Month: August 2026

Historian Alexander Alferov – since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion — an officer of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, served in the units of the Special Operations Forces “Azov-Kyiv” and the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade. Holds the rank of reserve major of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Since June 27, 2025 – head of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory.

The name of Kyiv in the popular imagination is almost inextricably linked with the figure of the legendary Kyi. This version, recorded in the “Tale of Bygone Years,” has long become part of the school canon and national myth.

But ancient Kyiv, as sources from the 10th century claim, had another name — rare, mysterious, and almost vanished from historical memory. This name is Sambatas. And it is around this name that a complex and underestimated discussion about the early history of the city is taking place today.

Sambatas, the Sambation River, and Kyiv

The existence of the second name was reminded by historian Alexander Alferov, analyzing Byzantine sources that are rarely cited outside the academic environment. His conclusions are based not on later chronicles but on the direct testimony of a contemporary of the events.

The discussion is about the treatise “On the Governance of the Empire,” created in 948 by the Byzantine Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus. In this text, Kyiv is named the capital of Rus’ — and at the same time, its second name is indicated: Sambatas.

This mention is unique. Neither in later Byzantine chronicles, nor in ancient Russian chronicles, nor in Western European sources does Sambatas appear again. Historians do not have parallel texts or archaeological finds that directly confirm or refute this name.

It is this singularity of the source that makes Sambatas especially important.

Researchers are not just dealing with an alternative name for the city, but with a trace of a vanished layer of historical reality — possibly associated with another language, another culture, or a different circle of contacts.

The origin of the word Sambatas remains a subject of debate. No version is recognized as definitive, but each reflects a certain historical context of the region.

The Turkic interpretation associates Sambatas with the concept of a “high fortress” or fortified elevation. This interpretation seems logical from the geographical perspective of Kyiv and the role of the city as a defensive center.

The Scandinavian version suggests a possible origin from sand-bakki — “sandy shoal” or “shore.” It fits well with the idea of the Dnieper as a key trade route and the presence of the Varangians in the region.

The Gothic hypothesis proposes reading Sambatas as “a place for gathering boats,” emphasizing the transport and military function of the city. The Baltic version, in turn, interprets the name as “a structure on the edge” or “a house on a protrusion,” based on phonetic parallels.

A special place in this series is occupied by the Jewish interpretation. It connects Sambatas with the mythical river Sambation, known from ancient Judaic texts. According to these sources, Sambation is a river beyond which the “lost tribes of Israel” supposedly reside, and which flows turbulently for six days a week and stops on the Sabbath.

This version does not imply a literal identification of Kyiv with the biblical myth. However, it points to possible cultural and intellectual contacts in the region in the early Middle Ages, including the presence of Jewish communities, traders, and intermediaries whose ideas might be reflected in geographical names.

It is important to emphasize: none of the hypotheses has a decisive advantage. Sambatas remains a linguistic and historical mystery, the significance of which cannot be reduced to one people or one language.

According to Alferov, the very fact of the existence of such a name speaks of the multi-layered identity of early Kyiv. The city was formed at the intersection of trade routes, cultural zones, and religious traditions, and its history cannot be explained by a single chronicle version.

The history of Sambatas is a reminder that the past of Kyiv is much more complex than familiar schemes. Behind the well-known name lie layers of forgotten meanings that still require understanding — something that NANews — News of Israel | Nikk.Agency regularly engages in.

Sambation: where it is mentioned, how it is described, and what it meant

Sambation is a mythological river known from Judaic, ancient, and medieval sources. It was never considered a real geographical object and in all texts serves as a symbolic boundary, not a river in the literal sense.

In Judaic sources, Sambation is mentioned in the Babylonian Talmud, tractate Sanhedrin 65b. It states that “the ten lost tribes of Israel” are located beyond the Sambation River. The context is a discussion of the boundaries of the inhabited world and the fate of the exiled tribes, not a description of a specific locality.

The Midrashic tradition (including Bereishit Rabbah and later aggadic texts) describes the properties of the river in detail. According to these texts, Sambation:

• boils, throws stones, sand, and dust six days a week;
• completely stops on the Sabbath;
• remains impassable, as crossing on the Sabbath is prohibited by religious law.

Thus, Sambation becomes a double boundary — physical and religious, which cannot be overcome by force or by observing the law.

In ancient tradition, Sambation is mentioned by Josephus Flavius in the work “The Jewish War” (Book VII). He describes a river that throws stones and becomes calm on the seventh day. For Flavius, Sambation appears as part of the ideas about distant eastern lands and has no precise localization.

In medieval Byzantine and Latin texts, Sambation is included in encyclopedic and chronicle writings as an element of the “wondrous geography of the East.” Here it is no longer directly associated with religious polemics but serves as an inherited image from the Jewish tradition.

The spelling of the term depends on the language of the source:

• Hebrew — סמבטיון (Sambation);
• Greek — Σαμβατίων (Sambatíon);
• Latin — Sambation, Sambatyon, Sabbatyon.

Geographical attachment in all sources remains undefined. In different eras, Sambation was conditionally “placed”:

• in Mesopotamia,
• in Central Asia,
• in the Caucasus,
• beyond the Caspian Sea,
• in an undefined “East.”

These versions do not contradict each other, as Sambation was understood not cartographically, but cosmologically — as a boundary between the known world and the space of exile, between the ordinary flow of time and the religious cycle.

Conclusion: Sambation is a stable mythological image present in several traditions. No source describes it as a real river, but all use it as a symbol of the limit, the expectation of return, and the messianic future.

Alexander Alferov

Full name — Alferov Alexander Anatolyevich.

Ukrainian historian, candidate of historical sciences, radio host, public and political figure. Born on November 30, 1983, in Kyiv (Ukrainian SSR). By nationality — Ukrainian.

He is a researcher at the Institute of History of Ukraine of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, specializing in the history of Ukraine in the 16th–18th centuries, sigillography, genealogy, the history of the Cossack elite, and historical institutions.

Graduated from the National Pedagogical University named after M. P. Drahomanov with a degree in “history teacher, law teacher.” In 2012, he defended his candidate dissertation on the role of the Cossack-elite family Golubov in the history of Ukraine.

Since 2008, he has been working as a radio host on Ukrainian Radio “Culture,” author and host of the program “Historical Frescoes.” He was also a TV host on the public TV channel UA: Culture.

At different times, he held positions as a researcher, press secretary of the People’s Deputy of Ukraine Andriy Biletsky, and head of the press service of the “Azov” regiment.

Since the beginning of the full-scale war — an officer of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, served in the units of the Special Operations Forces “Azov-Kyiv” and the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade. Holds the rank of reserve major of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

On June 27, 2025, he was appointed head of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory.

Author of more than 100 scientific publications, as well as numerous books and catalogs dedicated to Ukrainian sigillography, Cossack history, genealogy, and archival sources. In 2009, he discovered a copy of the “Constitution of Pylyp Orlyk” in Old Ukrainian in Russian archives.

Awarded the Order of Merit III degree, the presidential award “For Participation in the Anti-Terrorist Operation,” the medal “For Sacrifice and Love for Ukraine,” and a number of professional awards.

…
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On May 3rd, 127 years have passed since the birth of Golda Meir. The most influential woman of the 20th century was born in Kyiv and became one of the founders of the State of Israel.

Meir was one of the most prominent figures in world politics for over 30 years. She became the Prime Minister of Israel during one of the most difficult periods in the country’s history.

Her famous quote: “You cannot negotiate peace with those who have come to kill you”, remains relevant today, both for Israel and Ukraine. Section Jews from Ukraine.

Golda Meir (born Golda Mabovich) was born on April 21, 1898 (May 3, new style) in Kyiv to a Jewish family. Her father, Moshe Mabovich, was a carpenter, and her mother, Bluma Naidich, worked at home. In 1903, when Golda was 8 years old, her family emigrated to the USA, where she finished school and a teacher’s college.

In 1921, Golda moved to Palestine, where she began her Zionist activities. She became one of the closest associates of David Ben-Gurion, playing a key role in the creation of the State of Israel in 1948. Golda Meir held several important government positions in Israel:

• Minister of Labor and Social Welfare (1949–1956)
• Minister of Foreign Affairs (1956–1966)
• Minister of the Interior (1970)
• Prime Minister of Israel (1969–1974)

Golda Meir passed away on December 8, 1978, in Jerusalem. She left a lasting legacy in Israel, with her memory preserved in street and square names, as well as memorial plaques and statues. A Golda Meir Square was named in her honor in Tel Aviv, along with streets in Jerusalem. Her contribution to the creation of Israel remains invaluable, and her name continues to symbolize strength and determination.

