Ukrainian-Jewish

The history of the Jews in Ukraine dates back over a thousand years; Jewish communities have existed in the modern territory of Ukraine from the time of the Kievan Rus' (late 9th to mid-13th century). Important Jewish religious and cultural movements, from Hasidism to Zionism, arose there. According to the World Jewish Congress, the Jewish community in Ukraine is Europe's fourth largest and the world's 11th largest.Ukraine
World Jewish Congress.

The presence of Jews in Ukrainian territory is first mentioned in the 10th century. At times Jewish life in Ukrainian lands flourished, while at other times it faced persecution and anti-Semitic discrimination. During the Khmelnytsky Uprising between 1648 and 1657, an army of Cossacks massacred and took large numbers of Jews, Roman Catholics, and Uniate Christians into captivity. One estimate (1996) reported that 15,000-30,000 Jews were killed or taken captive, and that 300 Jewish communities were completely destroyed. Paul Magocsi, ''A History of Ukraine'', p. 350. University of Washington Press, 1996. More recent estimates (2014) report mortality of 3,000-6,000 people between the years 1648–1649.

During 1821 anti-Jewish riots in Odesa followed the death of the Greek Orthodox Patriarch in Constantinople, in which 14 Jews were recorded killed. Some sources claim this episode as the first pogrom. At the start of the 20th century, anti-Jewish pogroms continued, leading to large-scale emigration. In 1915, the imperial Russian government expelled thousands of Jews from the Empire's border areas, including parts of Ukraine.

In the Ukrainian People's Republic (1917–1920), Yiddish became a state language, along with Ukrainian and Russian. At that time, the Jewish National Union was created and the community was granted autonomous status. Yiddish was used on Ukrainian currency between 1917 and 1920. Nevertheless, between 1918 and 1920 in the period after the Russian Revolution and ensuing Ukrainian War of Independence, an estimated 31,071 but possibly up to 100,000 Jews were killed in pogroms perpetrated by the army of the Ukrainian People's Republic under command of Symon Petliura. Pogroms erupted in January 1919 in the northwest province of Volhynia and spread to many other regions, continuing until 1921. The actions of the Soviet government by 1927 led to a growing antisemitism.Сергійчук, В. Український Крим К. 2001, p.156

Before World War II, slightly less than one-third of Ukraine's urban population consisted of Jews. Total civilian losses in Ukraine during World War II and the German occupation are estimated at seven million. More than one million Soviet Jews, including 225,000 in Belarus, were killed by the Einsatzgruppen and their many Ukrainian supporters. Most of them were killed in Ukraine because most pre-WWII Soviet Jews lived in the Pale of Settlement, of which Ukraine was the biggest part. The major massacres against Jews occurred mainly in the first phase of the occupation, although they continued until the return of the Red Army.

In 1959 Ukraine had 840,000 Jews, a decrease of almost 70% from 1941 totals (within Ukraine's current borders). Ukraine's Jewish population continued to decline significantly during the Cold War. In 1989, Ukraine's Jewish population was only slightly more than half of what it was in 1959. During and after the collapse of communism in the 1990s, the majority of Jews left the country and moved abroad (mostly to Israel). Antisemitism, including violent attacks on Jews, was still a problem in Ukraine in 2012, according to UN report. The country's current president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is Jewish.

Medieval and Early Modern era

Kyivan Rus

The presence of a Jewish community in the territory of modern-day Ukraine is first mentioned in the Kievan Letter, which was composed in the 10th century and became the first written mention of the Ukrainian capital. The document is especially valuable because mentiones the names of members of the city's Jewish community, some of them of obvious Slavic and Turkic origin.

By the 11th century, Byzantine Jews of Constantinople had familial, cultural, and theological ties with the Jews of Kyiv. For instance, some 11th-century Jews from Kievan Rus participated in an anti- Karaite assembly held in either Thessaloniki or Constantinople. One of the three Kyivan city gates in the times of Yaroslav the Wise was called Zhydovski (Jewish).

Popular dissatisfaction with the influence of Jewish financiers was claimed by chronicles to be one of the causes of a popular uprising, which engulfed Kyiv in 1113 after the death of prince Sviatopolk Iziaslavich. The rebels plundered the houses of Kyiv's Jews, who were accused by them of usury.

