KYIV (Reuters) – The Hasidic Jews who arrived in Ukraine for an annual pilgrimage were stranded at airports Friday after the government closed the border, said a representative of the Rabino Nachman International Charitable Foundation.
Ukraine has limited access to foreign nationals to combat a recent outbreak of coronavirus cases and also in reaction to a request by Israel to ban a pilgrimage site in Ukraine, for fear that this will become a hot spot for coronavirus.
Tens of thousands of Hasidic Jews descend to the city of Ouman every Jewish New Year to stop at the tomb of Rabbi Najman de Breslov, who revived the Hasidic movement and died in 1810. Jewish New Year celebrations take place from 18 to 20 September this year.
The head of the race for Israeli coronavirus had asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to ban Hajj this year.
Irina Rybnitskaya of the Rabbi Nachman Foundation said many others had been stranded first on Friday, then said some had been fired.
“It turns out they started letting them in. But not all,” Rybnitskaya told Reuters. There is no kosher food where they are stored, he added.
Andriy Demchenko, a spokesman for the border service, told Interfax Ukraine that dozens of Hasidic Jews were arrested at airports this week, as border guards can verify the purpose of their trip.
“We don’t make decisions about discriminatory criteria. We make decisions that help the fitness of our citizens, regardless of their nationality, citizenship or religion,” Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Friday.
Mikhail Tkach, executive director of the United Jewish Community of Ukraine, said that pilgrims had been warned beforehand that there would be disruption upon their arrival.
“I don’t know what they were counting on, it’s hard to perceive their logic,” Tkach said.
Additional report through Natalia Zinets; Writing through Matthias Williams; Edited through Peter Graff
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