Golda Meir was born on April 21, 1898 (May 3, new style) in Kyiv, on Baseyna Street, to a Jewish family. Her father, Moshe Mabovich, was a carpenter, and her mother, Bluma Naidich, worked at home. The family went through difficult times, and Golda often recalled her childhood as a time of need, when there was not enough food and warmth at home. In her memoirs, she wrote about how her father nailed doors in response to rumors of possible pogroms, which left a deep mark on her consciousness and shaped her views on life.

The family lived in a modest apartment on the ground floor of a two-story house located on Baseyna Street in Kyiv, near Bessarabska Square. Golda later described this place as a “wretched and damp room.” In her memoirs, she emphasized that her father dreamed of escaping poverty and opened a carpentry shop, but his attempts were unsuccessful, and their family continued to live in need.

Family roots and childhood in Kyiv

Golda was named after her great-grandmother on her mother’s side, a woman who lived to be 94 and always added salt to her tea instead of sugar to remember the bitterness of life in the Jewish diaspora. This heritage deeply influenced her character and worldview. The Meir family was from Pinsk (modern-day Belarus), and they moved to Kyiv in search of a better life. Moshe Mabovich, Golda’s father, was a carpenter, and thanks to passing qualification exams, he was able to move with his family to Kyiv, despite the strict restrictions for Jews in the Russian Empire.

Connection to Ukraine in her memoirs

In her autobiography “My Life”, Golda Meir devoted attention to her childhood in Kyiv. She described how, at that time, there was a lack of resources in her family, and life in Russia was unsafe for Jews. Golda remembered that in Kyiv, she realized that “justice does not exist in the world.” This left a strong impression on her and shaped her resilience, which later manifested in her political life.

When she was 8 years old, the family moved to Pinsk, and then emigrated to the United States. These years in Kyiv left a deep mark on Golda, and she always remained attached to her Ukrainian roots. She was proud of belonging to a resilient Jewish family that had survived many hardships. Golda believed that her upbringing in Kyiv, as well as the experience of living in a Jewish ghetto, toughened her and prepared her for life in Israel.

Square and memorials in Kyiv

In Kyiv, in 2024, a Golda Meir Square was named on Borychev Tik Street (17, 19, 21). This square was opened in 2024, marking an important moment in preserving Golda’s memory in her hometown. A memorial plaque on House No. 5-A on Baseyna Street, where she lived until 1903, also serves as a reminder of her connection to Kyiv. The plaque was installed in 1998, and it is another sign of respect and recognition for her contribution to the history of Israel and the Jewish people.

Golda Meir Street in Kyiv was renamed in 2022. It was formerly called Krasnodarska Street and was located in the “Nivki” metro area. The renaming was part of an initiative to honor outstanding personalities and symbolized the recognition of Golda Meir as a native of Kyiv and an important figure in the history of Israel.

Famous quotes by Golda Meir

Golda Meir was not only an outstanding political leader but also a person with a bright, independent character. Her thoughts on war, politics, the role of women, and life’s challenges will forever remain in history as a symbol of strength of spirit and the pursuit of justice. Here are some famous quotes from this remarkable woman that reflect her views on life, politics, and Israel:

1. On the position of prime minister:
   • “It was never in my plans to become prime minister. I never thought about positions. I became prime minister — and I did it, just like my milkman became the commander of our outpost on Mount Hermon. Neither he nor I particularly enjoyed the job, but both of us tried to do it as best as we could.”
2. On Israel:
   • “Moses led us through the desert for 40 years to bring us to the only place in the Middle East that has no oil.”

• On how to govern a small country:
  • “The world is cruel, selfish, and brutal. The suffering of small nations goes unnoticed. Even the most educated governments and democracies, led by decent people who represent decent people, are not too inclined to think about issues of justice in international relations. We cannot always rely on their advice, and thus we must have the courage to look at things realistically and act as our instinct for self-preservation tells us.”
• On the Holocaust:
  • “ […] We couldn’t believe that such a horrible crime could be committed, or that the world would allow it to happen. No, we were not naive. We simply could not imagine something our imagination had never conceived. But now there are no horrors that I can’t imagine.”
• On independence:
  • “Two dangers face those of us who emerged as a new independent country: the first is the danger of being stuck in the past; the second is the illusion that political independence will immediately solve all our problems.”
• On war:
  • “We could not afford the luxury of pessimism, so we made completely different calculations, based on the fact that we all — all 650,000 of us — had such a strong will to live that it was impossible to understand outside of Israel. If we didn’t want to be thrown into the sea, we had no choice but to win. And so we won.”
• On peace:
  • “It will be a great day when Arab farmers cross the Jordan not on tanks, but on tractors and extend a hand of friendship — farmer to farmer, human to human. Perhaps this is a dream, but I am sure that one day it will come true.”
• On life’s challenges:
  • “I learned a very important lesson: a person can always do a little more than seemed possible yesterday.”
• On the position of women:
  • “The fact that I am a woman has never hindered me. I never felt awkward or inferior, I never thought that men were better than women or that giving birth to a child was a misfortune. Never. And men, on their part, never gave me any special privileges. But, as it seems to me, it’s true that for a woman who wants to lead not only a domestic but also a public life, everything is significantly more difficult than for a man, because she bears a double load.”

From NAnews – “Jews from Ukraine”

Golda Meir, born in Kyiv, became a symbol of resilience, determination, and an unwavering pursuit of independence for the Jewish people. Despite the hardships of her childhood in Kyiv, she became a figure ready to fight for the rights and dignity of the Jewish people. Golda Meir, despite poverty and harsh circumstances, was able to achieve greatness and change the course of history by playing a key role in the founding of the State of Israel.

Her quotes continue to inspire millions of people around the world, and her legacy lives on in commemorative sites in Kyiv and other cities where she was born and raised. Golda Meir remains a symbol of struggle and fearlessness for all Jews, especially those coming from Ukraine, who continue to defend their rights and independence.

NAnews (news about Israel and Ukraine) takes pride in telling the story of great personalities like Golda Meir and emphasizes the importance of her connection to both Ukraine and Israel. We believe that the memory of such individuals helps preserve historical unity between the nations and inspires for the future.

Additional information about Golda Meir and her Ukrainian roots is available in articles on our website:

We have already written:

• Golda Meir: Birth, Biography, and Career
  • Article about Golda Meir, her birth on May 3, 1898, in Kyiv, her family, and life before emigration. This article covers key moments of her childhood in Ukraine and her career before she became Prime Minister of Israel.
• Video Teaser about Golda Meir
  • Video teaser dedicated to Golda Meir, focusing on her influence on the development of Israel and her role in world politics.
• Streets of Golda Meir and Vladimir Jabotinsky
  • Story about how streets in Israel were named after Golda Meir and Vladimir Jabotinsky, two great figures in the history of Israel and Zionism.
• Golda Meir’s Grandson
  • Article about Golda Meir’s grandson, who continues to support her legacy and influence, along with interesting facts about the Meir family.
• Exhibition about Golda Meir
  • Overview of an exhibition dedicated to Golda Meir, organized in Israel, featuring information about her life, career, and achievements.
• Square and Memorial Plaque for Golda Meir in Kyiv
  • Story about the memorial plaque on the house in Kyiv where Golda Meir lived until 1903, as well as the square dedicated to her, opened in 2024.
• Golda Meir on Israeli Banknotes
  • History of how Golda Meir was depicted on Israeli banknotes, reflecting her significance to the state.
• Jewish Conference of 1938
  • Article about the events of the Evian Conference in 1938, in the context of the struggle for Jewish rights and the efforts Golda Meir made in international politics to address issues related to the Holocaust.

Section Jews from Ukraine

The “Jews from Ukraine” section on the NAnews website is dedicated to the history and lives of emigrants from Ukraine who became significant figures in Israel and the world. We explore their journey, achievements, and impact on both countries, as well as important moments connected to the Jewish heritage of Ukraine.

Read more about Golda Meir and other important figures whose roots and fates are intertwined with the history of Ukraine and Israel. It is essential for us not only to preserve the memory of such individuals but also to highlight their contributions to the development of society and strengthening ties between the two nations.