In Galicia, Jews were mentioned for the first time in 1030. From the second part of the 14th century, they were subjects of Polish kings and magnates.

Polish-Lithuanian rule

Founded in 1569, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth became one of the most diverse countries in Europe. Massive settlement of Jews in lands under Polish rule started in the 14th century in the aftermath of the adoption of the Statute of Kalisz. As a result, the kingdom became home to one of the world's largest and most vibrant Jewish communities. Jewish settlement also began in nearby Lithuania, which controlled many lands of today's Ukraine during that time.

The Jewish community became one of the largest and most important ethnic minority groups in the territory of Ukraine during the Commonwealth era. Jews constituted 3 to 5% of the entire population of the Commonwealth, but in cities their share reached up to 20%. Many Jews worked as traders, but some also managed the estates of noble landowners (szlachta), which made them especially unpopular among Ukrainian peasants. Unlike the rest of the population, Jews spoke their own language - Yiddish, and governed themselves through autonomous communities, whose leaders were elected in a democratic manner. On the other hand, many elements of Jewish culture, such as folk beliefs, clothing and architecture (e.g. the construction technology of wooden synagogues) were shared with the Christian majority. The supreme representative organ of Jews in the Commonwealth, including Ukrainian lands, was the Council of Four Lands, which included members of Jewish communities from Greater Poland, Lesser Poland, Volhynia and Podolia.

Modern era

Khmelnytsky Uprising

In 1648-1657 Ukrainian Cossack Hetman Bohdan Khmelnytsky led a Cossack and peasant rebellion, known as Khmelnytsky Uprising, during which Jews were targeted for their role as managers of noble estates, which was seen as oppression of Orthodox population on behalf of Catholic Poles. It is estimated that at that time the Jewish population in Ukraine numbered 51,325. As a result, hundreds of Jewish communities were destroyed by the rebels, and tens of thousands of Jews were killed or sold as slaves.

Historians consider the massacres under Khmelnytsky to have been the bloodiest episode of anti-Jewish violence until the 20th century. A 1996 estimate reported that 15,000-30,000 Jews were killed or taken captive, and that 300 Jewish communities were destroyed. A 2014 estimate reduced the toll to 3,000-6,000 from 1648 to 1649; of these, 3,000-6,000 Jews were killed by Cossacks in Nemyriv in May 1648 and 1,500 in Tulczyn in July 1648. Among contemporary Jews the effect of Khmelnytsky Uprising was compared to the destruction of the First and Second Temples. As a result of the massacres, many Jews from Ukraine moved to western regions of Poland, or emigrated to German lands, Amsterdam and the Ottoman Empire.

Rise of Hasidism and internal struggles

The Cossack Uprising and following massacres left a deep and lasting impression on Jewish social and spiritual life and led to the rise in popularity of Jewish mysticism including Kabbalah. The 1648 events in Ukraine played a role in the development of a number of messianic movements in Judaism, such as the sect of Sabbatai Zevi. These movements opposed traditional rabbinism and put an emphasis on magical healing practices, amulets and physical activity such as singing, dancing and prayer.

The teachings of Israel ben Eliezer, better known as the ''Baal Shem Tov'', or ''BeShT'' (1698–1760), who lived in the Ukrainian town of Medzhybizh, produced a massive religious movement which had a profound effect on Eastern European Jews. Known as Hasidism, it influenced Haredi Judaism, with a continuous influence through many Hasidic dynasties. The emergence of Hasidism with its specific rules and rites produced a strong opposition from traditional Ashkenazi Jewish circles. As a result of a split between Hasidic Jewish communities and their opponents ( ''Mitnagdim'') in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, a teritorial division emerged, with Hasidic rites dominating among poorer and less educated Jews in Volhynia, Podolia, Galicia and Hungarian-ruled territories of modern-day Ukraine.

A different movement was started by Jacob Frank in the middle of the 18th century. Frank's teachings were unorthodox (such as purification through transgression and adoption of elements of Christianity) and were supported by part of the Catholic clergy, including the bishop of Kamieniec Podolski, which led to his excommunication along with his numerous followers. In 1759 Frank and his supporters converted to Catholicism in Lemberg. As a result, a group of up to 20,000 Jewish converts emerged, who gradually assimilated with Christians, but preserved some peculiar traditions. In 1817 Frankists were officially recognized as Catholics by the Russian imperial government.

