The third holiday month in the shadow of the severe war in Ukraine finds the country's Jews dealing with severe electricity problems, sanitation problems, and massive conscription - including of the country's Jews - into the Ukrainian army, due to the intensification of fierce fighting in all sectors.
Because of this, the Federation of Jewish Communities in Ukraine (FJCU) decided to bring the holiday and its commandments to the thousands of Jewish soldiers at the front.
Within this framework, over the past two weeks, volunteers from the Federation have been touring central bases on the long front stretching over more than 1,000 kilometers, bringing special holiday kits to the soldiers there, including shortened prayer cycles translated into Ukrainian, a patterned kippah, pocket psalms in Ukrainian, honey, Shabbat candles, explanatory booklets about the holidays and their meaning, a Hebrew-Latin calendar magnet, a magnet for candle lighting times, canned goods, cleaning and care kits, and a shopping bag for the family.
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This time, 35 shofars were also distributed at the same points, with the 'Federation' volunteers teaching a Jewish soldier at each base who volunteered how to blow the shofar for all the Jewish soldiers stationed there. This Rosh Hashanah, the sound of the shofar will also be heard for the first time at the front.
Rabbi Yaakov Sinyakov, who is responsible for the activities with the Jewish soldiers who were drafted into the army, and who actually managed the project, says: "The soldiers' excitement about the project was unique. They understood that we do not forget them and that anywhere they can observe the commandments of their religion and remember their Judaism.".
At the same time, as in the months of Tishrei for the past two decades, and especially since the outbreak of the war, the federation has sent holiday kits, similar to those sent to soldiers on the front, to 51,000 Jewish households throughout the country. The kits are distributed in cooperation with dedicated Chabad emissaries stationed in 30 cities in Ukraine, who also assist in distributing them in smaller cities and a total of 169 Jewish communities in the giant country.
Chairman of the Federation, Rabbi Meir Stembler: "In addition to the distribution of assessments, on this upcoming Rosh Hashanah, as every year since the fall of communism, the synagogues in Ukraine will be filled with many thousands of Jews who will come to perform the Rosh Hashanah prayers in the synagogues, and many thousands more will also participate in the holiday feasts, with Chabad emissaries and the Federation also taking care of this. We pray from the bottom of our hearts that 'a year with its curses will end, and a year with its blessings will begin.' A new year filled with blessings, peace, health and abundance, and most of all – with true and complete redemption.".
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