Our section continues to tell the stories of notable personalities who have made significant contributions to historical processes and became symbols of the struggle for independence, human rights, and freedom. Golda Meir is a vivid example of how Jews who grew up in Ukraine managed to influence international politics and create an independent state for the Jewish people.

We take pride in being at the center of these stories and continue sharing them with our readers, supporting the unique heritage of Ukrainian Jews in Israel.

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Ex-goalkeeper of ‘Maccabi Haifa’ Georgy Ermakov married Alexandra Mikolyuk from ‘The Bachelor’: Israel appeared twice in the history of this couple - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

In Ukraine, an open online course by Anna Shternshis on Jewish life during the Soviet period is starting – anyone can join from October to December 2026 – from the ‘Culture League’ to the ‘Doctors’ Plot’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

Igor Kolomoisky from the hall of the Ukrainian court spoke about ballistic missiles, Lenin’s mausoleum, and Timur Mindich in Israel. But behind one sarcastic remark was the story of Kolomoisky’s own Israeli citizenship, the Jewish community of Dnipro, “Dnipro-1”, Fire Point, and several legal proceedings.

Igor Kolomoisky was back in the news not because of another court decision, but because of a remark that the war could supposedly be ended by a missile hitting Lenin’s mausoleum. But the conversation on August 28, 2026, was broader. He talked about Ukrainian ballistics, Fire Point, and Timur Mindich, who is in Israel. Kolomoisky himself is also an Israeli citizen, a former head of a major Jewish organization in Ukraine, and a person who has been in a Kyiv detention center for almost three years.

In this material, I, Alexander Khmelnitsky, for NANews — Israel News compared where Kolomoisky’s words were a joke and where he relied on real stories around Fire Point and Mindich. For the Israeli reader, his Israeli passport, the “Menorah” in Dnipro, the story of “Dnipro-1”, and several legal proceedings, which are often mixed into one, are important here.

The mausoleum was a joke. Mindich — not so much

On August 28, 2026, Kolomoisky spoke with journalists in the Appeals Chamber of the High Anti-Corruption Court of Ukraine. HACC is a special court for the most significant corruption cases. On that day, the defense tried to transfer the case to another court, where Kolomoisky and five other former managers of PrivatBank are accused of embezzling more than 9.2 billion hryvnias.

The court refused.

Against this backdrop, Kolomoisky began to speculate about the war. According to his logic, the mere possibility of Ukraine responding with ballistic strikes on Moscow would not yet force Russia to stop. Then followed sarcasm about Lenin’s mausoleum and the “death of Koschei.” The phrase “everything will end immediately” in context sounded like a joke, not a military plan.

He then spoke about Fire Point, called the company a “super organization,” demanded the return of the “chief designer,” and immediately recalled Mindich in Israel — supposedly “with all the secrets.”

“Chief designer” in Israel: where is the substitution of fact

Timur Mindich is not the chief designer of Fire Point. This position is held by the company’s co-founder Denis Shtilerman; in 2026, he publicly stated that he owns 97.5% of Fire Point.

But the connection of Mindich with the company is not entirely fictional. Shtilerman himself said that Mindich helped gain access to closed Soviet archives with materials on missile technologies, including documents on the S-300. He claimed that these materials helped work on Ukrainian missile projects.

This is Shtilerman’s version, not an independently established fact about which documents were transferred. There is no confirmation that Mindich took “all the drawings” to Israel.

Fire Point is indeed working on ballistics. Reuters reported on FP-7 and FP-9; for FP-9, a range of about 850 kilometers and a warhead of up to 800 kilograms is declared. Simultaneously, the company is developing the Freyja anti-missile project with the FP-7X interceptor.

Mindich is in Israel, and Ukraine is seeking his extradition in the “Midas” case. On August 10, the head of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, Alexander Klymenko, said that there was no response from Israel to the request for the extradition of Mindich and Alexander Zuckerman. SAP is the prosecutor’s office that handles top corruption cases together with NABU, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau.

Kolomoisky received an Israeli passport back in 1995

For the Israeli audience, Kolomoisky is not just a “Ukrainian oligarch.” He himself said that he received Israeli citizenship in 1995, after his first trip here in 1992. Later, he simultaneously had Ukrainian, Israeli, and Cypriot passports.

Since then, the set of citizenships has changed. In 2025, the Supreme Court of Ukraine finally upheld the decision to terminate his Ukrainian citizenship. Cyprus revoked its citizenship in 2024. I found no data on the termination of Israeli citizenship.

Since 2018, Kolomoisky lived in Herzliya, and in May 2019, he returned to Ukraine.

The connection with Jewish life was also real. In 2008, he was elected president of the United Jewish Community of Ukraine. He was a major donor to the Jewish community of Dnipro and participated in financing the “Menorah” complex; separately financed the related museum of Jewish memory and the Holocaust. In 2010, he headed the European Council of Jewish Communities, although his arrival was accompanied by conflict within the organization.

For NANews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency, I separate two things here: Kolomoisky’s Jewish and Israeli biography is an established part of his past, but it says nothing about guilt or innocence in current cases.

“Kolomoisky’s Battalion” — not quite a personal army

In the spring of 2014, after the annexation of Crimea by Russia and the start of the war in Donbas, Kolomoisky headed the Dnipropetrovsk Regional State Administration. For an Israeli, this is roughly a region head appointed by the central government, although there is no direct Israeli equivalent.

Kolomoisky and his team invested private money in the defense of the region and the support of volunteer units. The most famous is “Dnipro-1.”

It is often called “Kolomoisky’s battalion” or even “private army.” The latter is inaccurate. “Dnipro-1” was created in April 2014 as a special volunteer police battalion within the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine. Private funding and the role of Kolomoisky’s team were significant, but legally it was not his personal armed structure.

During that period, he also promised monetary rewards for captured Russian saboteurs. For Moscow, Kolomoisky became one of the symbols of Ukrainian resistance in the east — despite being a Jewish public figure and an Israeli citizen.

Why he has been in detention for the third year without a verdict

Kolomoisky has been in custody since September 2, 2023. But to say that he is “in prison by verdict” is incorrect. He is held in a pre-trial detention center during investigations and court proceedings.

On August 7, 2026, the Podolsky District Court of Kyiv kept him in custody until October 9, setting bail at 948 million hryvnias in a case related to PrivatBank.

Another proceeding is ongoing in parallel. Kolomoisky is accused of organizing an attempt on the lawyer Sergey Karpenko in 2003. According to the investigation, the conflict arose around a corporate dispute, after which Karpenko was attacked and stabbed. Kolomoisky denies involvement. In June 2026, Karpenko testified in court for the first time, and the defense tried to close the case due to the statute of limitations.

These cases cannot be mixed. And the detention itself does not prove guilt: the final decision is made by the court.

The court on August 28 returned the conversation to PrivatBank

NABU and SAP submitted the indictment to the court on August 6, 2026. According to the prosecution, in January–March 2015, the former ultimate owner of PrivatBank, who simultaneously headed the Dnipropetrovsk region, organized the embezzlement of more than 9.2 billion hryvnias of the bank through a controlled structure. Kolomoisky and other defendants have the right to challenge this version.

There is also a separate British process. In 2025, the High Court of England found Kolomoisky and Gennady Bogolyubov liable to PrivatBank for the withdrawal of funds. On May 22, 2026, the Court of Appeal of England and Wales dismissed their appeal. This is a civil decision, not a Ukrainian criminal verdict.

It was at the hearing on the Ukrainian case on August 28 that Kolomoisky spoke about Mindich. One Israeli citizen is in custody in Kyiv; another Ukraine is trying to obtain from Israel through extradition. Between them in this story is Fire Point — a Ukrainian missile manufacturer, around which the dispute over Mindich’s real role remains a dispute, not a fact established by the court.

…
Ex-goalkeeper of ‘Maccabi Haifa’ Georgy Ermakov married Alexandra Mikolyuk from ‘The Bachelor’: Israel appeared twice in the history of this couple - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

In Ukraine, an open online course by Anna Shternshis on Jewish life during the Soviet period is starting – anyone can join from October to December 2026 – from the ‘Culture League’ to the ‘Doctors’ Plot’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

To the fourth anniversary of the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation, the United Jewish Community of Ukraine compiled a chronology of damaged and destroyed Jewish objects: synagogues, community buildings, schools, social institutions, Jewish cemeteries, and memorial sites.