Russian Empire and Austrian rule

The traditional measures used to keep the Russian Empire free of Jews were hindered when the main territory of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was annexed during the partitions of Poland. During the second (1793) and the third (1795) partitions, large populations of Jews were absorbed by the Russian Empire, and Catherine the Great established the Pale of Settlement that included Congress Poland and Crimea.

During 1821 anti-Jewish riots in Odesa after the death of the Greek Orthodox patriarch in Constantinople, 14 Jews were killed. Some sources mark this episode as the first pogrom, while according to others (such as the ''Jewish Encyclopedia'', 1911 ed.) say the first pogrom was an 1859 riot in Odesa. The term became common after a wave of anti-Jewish violence swept the southern Russian Empire (including Ukraine) between 1881 and 1884, after Jews were blamed for the assassination of Alexander II.

In May 1882, Alexander III of Russia introduced temporary regulations called ''May Laws'' that remained in effect until 1917. Systematic policies of discrimination, strict quotas on the number of Jews allowed to obtain education and professions caused widespread poverty and mass emigration. In 1886, an edict of Expulsion was applied to Jews in Kyiv. In 1893–1894, some areas of Crimea were removed from the Pale.

When Alexander III died in Crimea on 20 October 1894, according to Simon Dubnow: "as the body of the deceased was carried by railway to St. Petersburg, the same rails were carrying the Jewish exiles from Yalta to the Pale. The reign of Alexander III began with pogroms and concluded with expulsions."

Odesa became the home of a large Jewish community during the 19th century, and by 1897 Jews were estimated to account for some 37% of the population.

The Jewish population of Galicia and Bukovina, part of Austria-Hungary, made up 5% of the global Jewish population.

Political activism and emigration

Jews were over-represented in the Russian revolutionary leadership. However, most were hostile to Jewish culture and Jewish political parties, and were loyal to the Communist Party's atheism and proletarian internationalism, and committed to stamping out any sign of "Jewish cultural particularism".

Counter-revolutionary groups, including the Black Hundreds, opposed the Revolution with violent attacks on socialists and pogroms against Jews. A backlash came from the conservative elements of society, notably in spasmodic anti-Jewish attacks – around five hundred were killed in a single day in Odesa. Nicholas II claimed that 90% of revolutionaries were Jews.

Early 20th century

Before WW1

At the start of the 20th century, anti-Jewish pogroms continued to occur in cities and towns across the Russian Empire such as Kishinev, Kyiv, Odesa, and many others. Numerous Jewish self-defense groups were organized to prevent the outbreak of pogroms among which the most successful one was under the leadership of Mishka Yaponchik in Odesa.

In 1905, a series of pogroms erupted at the same time as the Revolution against the government of Nicholas II. The chief organizers of the pogroms were the members of the Union of the Russian People (commonly known as the " Black Hundreds").

From 1911 to 1913, the antisemitic tenor of the period was characterized by a number of blood libel cases (accusations of Jews murdering Christians for ritual purposes). One of the most famous was the two-year trial of Menahem Mendel Beilis, a Jew from Kyiv, who was charged with the murder of a Christian boy. The trial was showcased by the authorities to illustrate the perfidy of the Jewish population.

In 1912-1914, S. An-sky led the Jewish Ethnographic Expedition to the Pale, which visited around 70 shtetls in Volyn, Podolia, and Galicia (all in modern Ukraine) gathering folk stories, artifacts, recording music, and making photos, as an attempt to preserve and salvage traditional Ashkenazim culture that was vanishing because of modernization, pogroms, and emigration.

From March to May 1915, in the face of the German army, the government expelled thousands of Jews from the Empire's border areas, mainly the Pale of Settlement.

Ukrainian People's Republic

After the establishment of the Ukrainian People's Republic (UPR, 1917–1921) in the aftermath of the February Revolution, Yiddish was recognized as one of its official languages, while all government institutions had Jewish members. A Ministry for Jewish Affairs was established (Ukraine was the first modern state to do so) and rights of Jewish culture were guaranteed. However, Jewish deputies abstained or voted against the Tsentralna Rada's Fourth Universal of 25 January 1918 which was aimed at breaking ties with Bolshevik Russia and proclaiming a sovereign Ukrainian state, since all Jewish parties were strongly against Ukrainian independence.

