“The people of the Red Cross were handing out tea and blankets to other people who trembled with the wind,” he said.
Pilgrims are allowed to return to Minsk, the capital of Belarus, and return home, basically to Israel.
“But coming to Uman is like oxygen, fuel for the year, ” said Klein. “We’re willing to sacrifice everything for this. “
According to Vitman, who said he was willing to threaten his life to succeed in Uman this year, up to 4,000 more people had planned to leave Minsk, Pinsk and Gomel on Tuesday to the border checkpoint.
“More and more people come here,” he says.
Vitman said he assumed that a “fix” would allow him to enter Ukraine once he arrived. Others, he said, had disguised themselves as lay tourists to enter the country, and heard some of them pass by, appearing “that there is discrimination. “opposed to Orthodox Jews. “
Do Belarusian pilgrims come to the border to pressure the Ukrainian government to allow them in?
“It’s not about pressure, it’s about looking to get as close as possible to Rebbe Nachman, and right now it’s the closest thing,” Vitman said.
He grew up in Ashdod, southern Israel, and remembered that he had come to Uman for the first time when he was a month old. His parents are also among the staunch believers of the Bratslav philosophy, which emphasizes joy as a vehicle for worship.
“I’ve been here every year at least once since,” Vitman said. “It’s a promise. I made the promise and promise That Rabbi Nachman made to me. “
Klein said pilgrims were willing to do whatever it took to prevent the spread of coronavirus, which is now in Israel.
“We’re ready to go through 3 tests, if that’s what Array is and spend as much time as you’ve been detained at home in Israel, ifArray,” he said. “We will also adhere to social estating regulations in Uman. no other tourists who are leaving Israel right now, however, treat us very differently, it is discriminatory ”.
Some videos showed pilgrims near Gomel’s checkpoint dancing, hugging others in violation of social estating measures, Mendi Guzman de Kan reported.
“There are poisons, but in general there will be general respect, ” confided Klein in him.
Uman, in central Ukraine, about 210 km from Kiev, the capital, now has about 1,500 foreigners who arrived before the border was closed to defeat it. The city of another 82,000 people has a Jewish network of about three hundred people, up from them Israelis, who have settled there in recent years.
Klein in Kan’s interview said that the Israeli government had “left them out in the cold” by failing to help convince the Ukrainian government to let them in. Many Breslovers appear in the Shas, the Israeli Orthodox Sephardic party, which has a large following in Breslov circles.
“This is outrageous, of helping stranded Jews in a desperate situation, the Shas is attacking them,” wrote a prominent Breslov activist, Zadok David, on Facebook.
David reacts to comments through an Israeli lawmaker, Yakov Margi, about who is guilty of the current fate of pilgrims and their children.
“The user who made a decision, even if he knew the border was closed, can take responsibility for the scenario in which he, his youth and others,” Margi said.