This is not a checklist. It shows how the war hits people and memory simultaneously — places of prayer, education, care for the elderly, and burial sites.

For 4 years, monitoring of destruction has been ongoing, but due to the large volume of information or its temporary absence, the list may be incomplete and expanded in the future. The degrees of damage to objects range from minor (broken windows) to complete destruction. Due to the complexity of accurately qualifying the damage for a number of objects, the provided data is of an estimated nature.

The authors specify separately: the dates in some points are approximate, some objects may have been damaged repeatedly, and in occupied territories, accurate verification is often impossible. Publication date February 22, 2026.

Full list (as in the community’s publication)

2022

1. February 2022, Kyiv — the building of the Galitskaya Synagogue was damaged after a strike on civilian infrastructure in the city center.

2. March 1, 2022, Kyiv — a strike in the area of the TV tower near the memorial complex “Babyn Yar”, reported damage to the Holocaust victims’ memorial.

3. March 2, 2022, Kharkiv — the office premises of the organization Hillel were completely destroyed.

4. March 4, 2022, Kharkiv — the building of the Jewish school was damaged, windows were broken.

5. March 9, 2022, Kharkiv — windows were damaged in the women’s prayer hall of the synagogue.

6. March 15, 2022, Kharkiv — a hit on the building of the yeshiva (roof pierced).

7. March 26, 2022, Kharkiv — the memorial “Menorah” on the territory of the “Drobytsky Yar” complex was damaged.

8. March 31, 2022, Kharkiv — the building of the Karaite Kenesa (1891) was damaged: windows were broken, the facade was hit by shrapnel.

9. Spring 2022, Mariupol — large-scale destruction of Jewish infrastructure was recorded: the building of the small synagogue was destroyed; the pre-revolutionary building of the functioning Chabad synagogue was seriously damaged (ceilings and roof destroyed, outer walls preserved); a hit on the historical building of the 19th-century synagogue (“craft”) and damage to the walls of the Choral Synagogue (1882) were noted. It was also indicated that the Jewish cemetery of the city might have been damaged.

10. Spring 2022, Chernihiv — the buildings of the regional Jewish community and the Jewish charitable foundation were damaged, windows were broken.

11. April 21, 2022, Kyiv — a hit in the Jewish section of the Berkovets City Cemetery, graves were damaged.

12. May 2022, Huliaipole — the historical building of the synagogue (1909) was damaged: windows were broken, a wall was damaged.

13. May 8, 2022, Hlukhiv (Sumy region) — a missile hit the territory of the Jewish cemetery: fire, part of the tombstones destroyed.

14. May 25, 2022, Zaporizhzhia — the shock wave after a missile strike damaged the Kravtsov Synagogue (1888): windows in historical frames were broken.

15. June 11, 2022, Chortkiv (Ternopil region) — the building of the old synagogue was damaged after a missile attack.

2023

16. January 2023, Bakhmut (Donetsk region) — destruction of the historical Choral Synagogue (mid-19th century): significant damage to the facade and structures.

17. January 27, 2023, Huliaipole — repeated damage to the building of the synagogue (1909): a hole in the wall near the roof from a hit, windows were broken.

18. October 6, 2023, Kharkiv — the synagogue and rabbi’s house were damaged, windows were broken.

2024

19. January 2, 2024, Kyiv — a hit on the territory of the memorial complex “Babyn Yar” near places of mass shootings and burials.

20. January 22, 2024, Kherson — the building of the main synagogue was damaged: facade, walls, and inner courtyard were hit by shrapnel (explosion nearby).

21. September 9, 2024, Lviv — windows were damaged in the “Beit Aaron ve-Israel” synagogue.

22. September 26, 2024, Zaporizhzhia — the Jewish cemetery was seriously damaged as a result of a direct hit on its territory.

23. October 30, 2024, Kyiv — significant damage to the building of the Jewish school “Perlina” after a night drone attack.

24. December 11, 2024, Zaporizhzhia — the building of the lyceum “ORT-Alef” was damaged: about 50 windows were broken, the roof was pierced, the heating system was damaged.

2025

25. February 2, 2025, Odesa — minor damage to the Brodsky Synagogue (1863), where the regional archive is located.

26. May 7, 2025, Uman — the building of the synagogue over the grave of Rabbi Nachman was damaged: the roof was pierced by shrapnel.

27. June 20, 2025, Odesa — significant damage to the building where the Jewish children’s home is located (shrapnel after a missile explosion).

28. June 25, 2025, Dnipro — minor damage to the home for the elderly “Beit-Baruch”: a window was broken, the interior decoration was damaged.

29. August 1, 2025 (night of July 31), Kyiv — the Babyn Yar memorial complex was damaged, the Alley of the Righteous was affected.

30. August 5, 2025, Odesa — the building of the synagogue “Nachlas Eliezer” (19th century) was partially damaged after a drone strike.

31. October 9, 2025, Kherson — a cluster munition hit the building of the synagogue: damaging elements damaged the facade.

32. October 23, 2025, Kherson — a direct hit of a shell in the building of the synagogue: the roof and interior decoration were damaged (the ammunition did not detonate).

33. October 23, 2025, Kyiv — the Rosenberg Synagogue in Podil was damaged (roof, windows, doors, interior decoration). Damage to the premises of the yeshiva and the adjacent hotel complex was also recorded.

34. November 28, 2025, Kharkiv — an airstrike on the Jewish sector of the city cemetery No. 3: about 240 graves were damaged.

2026

35. January 15, 2026, Bilopillya (Sumy region) — the monument to the victims of the Holocaust (installed in 2021) was completely destroyed. Damage to the historical building of the former ghetto was also noted.

How many points and how many objects are there really

The list contains 35 entries (episodes).

But some episodes include several objects at once (especially Mariupol and Kyiv on October 23, 2025), so the final estimate in the community’s message sounds like “about 40 objects”.

If you have additional information, the authors urge, about damaged or destroyed Jewish objects or noticed an inaccuracy, please write to the email of the United Jewish Community of Ukraine: office@jew.org.ua

“In four years of full-scale war, about 40 Jewish religious, educational, social, memorial, and historical infrastructure objects have been recorded as damaged and destroyed in various regions of Ukraine — from frontline territories to major cities. The scale of the real damage, especially in temporarily occupied territories, may be significantly higher and is subject to clarification after the end of hostilities and the conduct of safe inspections”.

And here the Israeli perspective is also important: NANews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency regularly writes about the connection between Ukraine and Israel not in slogans, but in how the war hits people, communities, and memory — and this list is precisely about memory, which cannot be evacuated “to a safe place”.

Who and why is bombing and shelling this

The damage being discussed occurred as a result of Russian strikes on Ukrainian cities and towns — with missiles, drones, artillery, aviation munitions. In most cases, Jewish objects suffered as part of a general attack on civilian infrastructure: a missile explodes nearby, shrapnel flies, a shock wave hits — and the window of a synagogue, a school, a rabbi’s house, or tombstones end up “in the impact zone”.

Why this happens:

• Strikes on cities — this is a way to pressure the rear: to break infrastructure, sow fear, exhaust. In a war of this type, “rear areas” become the front — and all communities, any minorities, any religious objects suffer.

• Dense urban development. Synagogues, schools, community centers are often located in historical quarters, next to residential buildings, administrative buildings, transport hubs. When they hit the area — everyone gets hit.

• The effect of “a strike on memory”. Memorials, cemeteries, places of mass shootings — these are not just stones and plaques. This is identity, testimony. Their damage (even “accidental”) is perceived by society as a special trauma, and the aggressor understands this.

It is important to say carefully: in the published chronology, it is not always stated that each object was deliberately chosen as a “Jewish target”. But the fact remains: strikes on Ukraine lead to the destruction of Jewish infrastructure, and this is a systemic result of the war.

The Jewish community of Ukraine — together with the country: protection, volunteering, assistance

A separate meaning of this material is to remind: Jewish Ukraine is not an “observer”. It is part of Ukrainian society, living in the same reality — and doing what the country does.

In practice, it looks like this:

Jewish communities and organizations help with evacuation, accommodating people, humanitarian kits, medicines, supporting the elderly, children, families who have been left without housing or work. Somewhere these are large centers and funds, somewhere — ordinary people who just deliver food, collect money “for the pharmacy”, look for transport, help with documents.