During the ensuing Russian Civil War, an estimated 70,000 to 250,000 Jewish civilians were killed in atrocities throughout the former Russian Empire. In modern Ukraine an estimated 31,071 died in 1918–1920. Other estimates give the number of civilian Jews killed during the period as 35,000 to 50,000. Archives declassified after 1991 provide evidence of a higher number; in the period from 1918 to 1921, "according to incomplete data, at least 100,000 Jews were killed in Ukraine in the pogroms." The Ukrainian People's Republic did issue orders condemning pogroms and attempted to investigate them, but it lacked authority to stop the violence. In the last months of its existence the state lacked any power to create social stability.

Among the prominent Ukrainian Jewish statesmen of this period were Moisei Rafes, Pinkhas Krasny, Abram Revutsky, Moishe Zilberfarb, and many others. (see General Secretariat of Ukraine) The autonomy of Ukraine was openly greeted by Volodymyr Zhabotinsky, himself a native of Ukraine.

Between April and December 1918 the Ukrainian People's Republic was non-existent and overthrown by the Ukrainian State of Pavlo Skoropadsky, who ended the experiment in Jewish autonomy.

Provisional Government of Russia and Soviets

The February 1917 revolution brought a liberal Provisional Government to power in the Russian Empire. On 21 March/3 April, the government removed all "discrimination based upon ethnic religious or social grounds".Korey 1978, 90. The Pale was officially abolished. The removal of the restrictions on Jews' geographical mobility and educational opportunities led to a migration to the country's major cities.

One week after the 25 October / 7 November 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, the new government proclaimed the "Declaration of the Rights of the Peoples ationsof Russia," promising all nationalities the rights of equality, self-determination and secession. Jews were not specifically mentioned in the declaration, reflecting Lenin's view that Jews did not constitute a nation.

In 1918, the RSFSR Council of Ministers issued a decree entitled "On the Separation of Church from State and School from Church", depriving religious communities of the status of juridical persons, the right to own property and the right to enter into contracts. The decree nationalized the property of religious communities and banned their assessment of religious tuition. As a result, religion could be taught or studied only in private.

On 1 February 1918 the Commissariat for Jewish National Affairs was established as a subsection of the Commissariat for Nationality Affairs. It was mandated to establish the "dictatorship of the proletariat in the Jewish streets" and attract the Jewish masses to the regime while advising local and central institutions on Jewish issues. The Commissariat was also expected to fight the influence of Zionist and Jewish-Socialist Parties. On 27 July 1918 the Council of People's Commissars issued a decree stating that antisemitism is "fatal to the cause of the ... revolution". Pogroms were officially outlawed. On 20 October 1918 the Jewish section of the CPSU ( Yevsektsia) was established for the Party's Jewish members; its goals were similar to those of the Jewish Commissariat.Survey January 1968, 77–81.

During the Hryhoriv Uprising in May 1919, almost 3000 Jews of Yelisavetgrad (today Kropyvnytskyi) were murdered and their property stolen during a mutiny of Bolshevik troops.

The White Army and counterrevolutionary pogroms

In contrast with the Bolshevik government's official policy of equality among citizens, antisemitism remained deeply entrenched in the political and social ideologies of the tsarist counterrevolutionaries, especially among paramilitary groups such as the Black Hundreds. These militias incited and organized pogroms against Russian Jews. The official slogan of the Black Hundreds was "Bei Zhidov," meaning 'Beat the Jews.' Thus, during the Russian Civil War that followed the 1917 Revolution, the Jews became a crucial site of the conflict between revolutionary Reds and counterrevolutionary Whites, particularly in the contested territory of Ukraine. The Bolsheviks' official opposition to antisemitism—coupled with the prominence of Jews such as Leon Trotsky within the Bolshevik ranks—allowed the Christian nationalist movements of both the White Army and the emergent Ukrainian National Republic to link Ukrainian Jews to the despised communism. These connections, combined with the cultural tradition of antisemitism among Russian peasantry, provided ample justification for the Whites to attack Ukraine's Jewish population. Between 1918 and 1921, almost all of the approximately 2,000 pogroms carried out in Ukraine were organized by White Army forces. eyewitnesses reported hearing counterrevolutionary militia members expound slogans such as, "We beat the Yids, we beat the Commune", and "This is the answer to the Bolsheviks for the Red Terror." Recent studies hold that about 30,000 Jews were killed in these pogroms, while another 150,000 died from wounds sustained during the violence.

