Pesach Seder Under Fire in Kharkov

Close to one hundred people celebrated their Pesach seder in the makeshift shelter/basement of the Kharkov synagogue. The “Operation Pesach” began weeks before as Rabbi Moshe Moskovitz worked on getting over a ton of matza, hundreds of bottles of wine and grape juice, kosher meat and chicken into the city that has been under intense bombing since the first day of the war.

Buses that daily evacuate hundreds of people from the synagogue to safety further in Ukraine and over the border return back with food and medicines for the needy.

A brave team of workers and cooks have been living in the synagogue and ensuring that all those who have remained in the city have all the hot meals, food and medicines they need. Drivers go from home to home with packages and seder boxes despite the shellings and artillery fire.

As the women lit candles on Friday night in the dining room on Pushkinskaya Street, they had a lot to pray for. Peace and a true exodus from all suffering and exile.

The seder began. Living together for over seven weeks in the synagogue they have become like a big family. “Mah nishtana halayla hazeh” “How is this Night different?”. So different this year. With a curfew. With bombings and fear. With so many family and community members so far away. But the words in the seder ring stronger than ever before…”they rise up against us…but G-d saves us from their hands”.Celebrating miracles in Egypt. Believing in miracles today.

“The Baal Shem Tov said ‘Where a person’s thoughts are, that is where he is’. Tonight we are all in Kharkov,” said Rabbi Moshe Moskovitz, with 300 refugees in Israel on the seder night in Kfar Sitrin. “Let us together pray for the safety of those in Kharkov and that we should be next year all be in Yerushalayim with the complete redemption.”

Anya, her mother Tatyana, and grandmother Nechama still recovering from their long journey from Kharkov to Warsaw and on to Israel eat the matza together with so many of their fellow Jews displaced from their homes in Kharkov. They too join Rabbi Moskovitz in prayer and those in the synagogue in Kharkov that peace will reign throughout the world and we will see miracles today.