Rabbis and religious leaders in this story are not “in the background”. They stay with their communities in shelled cities, engage in support, organization of life and assistance, and sometimes — direct coordination of volunteer flows. Next to them are teachers, doctors, social workers, volunteers, and just community members who do routine hard work.

And yes, among the community members there are many people who, like all other Ukrainians, serve in the Ukrainian defense forces, in territorial defense, in medical units, in logistics, in volunteer networks. This is not a “separate” story — this is a common Ukrainian experience, where the Jewish community experiences the war together with the whole country.

…
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In Haifa, they are preparing an almost 400-page anthology of contemporary Ukrainian poetry in Hebrew — 50 authors from Emma Andievska to the youngest voices. I checked the history of the project and discovered an important detail: Ukrainian poetry was translated into Hebrew long before 2026, but this book presents a completely different Ukraine to the Israeli reader — modern, multi-generational, and multilingual.

Author: R.Verter

On August 25, 2026, a seemingly small literary news appeared: the Israeli publishing house Pardes is preparing an anthology of contemporary Ukrainian poetry translated into Hebrew. Almost 400 pages. Fifty poets. Several generations — from Emma Andievska to the youngest authors.

But when I started checking the background of this book, the simple news began to unravel into several much more interesting stories. It turned out that Ukrainian poetry was heard in Hebrew in 2017 and in 1990. Moreover, literally in this same 2026, the Israeli reader already received a separate large anthology of Ukrainian classics. Therefore, the formula ‘Ukrainian poetry is being published in Hebrew in Israel for the first time’ would be beautiful — and incorrect.

However, the truly new thing here is different. The new anthology attempts to show Israel not only Ukrainian literature but also Ukraine itself as a country of several languages, ethnic traditions, different historical experiences, and generations. And when among the texts, alongside Ukrainian, appear Crimean Tatar, Romani, Rumeika, and Urum, it is no longer just a matter of translating poems.

For NAnews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency, this intersection point is particularly interesting. We are used to seeing Ukraine in the Israeli news through war, diplomatic disputes, Uman, Jewish communities, or the relations between Kyiv and Jerusalem. Here, the conversation goes a different way: what does an Israeli learn about Ukraine when Ukraine starts speaking to him directly in Hebrew?

What exactly is being prepared in Haifa — and why should we be cautious with the word ‘first’

The compiler and translator of the anthology on August 25, 2026, Alexander Averbukh announced that the book will include works by 50 Ukrainian poets of different generations. Volume — almost 400 pages. The book is published by Pardes Publishing in Haifa.

Chytomo published the names of 36 participants: Alexander Mimruk, Kateryna Mikhalitsyna, Ostap Slyvynsky, Bohdana Matiash, Ihor Mitrov, Yulia Musakovska, Lesyk Panasyuk, Oleh Kotsarev, Dmytro Lazutkin, Rostyslav Kuzyk, Darina Hladun, Oksana Maksymchuk, Olha Brahina, Myroslav Laiuk, Viktor Shylo, Stanislav Belsky, Marta Mokhnatska, Dmytro Blyznyuk, Sergo Mushtatov, Vasyl Makhno, Anastasia Afanasieva, Marianna Kiyanovska, Seyare Kokcheeva-Useinova, Yanush Panchenko, Viktor Neborak, Maye Abdulganieva, Nicholas Akhbash, Vano Kryuger, Yanis Sinaiko, Iryna Shuvalova, Yuriy Tarnavsky, Olena Huseynova, Kateryna Kalytko, Halyna Kruk, Iryna Tsilyk, and Hryhoriy Falkovych.

It turns out to be simple but important arithmetic: 50 authors are announced, and so far 36 have been publicly named. The names of the remaining 14 participants are not indicated in the open materials I checked. I deliberately do not try to complete this list based on Averbukh’s past events: a person’s participation in his festival five years ago does not necessarily mean they were included in the final 2026 book.

Diana Shapiro, Shlomo Krol, Dolya Pidgaits, Valeria Valdman, and Anton Paperny worked on the translations together with Averbukh. The literary editor is Leah Klebanoff. Some of these names appeared in Averbukh’s Ukrainian-Israeli poetic projects during the first months of the full-scale Russian war.

The publishing house Pardes formulates the significance of the book more carefully than sometimes retold in headlines: it is about the first Hebrew translation project of this type, which presents contemporary Ukrainian poetry as both multi-generational and multilingual.

With such a formulation, the facts align.

Averbukh wrote about the project: ‘For me, this is more than a book. This is my Ukraine — polyphonic, alive, indestructible.’ Another of his formulations helps to understand the publishing principle even more precisely: from the very beginning, it was important to him that Ukraine ‘sounded in many of its languages.’

And this is not a metaphor.

Why Crimean Tatar, Romani, Rumeika, and Urum are in the Ukrainian anthology

The Israeli reader here requires an explanation because even the phrase ‘multilingual Ukraine’ can be easily understood too simplistically — as a usual dispute between Ukrainian and Russian.

The new anthology is arranged differently. In addition to works originally written in Ukrainian, it features texts in Crimean Tatar, Romani, Rumeika, and Urum.

Crimean Tatar is the language of the indigenous people of Crimea, who experienced the Soviet deportation of 1944, return to the peninsula, and after the Russian occupation of Crimea in 2014, again found themselves under strong political and cultural pressure.

Romani is not one absolutely uniform literary language. In Ukraine, there are several Romani dialect traditions. One of the anthology’s authors, Yanush Panchenko, is a poet, translator, ethnographer, and researcher of Romani dialects. He writes, among other things, in the Vlach dialect of Romani and is engaged in its preservation and development. For him, creating his own poems is literally one of the ways to prevent the language from disappearing.

Rumeika and Urum will require decoding for most Israelis. Rumeika is associated with the Greek-speaking tradition of part of the Greeks of Ukrainian Azov. Urum is the Turkic language of another part of this historical community. These are two different language branches within the world of Azov Greeks, who have lived for centuries in the territory of present-day Ukraine.

The Crimean Tatar line is well represented by another participant in the book — Maye Abdulganieva, also known as Maye Safet. She was born in Crimea in 1972, writes in Crimean Tatar, Ukrainian, and Russian. In 2013, her first Crimean Tatar poetry collection was published. And on February 21, 2026, it was Abdulganieva who read the text of the eighth annual online dictation in the Crimean Tatar language.

That is, these languages are included in the book not for a beautiful publishing annotation. Behind them are living literary communities, the problems of passing the language to the next generations, occupation, deportations, assimilation, and attempts to preserve their own speech.

For Israel, this is perhaps more understandable than it might seem. Here, there is no need to explain from scratch that a language can be both a means of everyday communication, a part of national memory, and a way of resisting the disappearance of culture.

That is why I would not reduce the new book to the formula ’50 Ukrainian poets translated into Hebrew.’ The main difference begins after the word ‘Ukrainian’: the anthology offers the Israeli a more complex definition of who and what modern Ukraine includes.

Who is Alexander Averbukh — and why this book did not appear in one year

For the Israeli reader, Alexander Averbukh also requires an introduction. He is not an external translator whom the publishing house once commissioned to write a book about Ukraine.

Averbukh was born in 1985 in Novoaidar, Luhansk region. After the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, this settlement came under Russian occupation. Averbukh himself lived in Israel for about 15 years and then moved to Canada for academic work.

In 2022, he received a PhD from the University of Toronto. He worked at the University of Alberta and Harvard. Currently, the University of Michigan lists him as an Assistant Professor of Ukrainian Literature and Culture and LSA Collegiate Fellow — in simpler terms, a teacher and researcher of Ukrainian literature and culture.

His academic work is precisely at the intersection of Eastern European and Jewish history, literature, memory, propaganda, identity, and multilingualism. His university profile currently lists more than 60 published collections of literary translations between Ukrainian, Hebrew, Russian, and English. Separately, sources on Averbukh’s Ukrainian-Jewish activities record more than 30 collections of contemporary Ukrainian poetry that he translated and published in Hebrew.

His own book ‘Jewish King’ became a finalist for the National Prize of Ukraine named after Taras Shevchenko. For the Israeli reader, the closest human explanation is this: it is one of Ukraine’s main state awards in the field of culture and literature, although there is no direct legal analogue of any specific Israeli award here.