Pogroms in western Ukraine

During the Polish-Ukrainian War in late 1918 Galician Jews were suspected by many Poles to have collaborated with forces of the West Ukrainian People's Republic. As a result, after Polish troops entered Lviv on 22 November 1918 a pogrom was perpetrated by Poles in the city's Jewish quarter, killing at least 75 inhabitants, although higher estimates also exist. The event caused indignation in global press. After the pogrom Polish military command accused Lviv's Jews of not restraining their compatriots and threatened with catastrophic circumstances in case of their opposition to Polish authorities.

In the territory controlled by Ukrainian forces pogroms erupted in January 1919 in the northwest province of Volhynia and spread during February and March to the cities, towns, and villages of many other regions of Ukraine. After Sarny it was the turn of Ovruch, northwest of Kyiv. In Tetiev on 25 March, approximately 4,000 Jews were murdered, half in a synagogue set ablaze by Cossack troops under Colonels Kurovsky, Cherkowsy, and Shliatoshenko. Then Vashilkov (6 and 7 April). originally in Yiddish, YIVO Institute, 1965; ''The Berdichev Revival'' In Dubovo (17 June) 800 Jews were decapitated in assembly-line fashion. According to David A. Chapin, the town of Proskurov (now Khmelnitsky), near the city of Sudilkov, "was the site of the worst atrocity committed against Jews this century before the Nazis." Pogroms continued until 1921.

Pogroms across Podolia

On 15 February 1919, during the Ukrainian-Soviet war, Otaman Ivan Semesenko initiated a pogrom Proskurov in which many Jews were massacred on Shabbat ( parashah Tesaveh). Semesenko claimed that the pogrom was in retaliation for a previous Bolshevik uprising that he believed was led by Jews.

According to the ''pinqasim'' record books those murdered in the pogrom included 390 men, 309 women and 76 children. The number of wounded exceeded 500. Two weeks later Order 131 was published in the central newspaper by the head of Directorate of Ukraine. In it Symon Petliura denounced such actions and eventually executed Otaman Semesenko by firing-squad in 1920. Semesenko's brigade was disarmed and dissolved. This event is especially remarkable because it was used to justify Sholem Schwarzbard's assassination of the Ukrainian leader in 1926. Although Petliura's direct involvement was never proven, Schwartzbard was acquitted in revenge. The series of Jewish pogroms around Ukraine culminated in the Kyiv pogroms of 1919 between June and October of that year.

Interwar era

Consolidation of Soviet power

In July 1919, the Central Jewish Commissariat dissolved the ''kehillot'' (Jewish Communal Councils). The ''kehillot'' had provided social services to the Jewish community.

From 1919 to 1920, Jewish parties and Zionist organizations were driven underground as the Communist government sought to abolish all potential opposition. The Yevsektsiya Jewish section of the Soviet Communist party was at the forefront of the anti-religious campaigns of the 1920s that led to the closing of religious institutions, the break-up of religious communities and the further restriction of access to religious education. To that end a series of "community trials" against the Jewish religion were held. The last known such trial, on the subject of circumcision, was held in 1928 in Kharkiv. At the same time, the body worked to establish a secular identity for the Jewish community.

In 1921 many Jews emigrated to Poland, as they were entitled by a peace treaty in Riga to choose the country they preferred. Several hundred thousand joined the already numerous Jewish minority of the Polish Second Republic. Also, during the interwar period, thousands of Jewish refugees from the Soviet Ukraine migrated to Romania.

On 31 January 1924 the Commissariat for Nationalities' Affairs was disbanded. On 29 August 1924 an official agency for Jewish resettlement, the Commission for the Settlement of Jewish Toilers on the Land ( KOMZET), was established. KOMZET studied, managed and funded projects for Jewish resettlement in rural areas. A public organization, the Society for the Agricultural Organization of Working Class Jews in the USSR ( OZET), was created in January 1925 to help recruit colonists and support the colonization work of KOMZET. For the first few years the government encouraged Jewish settlements, particularly in Ukraine. Support for the project dwindled throughout the next decade. In 1938 OZET was disbanded, following years of declining activity. The Soviets set up three Jewish national ''raions'' in Ukraine as well as two in the Crimea – national ''raions'' occupied the 3rd level of the Soviet system, but were all disbanded by the end of World War II.

