As soon as you cross the threshold of the chabad synagogue of Odessa, it is obvious that these are times of fat cows for the local jewish community. the place is wide, care and comfortablethe prayer room appears clean as the streams of gold, and on its upper floor, where there is a soup kitchen for people in need and the rabbi has his office Abraham Wolfe, several secretaries they insistently type computers and manage the visits of their religious superior. The office is flanked by a careful bookstore with copies of the Torah and even librarian relics of great value.
Although he insists that he does not wish to discuss politics or enter into controversies with anyone, Wolfe does not hesitate when asked if there is discrimination against his community in Ukrainea country that, according to the Russian president Vladimir Putinhas in front a government of “Nazis”. “Odessa is one of the places in the world where the Jewish community can develop better; we have two nurseries, two schools for minors, two high schools, a university in which 140 students study, three synagogues…” he lists.
The attack of the russian forces against Ukraine has disrupted to the extreme the lives of 35,000 Jews registered in this ukrainian port from the Black Sea, but not to a greater extent than the rest of the Ukrainians. “The percentage of our community members who wanted to be evacuated is the same as the rest of the citizens”, he assures, implying in this way that no member of the Jewish community fears no pogrom or any repression after the invasion by an Army that supposedly comes to “denazify” the country. “I feel an absolute respect from the part of the president, the ministers and the mayor; this one, when he has to meet with me, he even comes here to the synagogue”, emphasizes wolfe.
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morning prayers
on the ground floor, Igor Oks41 years old, with his head covered by a tallita woolen shawl, and the corresponding tellfin on the forehead and the bicepsthe two small leather boxes containing parchment scrolls with verses from the Torahtwo special utensils for morning prayer, finish his prayers and lashes against the leader of the Kremlin, with much more direct words than the rabbi, for talking about Ukraine in the days before the russian invasion as a country where far right and the fascism they roam freely. “Putin is lying; a law has just been passed that makes it a criminal offense to manifestation of anti-semitism“, responds Igor, indignant in a Russian academic. Rather than as a savior army, due to his dual status as a Jew and a Russian-speaker, Igor blames the troops of the neighboring country for having relived the traumas of his ancestors during the Second World War, a significant part of whom died during the Nazi occupation.”I had to evacuate my family to Romania,” he says.