VANDALS AGAIN...

JEWS IN SEARCH OF SYNAGOGUE

THEATRE OF ABSURDITY

OUR CHILDREN AND «OUR FATHER»?

Hardly had the newspapers published a sent-by-us material about opening a monument to killed Jews of Ivankov, Kiev region, when stunning news arrived. The night June 13 through 14 unknown vandals crushed a monument's stele. It bore an inscription about the tragedy which had occurred 60 years ago in the tract Berezina Maslyakova near a small settlement in Polesje: fascists had killed 360 elderly women and children.

Spirit. It is in every building, in every inhabitant of Odessa. I've worked in Novosibirsk and Dnepropetrovsk, so I can compare and I say: Odessa residents are a particular separate nationality. You can accept it or not, you can laugh at it, but this is a particular nationality proud of its origin. Even leaving somewhere, they do not forget about their city. I was born in Jerusalem, and I am not used to having their desire to begin any talk, no matter what it is about, with a few words "on Odessa" and how they like it.

"...Say, are there any professions beyond Good and Evil? For instance, our profession - who has chosen whom: we have chosen it or vice versa?"...Silence reigned in the room. Outside the windows - inviting scenery of Yaremcha, inside the hall of the "Karpaty" hotel - participants of the seminar: directors of kheseds of Central, Western and Southern Ukraine, coordinators of the Kiev and Odessa "Joint" representations, staff of the Kiev and Odessa institutes of social and community workers. A quite unusual theme is offered for a discussion, "Ethic dominants in the work of Jewish charitable organizations".

Literature on Holocaust nowadays accounts for thousands of editions in many languages of the world. It reflects most diverse sides of life and death of the Jewish people. Books, magazine and newspaper articles also disclose a theme of Jews' miraculous salvation. During the war hundreds of Jews survived only because by they had been, by a lucky chance, rescued by people of other nationalities.

Members of the Jewish community, guests from other cities and countries eagerly go on an excursion "Jewish Kerch" during which they can discover unknown pages of the Kerch history. Kerch is one of a few cities of diaspora where over two thousands years monuments of Jewish history and religion have been kept intact.

There were times when every Jewish settlement-shtetl had a synagogue Jews attended. A multitude of synagogue buildings have survived in Ukraine till now: the majority of stone ones built in the XIX century correspond to typical buildings of those times. Synagogue of the XVI - XVII centuries are unique architectural constructions taking a particular position in an urban landscape. These synagogues served to defend a Jewish population as well as the whole settlement