The cities with the largest populations of Jews in 1926 were Odesa, 154,000 or 36.5% of the total population; Kyiv, 140,500 or 27.3%; Kharkiv, 81,500 or 19.5%; and Dnipropetrovsk, 62,000 or 26.7%. In 1931 Lviv's Jewish population numbered 98,000 or 31.9%, and in Chernivtsi, 42,600 or 37.9%.

On 8 April 1929 the new Law on Religious Associations codified all previous religious legislation. All meetings of religious associations were required to have their agenda approved in advance; lists of members of religious associations had to be provided to the authorities. In 1930 the Yevsektsia was dissolved, leaving no central Soviet-Jewish organization. Although the body had served to undermine Jewish religious life, its dissolution led to the disintegration of Jewish secular life as well; Jewish cultural and educational organizations gradually disappeared. When the Soviet government reintroduced the use of internal passports in 1933, "Jewish" was considered an ethnicity for those purposes.

The Soviet famine of 1932–1933 affected the Jewish population, and led to a migration from shtetls to overcrowded cities.

As the Soviet government annexed territory from Poland, Romania (both would be incorporated into the Ukrainian SSR after World War II) and the Baltic states, roughly two million Jews became Soviet citizens. Restrictions on Jews that had existed in those countries were lifted. At the same time, Jewish organizations in the transferred territories were shut down and their leaders were arrested and exiled. Approximately 250,000 Jews escaped or were evacuated from the annexed territories to the Soviet interior prior to the Nazi invasion.

Jewish settlement in Crimea

In 1921, Crimea became an autonomous republic. In 1923, the All-Union Central Committee passed a motion to resettle a large number of the Jewish population from Ukrainian and Belarusian cities to Crimea, numbering 570,400 families. The plan to further resettle Jewish families was confirmed by the Central Committee of the USSR on 15 July 1926, assigning 124 million roubles to the task and also receiving 67 million from foreign sources.

The Soviet initiative of Jewish settlement in Crimea was opposed by Symon Petliura, who regarded it as a provocation. This train of thought was supported by Arnold Margolin who stated that it would be dangerous to set up Jewish colonies there.

The Soviets twice sought to establish Jewish autonomy in Crimea; once, in the 1920s, with the support of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, and again in 1944, by the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee.

World War II and aftermath

Holocaust in Ukraine

The total number of civilians who died during the war and the German occupation of Ukraine is estimated to be as high as seven million. This estimate includes over one million Jews who were shot and killed by the Einsatzgruppen and local Ukrainian collaborators. The excuse of "Jewish Bolshevism" was also used to carry them out.

The total number of Jews killed in the Holocaust in Eastern Ukraine, or the Ukrainian SSR (within its 1938 borders), is estimated to be slightly less than 700,000 out of a total pre-Holocaust Jewish population of slightly over 1.5 million. Within the borders of Modern Ukraine, the death toll is estimated to be around 900,000.

Post-war situation

Ukraine had 840,000 Jews in 1959, a decrease of almost 70% from 1941 (within Ukraine's current borders). Ukraine's Jewish population declined significantly during the Cold War. In 1989, Ukraine's Jewish population was only slightly more than half of what it had been in 1959.

Such immigrants included artists, such as Marina Maximilian Blumin and street artist Klone, as well as activists including Gennady Riger and Lia Shemtov.

Independent Ukraine

Emigration

In 1989, a Soviet census counted 487,000 Jews living in Ukraine. Although discrimination by the state all but halted after Ukrainian independence in 1991, Jews were still discriminated against during the 1990s. For instance, Jews were not allowed to attend some educational institutions.Author bio
Antisemitism has since declined.

The overwhelming majority of the Jews who remained in Ukraine in 1989 then moved to other countries in the 1990s during and after the collapse of Communism.

Some 266,300 Ukrainian Jews emigrated to Israel in the 1990s. The 2001 Ukrainian Census counted 106,600 Jews living in Ukraine (the number of Jews also dropped due to a negative birthrate). According to the Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs Minister of Israel, early 2012 there were 250,000 Jews in Ukraine, half of them living in Kyiv. According to the European Jewish Congress, as of 2014, 360,000–400,000 Jews remained.

Jewish life and organizations in independent Ukraine

By 1999 there were various Ukrainian Jewish organizations that disputed each other's legitimacy.

