-grandfather was Baal Shem Tov, the founder of Hasidic Judaism. As a young boy Nachmzan was extremely pious, spending much of his time time praying and meditating in the nearby forest, and diligently studying Kabbalah. In accordance with the custom of his time, he was married at the age of 13, soon after his Bar Mitzvah. His wife was Sashia, daughter of a Rabbi from a nearby village. They had eight children, of whom four daughters survived, with known descendants to today. Rebbe Nachman gained an ardent following, including one of the senior leaders of the Hassidic movement. He openly addressed issues such as addiction and compulsive behaviours, and was a strong proponent of experiencing joy in the earthly realm through spirituality. Another of Rebbe Nachman’s well-known sayings is, “It is a great mitzvah to be happy.” […]

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Іsrael Baal Shem Tov is the founder of the Hasidic movement in Judaism. His name means «a good man who knows the secret name of God». Rabbi Baal Shem Tov developed a sophisticated mystical system based not on an intellectual comprehension of God, as did the Kabbalists, but on passionate religious aspiration, easily accessible to poor people. The aim was dvekut – union with God. Little is known about him and his life. What biographical information does exist  is interwoven with legends of miracles so it is often hard to determine fact from legend. Israel Baal Shem Tov was born to a poor family in the small village of Okopy, in the Ternopol region of western Ukraine. The exact year is unknown and often disputed. He was orphaned at the age of five. The Jewish community adopted him, and provided him with his basic needs. In 1710 Israel graduated and became assistant to the Melamed, which means instructor, in cheder, which is a Jewish elementary school. In 1716 he married, but soon became a widower and began to wander through Jewish shtetls in Eastern Galicia. In Yazlovtse (near Buchach) he managed to obtain a position as melamed. In 1727, the […]

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Drohobych is a town in the Lviv region of Ukraine, and the homeland of Bruno Szultz – a writer, literary critic, fine artist, and teacher of art. Szultz was born to Jewish parents and is regarded as one of the great Polish-language prose stylists of the 20th century. He attended school in Drohobych from 1902 to 1910, then went on to study architecture at Lviv Polytechnic. In 1917 he briefly studied architecture in Vienna. Szultz was discouraged by influential colleagues from publishing his first short stories. However, that changed when several letters he wrote to a friend were brought to the attention of the famous Polish novelist Zofia Nałkowska. The letters detailed Szultz’a solitary life and the lives of his family and fellow citizens. Nałkowska encouraged Szultz to have the letters published as short fiction. They were published in 1934 as The Cinnamon Shops. In English-speaking countries, it is most often referred to as The Street of Crocodiles. He went on to write a number of critical essays for various newspapers, and short stories for magazines. Due to World War Two, much of his work has been lost. In 1939, after the Nazi–Soviet invasion of Poland in World War II, […]

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Belz is a small city in the Lviv province of Western Ukraine near the border with Poland. The Ashkenazi Jewish community in Belz was established in the 14th century. The Ashkenazi are a Jewish ethnic division which coalesced in the Holy Roman Empire around the turn of the first millennium. They established communities in central and eastern Europe, and grew to become one of the largest Jewish sects. In 1931 they accounted for 92 percent of the world’s Jews. The Holocaust devastated the Ashkenazi and their Yiddish culture. Persecution continued under the Soviet Communists. The regime banned Hasidism, and its followers were executed or exiled to labor camps. Belz came under Polish rule in the 14th century, when the town was granted rights under the Magdeburg law. Some three centuries later, in 1665, the Jews of Belz received equal rights and duties. In the early 19th century, the town became home to a Hasidic dynasty in the early 19th century. The dynasty was founded by Rabbi Shalom Rokeach, also known as the Sar Shalom. He served as the first Belzer Rebbe from 1817 to 1855. In addition to leading his Hasidim, he defended the beleaguered Jews of his district to […]

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