And now begins the part that completely changed this story for me.

In the summer of 2020, Averbukh organized an online Festival of Contemporary Ukrainian Poetry. It lasted eight weeks — from July 2 to August 20 — and consisted of eight weekly meetings with the participation of 16 Ukrainian poets. Among them were already Marianna Kiyanovska, Ostap Slyvynsky, Halyna Kruk, Myroslav Laiuk, Iryna Shuvalova, Lesyk Panasyuk, Olena Huseynova, Yanis Sinaiko, Darina Hladun, Oleh Kotsarev, Vano Kryuger, Sergo Mushtatov, and others. A significant part of these names now reappears in the Pardes anthology.

In 2022, the work already received a direct Ukrainian-Israeli dimension. Averbukh organized the first series of bilingual Ukrainian-Hebrew literary events dedicated to contemporary Ukrainian poetry translated into Hebrew.

At least two meetings can be reconstructed from archival announcements. The first took place on March 10, 2022 — two weeks after the start of the full-scale Russian invasion. The second was held on June 30. At it, Israeli poets and translators read Hebrew versions of works by contemporary Ukrainian authors, and the Ukrainian poets themselves read the originals.

The organizers then quite directly described the goal: to support Ukraine, promote Ukrainian literature and culture in Israel and in Hebrew, and create direct contact between Ukrainian and Israeli authors.

In November 2023, the project can already be seen in the next stage. At the Frankel Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan, Averbukh talked about the upcoming anthology of contemporary Ukrainian poetry in Hebrew. At that time, it was about works by more than 30 authors.

There is a detail on which I stopped separately. At that meeting, it was noted that some Ukrainian poems, which arose as a reaction to Russian aggression against Ukraine, after the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, began to be perceived differently in Israel — Israeli listeners read them already through their own experience of war, violence, and loss.

And now let’s compare the numbers without unnecessary reasoning: in 2023 — more than 30 poets. In August 2026 — 50 and almost 400 pages.

This is not a random collection quickly made under the current war. We see a project that has grown for at least six years.

Ukrainian poetry spoke in Hebrew long before this book

Here, I had to check the word ‘first’ especially carefully.

In 2026 itself, a large anthology of Ukrainian classical poetry by Persimmon Books already appeared in Israel. NAnews previously detailed this edition.

Its Hebrew title — “למה, מלה, לא חדה כמו פלדה את? : מסקובורודה עד פרנקו” — ‘Why, word, are you not sharp as steel? From Skovoroda to Franko.’

The book features 25 authors — 18 men and seven women — from Ukrainian literature of the 18th century to the end of the 19th century. Translated by Anton Paperny, who is now also part of the translation team of the new contemporary Pardes anthology. Editors of the classical volume — Asaf Bartov and Nataliya Tymkiv. ISBN — 9789657798447.

Even here, a small library thorn was found, very useful for fact-checking. The Israeli library catalog indicates 343 pages, the bookstore — 344. Therefore, I did not turn one of these numbers into an absolute fact: in different bibliographic sources, the volume is indicated with a difference of one page.

The project is associated with the initiative נְמָלָה / ‘Nemala’, which builds a two-way bridge between Ukrainian and Hebrew literature. The printing of the book was announced on October 24, 2025, and the sale was announced from January 1, 2026.

So the contemporary Pardes anthology is not even the first large Ukrainian poetic anthology available to Israelis this year.

If we go further back, in 2017, Ukrainian writer Kateryna Babkina presented her poetry book in Hebrew translation by Anton Paperny at the Jerusalem International Book Fair, published by Khaver Laet. Ukrainian Jewish Encounter then separately noted a symbolic detail: Ukrainian poems were first heard from the main stage of the Jerusalem International Book Fair first in the original, then in Hebrew.

But even 2017 is not the beginning.

In 1990, the Kyiv publishing house ‘Veselka’ released a book of children’s poems by Ukrainian-Jewish poet Moisei Fishbein in Ukrainian with parallel translations into Hebrew by Israeli poet and translator Manfred Winkler.

Thirty-six years ago.

Therefore, it is historically more accurate to talk not about the moment when ‘Israel first discovered Ukrainian poetry.’ The process is much longer: individual translations, books, public readings, literary connections, a series of contemporary poetry after 2022, a large classical anthology — and now almost 400 pages of contemporary multilingual Ukraine.

There is also a broader international background. In the UK in 2026, Linen Press released War-Torn Voices: Ukrainian Women’s Poetry — 50 poems by 12 contemporary Ukrainian poets written during the full-scale Russian war. This is another anthology and another selection principle, but it shows one trend: outside Ukraine, they are now translating not only individual most famous authors but are trying to collect entire slices of contemporary Ukrainian literature.

Why the story with Pardes is especially interesting to Israel

Pardes is not a random name of a publishing house in the press release. It is a Haifa publishing house founded in 2000. It is located in the Lower City of Haifa and publishes poetry, prose, non-fiction, experimental literature, and periodicals.

The head of the publishing house is David Gottesman. Before creating Pardes, he worked at the Carmel publishing house in Jerusalem. In 2013, Pardes opened its own printing house. In 2022, together with other publishers, it participated in the creation of the Reading bookstore. Pardes is part of the Israeli Publishers Association.

For me, this is important not because of local Haifa patriotism. Simply, the phrase ‘a Ukrainian anthology will be published in Israel’ creates too abstract a picture. In fact, the book enters a specific Israeli literary environment — through an independent publisher who has been working within the Hebrew book market for a quarter of a century.

Israeli poet and editor Efrat Mishori saw another line in this: the opportunity to re-address through Ukrainian poetry to the space of Ukrainian-Jewish memory — with a shared history, neighborhood, and closeness, but simultaneously with ruptures and violence.

Here, it is very easy to go into beautiful words about ‘bridges between peoples.’ I would not.

Ukrainian-Jewish history does not consist only of bridges. It had pogroms, the Holocaust, Soviet repressions, wars, migrations, assimilation — and simultaneously decades of joint life, cultural influence, and family stories in which it is impossible to draw a sterile line between ‘Ukrainian’ and ‘Jewish.’

Even Averbukh’s own poetry constantly returns to this uncomfortable intersection. And therefore, Mishori’s statement about neighborhood and violence here does not look like a diplomatic reservation. On the contrary, it explains why such a translation might be interesting to the Israeli reader, who does not need another promotional story about ‘eternal friendship.’

There is another shift. Translation into Hebrew removes the intermediary.

For a significant part of past Ukrainian-Israeli cultural communication, such an intermediary was effectively the Russian language. The new book allows contemporary Ukrainian poetry — including texts of Ukraine’s own minorities — to address the Israeli directly in his language.

And here things connect that would separately look like just statistics: 50 authors, five original language traditions, almost 400 pages, six translators, Haifa, and Hebrew.

These are no longer five random parameters of a book. This is a model of what kind of Ukraine the publishers decided to show Israel.

When the anthology will be released, what it is called, and what we really do not know yet

As of August 28, 2026, I have not found confirmed data on the exact release date of the new Pardes anthology, its final price, ISBN, and final Hebrew title. The verified publications use the wording ‘preparing for release.’

Therefore, it is incorrect to write ‘the anthology has already been released in Israel’ or to report a sale date that the publisher has not publicly confirmed.

The full list of all 50 participants is also not published in the sources I found. As I noted above, 36 names are available. It is more reasonable to wait for the remaining 14 from the publisher or compiler themselves, rather than guessing.

These limitations are important for queries like ‘Ukrainian poetry anthology in Hebrew 2026,’ ‘when will the Ukrainian Pardes anthology be released,’ ‘Alexander Averbukh anthology in Israel,’ or ‘where to buy contemporary Ukrainian poetry in Hebrew.’ At the moment, one can confidently talk about the project itself, the Pardes publishing house, the composition of the published part of the authors, the translation team, the volume of about 400 pages, and 50 participants. The price, ISBN, final title, and day of sales start require separate confirmation.

And yet, the result is already visible, which is difficult to fit into a news summary.

In 1990, Moisei Fishbein’s poems with parallel Hebrew were published in Kyiv. In 2017, Kateryna Babkina read Ukrainian poems at the Jerusalem Book Fair. In 2020, Averbukh gathered 16 contemporary poets for an eight-week festival. In March and June 2022, Ukrainian and Israeli authors were already reading the same texts in Ukrainian and Hebrew. In November 2023, the future anthology numbered more than 30 voices. At the beginning of 2026, the Israeli book market received a large volume of Ukrainian classics from Skovoroda to Franko. Now Pardes is preparing 50 contemporary authors.