In November 2007, an estimated 700 Torah scrolls confiscated from Jewish communities during the Soviet era were returned to Jewish communes by state authorities.

The Ukrainian Jewish Committee was established in 2008 in Kyiv to concentrate the efforts of Jewish leaders in Ukraine on resolving the community's strategic problems and addressing socially significant issues. The Committee declared its intention to become one of the world's most influential organizations protecting the rights of Jews and "the most important and powerful structure protecting human rights in Ukraine".

Rise of far-right sympathies and Jewish reaction

In the 2012 Ukrainian parliamentary elections, All-Ukrainian Union "Svoboda" won its first seats in the Ukrainian Parliament, garnering 10.44% of the popular vote and the fourth most seats among national political parties; This led to concern among Jewish organizations that accused "Svoboda" of Nazi sympathies and antisemitism. In May 2013, the World Jewish Congress listed the party as neo-Nazi. "Svoboda" has denied the charges.

Antisemitic graffiti and violence against Jews were still a problem in 2010.

Revolution of 2014 and start of Russo-Ukrainian war

After the Euromaidan protests, unrest gripped southern and eastern Ukraine, and this escalated in April 2014 into the war in Donbas and the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

In April 2014, in the city of Donetsk occupied by Russian-backed forces, leaflets were distributed by three masked men as people left a synagogue, ordering Jews to register to avoid losing their property and citizenship "given that the leaders of the Jewish community of Ukraine support the Banderite Military junta, junta in Kyiv and are hostile to the Eastern Orthodox Church, Orthodox Donetsk People's Republic, Donetsk Republic and its citizens". After the distribution of the flyers was reported, Denis Pushilin, whom the leaflets claimed had issued the discriminatory order, denied any involvement on behalf of himself and the government of the Donetsk People's Republic. The chief rabbi of the city of Donetsk, Pinchas Vishedski, later called the distribution of the flyers a "hoax" that was carried out by an unknown party, adding "I think it's someone trying to use the Jewish community in Donetsk as an instrument in this conflict. That's why we're upset."

After the Euromaidan, the number of Ukrainian Jews making ''aliyah'' from Ukraine grew 142% during the first four months of 2014 compared to the previous year. 800 people arrived in Israel over January–April, and over 200 signed up for May 2014. However, chief rabbi and Chabad emissary of Kyiv Rabbi Jonathan Markovitch said in late April 2014 "Today, you can come to Kyiv, Dnipro or Odesa and walk through the streets openly dressed as a Jew, with nothing to be afraid of".

In August 2014, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported that the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews was organizing chartered flights to allow at least 150 Ukrainian Jews to immigrate to Israel in September. Jewish organizations within Ukraine, as well as the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, the Jewish Agency for Israel and the Jewish community of Dnipropetrovsk, arranged temporary homes and shelters for hundreds of Jews who fled the war in Donbas in eastern Ukraine. Hundreds of Jews reportedly fled the cities of Luhansk and Donetsk.

In 2014 Ihor Kolomoyskyi and Volodymyr Groysman were appointed Governor of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast and Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada, Speaker of the Parliament respectively. "The Ukrainian Crisis and the Jews: A Time for Hope or Despair," ''Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs'' VIII : 2 (2014) pp 77–85. Groysman became Prime Minister of Ukraine in April 2016.

Presidency of Volodymyr Zelenskyy

Ukraine elected its first Jewish president in the 2019 Ukrainian presidential election, 2019 presidential election, when comedian, head of Kvartal 95 Studio, and lead actor in the TV series ''Servant of the People (2015 TV series), Servant of the People'' Volodymyr Zelenskyy defeated incumbent Petro Poroshenko with 73.23% of the vote, the biggest landslide victory in the history of Ukrainian presidential elections. During the brief overlap of Zelenskyy's and Groysman's terms (20 May to 29 August 2019), Ukraine was the only country in the world apart from Israel to have both a Jewish president and prime minister.

