Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told the Israeli envoy in Moscow at a recent assembly that Russia could guarantee the protection of Jews traveling to Uman in Ukraine for an annual Rosh Hashanah pilgrimage, according to a report released Thursday.
Bogdanov told Ambassador Alexander Ben Zvi that Israel will have to prevent one of its citizens from traveling to the Ukrainian city for the Jewish New Year, the Twelfth Channel reported.
The pilgrimage attracts tens of thousands of Jewish worshippers, but Israel has continually warned that it opposes visiting Uman this year because of the war. Uman is located in the central component of Ukraine, south of Kyiv, and has already been hit by Russian missiles.
On Thursday, Russia firmly denied that Moscow planned to launch missiles at Jewish pilgrims in Uman, after an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made the claim on Israeli state television.
Speaking to state TV channel Kan last week, Mykhailo Podolyak said Russia could launch missiles at Uman to cause a “global shock. “
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova dismissed Podolyak’s warning as “an absurd and false thought. “
“However, those comments will need to be taken seriously, as they emanate from the Kyiv regime,” Zakharova said in response, according to Kan. “There is no doubt that [Ukrainians] are brutal enough to seize the opportunity to create other anti-Russian provocations.
Ukraine also warned Jews not to come to Uman this year for Rosh Hashanah at the end of the month.
The city is the burial position of the Hasidic Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav, who died in 1810. Nachman, the founder of the Breslov Hasidic movement that settled in Uman in the early nineteenth century. Before his death, he asked his fans to make a stop at his grave to celebrate the Jewish holidays.
Despite the warnings, thousands of ultra-Orthodox Israelis have vowed to face the risks of the Russian invasion and make the pilgrimage this year.
Avraham Burstein, 51, told AFP in Jerusalem: “It’s like being in love, I have to go. “
“For us, it would be great if he was buried in London, Amsterdam or even Berlin,” Burstein said. “But he chose to be there and asked us to go every year for Rosh Hashanah, so we have to leave. “
The pilgrimage was heavily suppressed in the days of the Soviet Union, and it was only after its collapse in 1991 that annual visits began to number in the tens of thousands.
“All my developing life, I prayed to God: Please let me pass once to rabbi Nachman’s grave, just once,” Burstein said. Although he said he hadn’t booked his ticket yet, Burstein planned to do so later this week with his two children. .
This month, Prime Minister Yair Lapid suggested citizens to Uman, warning of “mortal danger,” and the Ukrainian embassy in Israel issued a similar warning last week.
Uman was hit hard by Russian missiles in the first weeks of the war, and last month a civilian was killed by a Russian missile in the district, according to a regional official, Ihor Taburets, published on the Telegram messaging service.
Direct flights to Kyiv have been cancelled since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but thousands of pilgrims have already begun their journey.
A Haredi agent in Jerusalem, who asked not to be identified for fear of reprimand in the community, said flights to countries bordering Ukraine had been widely exhausted during the rest of the month.
Last week, at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport, flights to Moldova and Romania were filled with chassidim from Breslov to Uman.
“Why does he deserve us to worry? If you are in God, you are not afraid of anything,” Avraham Elbaz told AFP as he checked in for his flight to Chisinau, moldova’s capital.
In September 2020, thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews were trapped for days between the borders of Belarus and Ukraine after Kyiv refused to allow them entry due to the pandemic. Others who went to Uman clashed with the locals.
Before the pandemic, more than 50,000 pilgrims traveled each year to Rosh Hashanah, said Gilad Malach, director of the ultra-Orthodox program in Israel at the Israel Democracy Institute think tank.
He estimated that between 5,000 and 10,000 pilgrims would try this year.
“Most, when there are restrictions, perceive the reasons for not going, whether because of COVID-19 or because of the war,” Malach told AFP. “But for hardline Chassidim, this is one of the fundamental commitments they have,” he said. He added, saying his confidence is that “you do everything to get there. “
“The more forbidden or harsh it is, the more appreciated you are as a disciple if you manage to triumph over the stumbles and the grave,” he said.
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