Darkeinu’s Mega-Chanukah Keeps Up the Holidays’ Spirit
Over the Chanukah holiday, Darkeinu, FJC’s Jewish studies’ educational curriculum, is running a Mega-Chanukah contest aimed at connecting Jewish kids throughout the FSU and getting them more involved with the holiday and its customs. Where as state winter holidays in the FSU are widely and extensively celebrated, Jewish kids on Chanukah might feel isolated and […]
Georgian PM sends warm wishes to Jewish community on Chanukah
By the trend news agency Georgian Prime Minister Mamuka Bakhtadze has sent warm wishes to the Jewish community of Georgia on Chanukah today, an eight-day Jewish festival commemorates the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem during the second century B.C., where Jews stood against their Greek-Syrian oppressors in the Maccabean Revolt, Agenda.gereports. Bakhtadze symbolically lit […]
Holocaust survivors gather for global Hanukkah ceremonies
‘We have to celebrate them while we can,’ says former MK and survivor Colette Avital as commemorations are held in Jerusalem, Moscow, Berlin, and New York By DAVID RISING | The Times of Israel BERLIN (AP) — Hundreds of Holocaust survivors around the world marked the third night of Hanukkah on Tuesday, with menorah-lighting ceremonies paying […]
The Miracle of Light: Happy Hanukkah from Azerbaijan
BY DURDANE AGAYEVA | JEWISH JOURNAL | BLOGS Hanukkah is such a special time of year. It is a reminder of so much, and although as a Muslim it is not my holiday to celebrate, it is a special 8 days that I hold dear to my heart. For me, the most powerful part of the Hanukkah […]
The rabbis using social media to reach Russians with a dormant Jewish heritage
Extracts from article by Semyon Dovzhik | The JC Semyon Dovzhik discovered how one rabbi believes Moses himself would have been on Instagram In Russia, a rabbi is expected to be like the country: conservative, respectable and traditional. But a few pioneers have been bucking the trend in recent years by using social media to reach […]
On Ukraine Frontline, Prepping for Chanukah Under Martial Law
Public menorah will be lit in Mariupol, industrial port on Sea of Azov Extracts from article by Dovid Margolin | Chabad.org A public celebration of Chanukah will take place in the Ukrainian frontline city of Mariupoldespite the government’s declaration of martial law, the city’s rabbi said late Thursday. The martial-law status, which went into effect in nearly half the […]
The FSU will be shining brightly this Chanukah
Deep in the dark and cold winter of the FSU, the lights of Chanukah will begin to shine on Sunday evening, December 2. The frigid temperatures will not deter the members of many Jewish communities, young and old, to leave their homes and stand proudly in the main squares of the large cities and the […]
Darkeinu’s 5779 Olympics Contest Kicks Off Bigger and Better
FJC’s Darkeinu Jewish studies curriculum kicked off its popular “Olympics” Jewish heritage contest last month in 69 educational institutions across seven FSU countries. This year the contest is also open to pre-schoolers, for whom a special “Olympics Darkeinu Kids” was launched for the first time. Overall 2060 students participated in the first round, with 1436 moving […]
Jewish Life Thaws in Remote Arkhangelsk
One hundred years after the Communist Revolution, Arkhangelsk builds Jewish community By Lubavitch.com Government archives show that Arkhangelsk, some 750 miles north of Moscow and more than three degrees higher than Anchorage, Alaska, was once home to two synagogues. Last month, the city’s small Jewish community inaugurated a new synagogue and community center. Arkhangelsks’ original […]
Jews of former Cossack fort Irkutsk mark 200 years of prosperity and persecution
‘IRKUTSK BACK THEN WAS TRULY IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE’ Founded by a band of liberated Jewish Cantonist soldiers in 1818, this small Siberian community has donated to communal causes worldwide — and been threatened with expulsion By ROSSELLA TERCATIN | The Times of Israel IRKUTSK, Russia — Today, this frigid city of just over half […]