feature
IN UKRA I NE,
Chanukah Candles Are a Lifeline
in the Midst of Power Outages
Steve Lipman | JTA.org
Amid the power outages stemming from Russian
attacks, the volunteers brought blankets and
sweatshirts for the cold, as well as menorahs and
kippahs for religious observance purposes.

Some 300 boxes of Chanukah candles will also
do double duty.

These days, the power in Chernivtsi, a city
of around 250,000 (before the war) in Western
Ukraine, is more off than on. So the candles will
do more than allude to the story of the Maccabees;
they will help light Jewish homes across the city.

“This year, it’s really important” to have and use
Chanukah candles, said Lev Kleiman, leader of the
city’s Conservative Jewish community, in a recent
Zoom interview.

Although the need is urgent, “we will hold
onto the candles until Chanukah,” he added, his
Russian interpreted by Rabbi Irina Gritsevskaya, the
Russian-born and Jerusalem-based “circuit rabbi” of
the Conservative movement’s Schechter Institutes
18 DECEMBER 22, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
and executive director of its Midreshet Schechter
Ukraine. The organizations have been coordinating
the move of holiday supplies to Chernivtsi.

Among a few “couriers” bringing goods to Jewish
communities in Ukraine, Gritsevskaya has made
several trips there in the last 10 months. At the
start of the war, she urged Jews in other cities to
make their way to Chernivtsi, which was far from
the intense fi ghting on the eastern border.

Chernivtsi, which served as a place of refuge for
thousands of displaced people from elsewhere
in parts of the Soviet Union threatened by the
Nazi army during World War II, is again attracting
refugees from throughout the country. Earlier in the
war, Kleiman turned his synagogue into a refugee
center for some of the millions of Ukrainians
fl eeing their homeland. The city also became a
gathering site for worldwide faith leaders who have
denounced the violence and expressed solidarity
with the embattled Ukrainians.

Located on the Prut River, Chernivtsi (known
at one time as “Jerusalem upon the Prut” for the
strength of its Jewish community) is 25 miles north
of the Romanian border and home to one of the
country’s most active Conservative communities.

The city’s Jewish population before the war began
was estimated at 2,000, including many Holocaust
survivors. And today, following the invasion? The number
could be larger or smaller (no one is counting), but
some western cities have experienced population
growth due to all of the migration.

“No one knows,” said Kleiman. “Many left, but
many came.”
‘Th ere are a lot of parallels’
As in other Ukrainian cities, many Jews in Chernivtsi,
especially women, senior citizens and children
(everyone except draft-age males), have migrated.

But uncounted other ones have come to a place
of relative safety, either renting apartments or
staying in ones under the auspices of the Jewish
community. Most of the Jews in Chernivtsi now are
those exempt from military service, said Kleiman.

Others stayed to be with their husbands and fathers
who joined the Ukrainian army after the war began
or to care for their aged parents.

Despite real signs of war — rifl e-carrying soldiers
and policemen on the streets, empty shelves in
stores because of shortages, people hurrying to
Candles: Courtesy of the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies; Glow: Vitalii Bondarenko/iStock/Getty Images Plus
In the days before Chanukah, which started on Dec.

18, a few men and women from two Conservative
institutions in Israel traveled to the small Jewish
community in Chernivtsi, Ukraine, with a supply of
needed items.

Flame: apomares /E+/Getty Images Plus; Erin Clark/The Boston Globe via Getty Images;
Amid the power outages stemming from Russian attacks, the
volunteers will have blankets and sweatshirts for the cold, as well
as menorahs and kippahs for religious observance purposes.