But more important than the growth of numbers.

The Pardes anthology for the first time gathers for the Hebrew-speaking reader such a broad contemporary Ukrainian picture, where Ukraine speaks not with one voice and not even in one language. Ukrainian, Crimean Tatar, Romani, Rumeika, and Urum are side by side; poets of several generations; people with very different experiences of the country, war, memory, and identity.

I have not seen the final layout of the book, the publishing contract, and Pardes’s closed data, so I cannot evaluate what is not yet in the public field: the final selection of all 50 authors, circulation, sales, or editorial decisions within specific translations.

But the already published data is enough for another conclusion.

If the previous Israeli anthology of 2026 explained to the Hebrew-speaking reader where the Ukrainian poetic tradition grew from — from Skovoroda to Franko, then the new book tries to answer another question: how this tradition sounds today and how many different voices fit within the word ‘Ukraine.’

That is why almost 400 pages of Pardes turn out to be a much larger story than just another translation of a foreign book.

This is a story about how Ukraine gradually gains its own voice in Hebrew — without the obligatory translation through a foreign language and without the need to start acquaintance from scratch each time.

Such a cultural layer NAnews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency considers no less important a part of the relations between Israel and Ukraine than official visits and politicians’ statements. A political message lives for a few days. A book can remain on an Israeli shelf for decades.

…
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A recent report by local television about the monument to the Proskurov pogrom prompted me to check the history of the memorial itself. Behind the 1925 obelisk lies a separate century-long biography — a mass grave, rescuers of Jews, a vanished cemetery, an almost completed demolition, Hebrew inscriptions of the 21st century, and three different official names for one object.

Author: Anton Pshedynsky

On the evening of August 27, 2026, I came across a small segment on Khmelnytsky’s 33 channel titled “Bloody History of the Oldest Memorial Complex of the Jewish Community”.

In the frame — a tall light obelisk, bronze human figures, the Star of David, menorahs on the fence, and a slab with an inscription in Hebrew. The segment lasts less than four minutes. But almost every minute of it raised a separate question.

Why is a monument built in 1925 adorned with works by a sculptor born in 1937? Who paid for its construction? What from the current complex has truly been preserved from 1925? How did it survive the German occupation? Why did the Soviet authorities simultaneously limit Jewish memory and place this object under state protection? Who decided to demolish it after the collapse of the USSR? Why is the same monument called by three different names in official Ukrainian documents today?

And finally: who is actually buried under it and how many people are there?

I started checking.

The historian we hear in the report is Sergey Nikolaevich Yesyunin, a candidate of historical sciences and a leading researcher at the Khmelnytsky Regional Museum of Local Lore. He has been working at the museum since 1995, and since 2006 as a leading researcher, focusing on the history of Khmelnytsky and the cities of Podolia, and is the author of hundreds of historical and local lore publications. Therefore, his appearance in the segment is not a random street comment: before us is one of the people who professionally study the history of the city.

But then I deliberately did not limit myself even to his story. For NANews — News of Israel, I compared the segment with archival materials, documents of the Khmelnytsky City Council, the historical and architectural plan of the city, publications of “Hesed Besht”, “Shtetl No.7”, data on cultural heritage, and our previous studies of Ukrainian-Jewish history.

And the monument turned out to be almost an independent historical character.

February 15, 1919: three hours after which a mass grave appeared

First, we need to understand what happened at this place.

Proskurov is today’s Khmelnytsky. The city was renamed in 1954, so the name “Proskurov pogrom” may not mean anything to an Israeli reader who knows the modern map of Ukraine.

February 15, 1919, was a Saturday — Shabbat.

At this moment, Ukraine was in the chaos of war after the collapse of the Russian Empire. Bolsheviks, Ukrainian troops, White armies, local armed formations, and later Polish troops were simultaneously active here. State institutions existed, but control over armed people was far from what we understand today.

After an unsuccessful Bolshevik uprising in Proskurov, ataman Ivan Semesenko accused the local Jewish population of supporting the uprising.

Semesenko commanded a Ukrainian military unit that was part of the UNR — Ukrainian People’s Republic forces. For an Israeli reader, the closest explanation is this: the UNR was an attempt to create an independent Ukrainian state in 1917–1921, simultaneously at war with Bolshevik Moscow and other forces.

It was Semesenko’s Ukrainian military subordinates who went into the Jewish quarters of Proskurov.

Sergey Yesyunin in the report speaks of 1600 killed in less than three hours. He emphasizes another terrible feature: people were mostly not shot but killed with bayonets and other cold weapons.

Historical materials indeed contain testimonies of an order not to expend bullets. Descriptions feature bayonets and sabers.

Yesyunin also speaks of the elderly, children, women, and pregnant women among the victims.

Another detail sounds almost implausible: an orchestra and sisters of mercy.

It did not arise from thin air. Sources describe the organized passage of an armed column through the city before the start of mass killings, with the column accompanied by an orchestra; testimonies also mention sisters of mercy. But there is a fine line here. I did not find sufficient grounds to write that the orchestra continued playing directly during the killings inside the houses.

Therefore, the phrase “the massacre took place under the music of the orchestra” sounds impressive but goes beyond what can be confidently proven.

1600 dead — a number of memory, but the archive gives a different picture

The situation with the number of victims is not entirely clear.

On the memorial and in the materials of the local Jewish community, the number 1600 people is fixed.

But archival calculations do not allow it to be turned into the only indisputable number.

In the preserved nominal document, 1063 people killed and died from wounds are listed. Other sources give about 1200 directly killed and hundreds more who died later. In historical literature, one can find a range of approximately 900 to 1600 victims.

Why such a range?

Because we are comparing different things: people who died directly on February 15; those who died later from wounds; lists compiled at different times; eyewitness testimonies; materials of aid organizations; later reconstructions of losses.

Therefore, I would leave 1600 exactly where this number has a source: in the words of Sergey Yesyunin, on the memorial, and in the memory of the community. But if answering the question “how many people historically proven died,” the answer no longer fits into one number.

This is precisely the case where caution does not diminish the tragedy. On the contrary — it separates memory from the accounting illusion of absolute accuracy.

960 orphans and three orphanages

After the pogrom, another number remained, which is easy to overlook against the backdrop of the number of dead.

960 children, according to the local Jewish community and materials of “Shtetl No.7”, were left orphans.

Orphanages were created for them.

A hundred years later, the “Hesed Besht” foundation returned to these children as a separate line of memory: in a special issue of “Shtetl No.7”, prepared for the centenary of the pogrom, information about the dead, orphans, and eyewitness testimonies were collected.

The fund also holds the book “Fragments of Old Proskurov”, which contains documents about the Jewish history of the city.

This detail changes the scale of the event. “1600 dead” is a terrible statistic. But 960 children who had parents in the morning and were orphans by evening is already a social catastrophe of an entire urban community.

It was from this community that the idea of the monument was born six years later.

Was it “Petliura’s pogrom”

This is one of the questions that will inevitably arise for a reader in Israel.

For decades under Soviet rule, the monument was officially called “The Mass Grave of the Victims of the Petliura Pogrom”.

Does this mean that Symon Petliura ordered the killing of Jews in Proskurov?

I did not find such a document, and historians do not present it.

The direct organizer of the Proskurov pogrom is called Ivan Semesenko. At the same time, Semesenko and his people acted within the UNR armed forces system, which means it is also impossible to completely exclude the political and military leadership of the republic.

We have already separately analyzed this complex topic in the NANews material “Do not forget about the sword”: Symon Petliura, Ukraine, Israel, and the controversial memory that cannot be given to Moscow.

For this article, it is enough to fix the boundary of what is proven: Petliura’s order to conduct the Proskurov pogrom is not established; the mass killing was committed by Semesenko’s Ukrainian servicemen; the ability of the UNR leadership to prevent and punish pogroms remains a separate question of historical responsibility.

That is why the modern name “Proskurov pogrom” is more accurate than the Soviet political label “Petliura’s”.

But the Soviet formulation has not completely disappeared. A hundred years later, it unexpectedly resurfaces in the registry history of the monument itself. I will return to this.

