IS THERE ANY REASON TO CRY?

OVER BABIY YAR?

BREAD OF SHAME

DEPUTIES-JEWS. WELL, SO?

Probably, none of the articles in "JO" has ever caused such a storm of responses as the material by the "American" Alexander Burakovsky "Why Jews of Ukraine keep silence". Author's American passport provoked a rather firm rebuke to a notorious "why". We are to speak today of not "why", but "what" Jews of Ukraine are silent about. They keep silence, first of all, about the problems the state has nothing (God bless) to do with, i.e. about an inner crisis of their own community which can be called "community" rather conventionally. No, our meetings are well organized and microphone speeches are well grounded. They are grounded well enough not to be put to question.

"Jewish heritage center is a project of the Jewish community of Kiev and the American Joint Distribution Committee "Joint". It is supposed to be a gift of the world Jewish communities to Ukraine as an act of solidarity for the sake of life". These are the final words in the invitation for public discussion of projects made by Ukrainian and Israeli architects. The discussion was held in the Republican Artists' House.

The contest is over. The winner has been defined. What do we expect further? Construction? Of course, one wants to live without problems. But life makes us open eyes. We can't deprive ourselves of national memory. The memory, which, as Vitaliy Portnikov said in the newspaper "Zerkalo Nedeli", "would not let any of us pass emotionlessly through Babiy Yar or look at the time-table of trains going to Oswecin".

Finally, will non-Jews, whose relatives perished there too, agree with the decision made? They also have their national memory.

The world recognizes a fundamental law, which we could call "restriction on enjoyment from an underserved gift", and in the Jewish tradition this principle is called a ban on "bread of shame".