2022 Russian invasion

In February 2022 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia invaded Ukraine. The Israeli Embassy stayed open on the Sabbath to facilitate the evacuation of Jews. A total of 97 Jews chose to travel to Israel. In addition, 140 Jewish orphans fled to Romania and Moldova. 100 Jews fled to Belarus in order to prepare for their eventual move to Israel. On 2 March 2022, the Jewish Agency for Israel reported that hundreds of Jewish war refugees sheltering in Poland, Romania and Moldova were scheduled to leave for Israel the following week. Refugee estimates ranged from 10,000 to 15,200 refugees had arrived in Israel. In September 2023 it was reported that over 43,000 Jews from Russia and over 15,000 Jews from Ukraine have fled to Israel. By August 2024, out of an estimated 30,000 Jews who immigrated to Israel since 7 October 2023, 17,000 Jews were from Russia and 900 Jews from Ukraine.

On 22 August 2024, Israeli Ynet news reported that at least 100 Jewish Ukrainian soldiers had been killed fighting Russia since the beginning of the invasion.

Jewish communities in modern Ukraine

As of 2012, Ukraine had the fifth-largest Jewish community in Europe and the twelfth-largest Jewish population by country, in the world, behind South Africa and ahead of Mexico. The majority live in Kyiv (about half), Dnipro, Kharkiv and Odesa. Rabbis Jonathan Markovitch of Kyiv and Shmuel Kaminetsky of Dnipro are considered to be among the most influential foreigners in the country. Opened in October 2012 in Dnipro, the multifunctional Menorah center (Dnipro), Menorah center is among the world's largest Jewish community centers.

A growing trend among Israelis is to visit Ukraine on a "roots trip" to learn of Jewish life there.''A mile in their shoes, By Moshe Gilad, RISU'' Kyiv is usually mentioned, where it is possible to trace the paths of Sholem Aleichem and Golda Meir; Zhytomyr and Korostyshiv, where one can follow the steps of Haim Nahman Bialik; Berdychiv, where one can trace the life of Mendele Mocher Sforim; Rivne, where one can follow the course of Amos Oz; Buchach – the path of S.Y. Agnon; Drohobych – the place of Maurycy Gottlieb and Bruno Schulz.

Ukraine is known as a major exporter of handmade matzah to the United States.

Notable Ukrainian Jews

See also

* Antisemitism in Europe
* Racism in Europe
* Racism in Lithuania
* Racism in Poland
* Antisemitism in Russia
* Racism in Russia
* Antisemitism in the Soviet Union
* Racism in the Soviet Union
* Antisemitism in Ukraine
* Racism in Ukraine
* Galician Jews
* History of the Jews in Carpathian Ruthenia
* History of the Jews in Europe
* History of the Jews in Kyiv
* History of the Jews in Lithuania
* History of the Jews in Poland
* History of the Jews in Russia
* History of the Jews in the Soviet Union
* Israel–Lithuania relations
* Israel–Poland relations
* Israel–Russia relations
* Soviet Union and the Arab–Israeli conflict
* Israel–Ukraine relations
* Janowska concentration camp
* ''Jewish Roots in Ukraine and Moldova'' (book)
* Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee
* Jewish gauchos
* Jewish–Ukrainian relations in Eastern Galicia
* List of Galician Jews
* List of Polish Jews
* Lithuanian Jews
* Lwów Ghetto
* Lwów Uprising
* The Holocaust in Lithuania
* The Holocaust in Poland
* The Holocaust in Russia
* The Holocaust in the Soviet Union
* The Holocaust in Ukraine
* Three hares
* Wooden synagogues of the former Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Wooden synagogue
* Yerusalimka
* List of synagogues in Ukraine

Notes

References

Further reading

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* Velychenko, Stephen (2021) ''Ukraine's Revolutions and anti-Jewish Pogroms * (historians.in.ua)''.

External links

Chabad-Lubavitch Centers in Ukraine

Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS

Jewish Agricultural Colonies, adjacent towns and villages in Southern Ukraine


* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110122024614/http://renaissance.jewishagency.org/2010/11/24/jewish-renaissance-in-odessa/ Jewish Renaissance in Odessa]

Video of Lecture on Jews of 17th-century Ukraine by Dr. Henry Abramson
*
Jewish Roots in Ukraine and Moldova
' at Routes to Roots Foundation

Routes to Roots Foundation's Archive Database
– search includes Ukraine and Moldova

Routes to Roots Foundation's Image Database
– search includes Ukraine and Moldova

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jews In Ukraine (history)
Jewish Ukrainian history,
Ethnic groups in Ukraine, Jews
History of religion in Ukraine, Judaism
Judaism in Ukraine, History