There were Jews in the same Ukrainian army: 1919 does not fit into a black-and-white picture

Here it is especially easy to make history convenient.

One can say: Ukrainian military killed Jews — and put a period.

But then another reality from the same 1919 will have to be cut out.

A few months after the Proskurov massacre, a full-fledged Jewish military unit operated within the Ukrainian Galician Army — Solomon Leinberg’s Jewish Kurin. NANews detailed it in the material “The History of the Jewish Kurin in the Ukrainian Galician Army of 1919”.

Jewish fighters fought for the Ukrainian state project, operating in areas including Proskurov, Vinnytsia, Berdychiv, and Fastiv.

Another line is associated with Yevhen Konovalets.

Konovalets’ Sich Riflemen arrived in Proskurov after the pogrom. Konovalets ordered an investigation. Sotnik Mykola Bisik and city commandant Hryhoriy Hladky collected materials on the causes of the killings, organizers, perpetrators, and losses of the Jewish population.

We checked this episode separately in the article “Yevhen Konovalets returns to Ukraine: Jews alongside the founder of the OUN…”.

But even there, I did not find evidence that this investigation resulted in a full-fledged judicial punishment of the organizers specifically for the mass killing of Jews.

An inconvenient, yet real picture emerges.

In one 1919, people in Ukrainian uniforms killed Jews in Proskurov.

Other Ukrainian military investigated this killing.

And Jewish soldiers simultaneously wore Ukrainian uniforms themselves and fought for Ukrainian statehood.

A short slogan here will inevitably lie about something.

People who said “no” in February 1919

Another feature of the current memorial is that it tells not only about the victims.

In the report, Sergey Yesyunin separately recalls people who tried to save Jews.

Klymentiy Kachurovsky was a protodeacon of the Proskurov Cathedral. It is important to clarify: protodeacon is a church rank, so the common definition “priest-protodeacon” is legally and ecclesiastically inaccurate.

Kachurovsky hid Jewish children in his home. When people sought refuge near the temple, he tried to protect them and was killed himself.

His story later received a separate place on the memorial.

Sergey Polozov — a doctor and public figure — also sheltered people and helped the victims.

Trokhym Verkholya, associated with the city council and the Ukrainian public movement, opposed the pogrom and sought to stop the violence.

Sources also mention an official L. Bienko, who died trying to protect Jews.

But the automatic transcription of the fresh TV segment let us down here.

It mentions a certain “Vikentiy Sihora”.

When I started looking for this person, the story did not add up.

Historical materials name the head of Proskurov Mykola Vikentiyovych Sikora. Together with other city authorities, including Marian Stavinsky, he demanded to stop what was happening.

This is a minor mistake only at first glance.

After several reprints, “Vikentiy Sihora” would have turned into yet another historical character, although he most likely appeared simply from poorly recognized Ukrainian speech.

1925: the monument is erected not by the state, but by the living community of the deceased

Six years later, an obelisk appeared over the mass grave.

This is 1925.

At that time, people who had seen the pogrom with their own eyes were still alive. Widows of the deceased walked the streets of Proskurov. Children who had been orphaned were growing up. For them, February 15, 1919, was not “the history of Ukrainian Jewry,” but a specific day of their own lives.

And it was they who collected the money.

The main funds for the creation of the memorial were provided by the families of the deceased and the Jewish community of Proskurov. More detailed local materials also indicate partial financial assistance from the city authorities.

Therefore, the too beautiful phrase from the TV segment — “built entirely without state funds” — I would slightly correct. The initiative and main funding were indeed communal, but the city’s participation, according to sources, was also present.

For construction, bricks from the local Halperin factory were used.

In “Shtetl No.7”, the author of the project is named I. Korenblit, as well as local craftsmen whose names have not been preserved.

There are grounds to assume that this refers to the artist Israel Korenblit (1890–1971), but I did not find a document that would allow unequivocally equating “I. Korenblit” with Israel Korenblit.

Therefore, the modern city record remains more cautious and simply states:

“local craftsmen”.

What exactly remains of the 1925 monument

Here begins the first big mystery that the TV report does not explain.

Today, the memorial looks like a rather complex complex: a tall obelisk, bronze reliefs, inscriptions, menorahs, the Star of David, tiles.

But in 1925, this entire set did not exist.

The historical core was a stepped brick obelisk over the mass grave.

The official record gives its height as 7.4 meters. In the materials of the Jewish community, a rounded description is found — about eight meters.

In the detailed documentation, the foundation dimensions are approximately 5.07 × 3.8 meters.

This is a massive brick structure consisting of several volumes decreasing upwards with a pyramidal top.

And here’s another characteristic detail emphasized by the community: the monument did not receive the usual set of Soviet symbols. It emerged before the Stalin era and was created as a Jewish memorial pantheon, not as a later state Soviet structure.

But the most noticeable thing in modern photographs appeared much later.

Sculptor Korzhev was minus 12 years old in 1925.

In the 33 channel story, we see bronze bas-reliefs and hear the name of the Khmelnytsky sculptor Konstantin Korzhev.

If you watch the video without additional verification, you might decide that Korzhev designed the monument in 1925.

Impossible.

Konstantin Alekseevich Korzhev was born on March 4, 1937, in Baku. He lived and worked in Khmelnytsky from the mid-1960s, engaged in monumental sculpture, and died in 2004.

Therefore, the bas-reliefs belong to the modern reconstruction.

Even more interesting is the discrepancy in authorship.

The TV story names Konstantin Korzhev.

The historical and architectural documentation of Khmelnytsky associates the relief compositions with Konstantin and Alexander Korzhev.

Therefore, the most accurate formulation is not to attribute the entire current complex to one author, but to say that the bas-relief design was created by the Korzhevs during the later reconstruction.

One of the reliefs is dedicated to Klymentiy Kachurovsky.

This is no longer the monument of 1925.

This is a conversation of descendants with the monument of 1925.

The obelisk survived the German occupation — and we don’t know why.

In July 1941, German troops occupied Proskurov.

For the local Jewish community, another catastrophe began — the Holocaust.

The Nazi occupiers created a ghetto in Proskurov. The history of the Jews of the region during the Holocaust is gradually returning today through archival documents. As early as 2024, NANovosti reported how the materials of the Jewish communities of the Khmelnytsky region began to be massively digitized: “Archival documents about the Jewish community and the Holocaust are being digitized in the Khmelnytsky region of Ukraine”.

And the monument to the 1919 pogrom — survived.

Why?

I don’t know.

And after searching, I didn’t find a document that allows a confident answer.

You can’t write that the Germans “decided to leave” the monument. You can’t invent a secret reason. We only know the result: the structure survived the occupation.

There is a photograph from 1950. The obelisk is already back in Soviet Proskurov and looks quite recognizable. Next to it in the photo are still Jewish tombstones.

This is a very important photograph.

Because today the surrounding cemetery of the monument in that form no longer exists.

The cemetery disappeared around the monument.

Initially, the obelisk stood in the Jewish cemetery.

Later, the urban environment around changed. The materials of the Jewish community say that part of the cemetery territory was liquidated, the land was used for construction, household needs, and gardens.

As a result, there was almost a visual substitution.

A modern person arrives at the address, sees a standalone well-maintained memorial complex, and perceives it as a monument that was once specifically placed on a vacant lot.

But it stands here because under it is a mass grave, and around it was once a Jewish cemetery.

The disappearance of the surrounding space changed the reading of the monument itself.

That is why in this story, it is necessary to distinguish between the preservation of the obelisk and the preservation of the historical landscape.

These are not the same thing.

Soviet power: prohibiting memory and simultaneously protecting the monument.

The Soviet episode especially poorly fits into ready-made schemes.

The materials of the Jewish community speak of restrictions on holding independent commemorative events. There is also a statement about plans to remove the monument.

But at the same time, it was the Soviet authorities that officially made it a protected historical object.

On March 11, 1972, the executive committee of the Khmelnytsky regional council adopted decision No. 66.

The object received protection number 1.

The name was:

“Mass grave of the victims of the Petliura pogrom”.

At the same time, Soviet communal services periodically performed cosmetic repairs.

It turns out to be an inconvenient paradox: the Soviet system could control the form of Jewish public memory, but physically not only did it not destroy the obelisk — it included it in the state register.

And it is this 1972 decision that still surfaces in Khmelnytsky documents 54 years later.

After the USSR, the monument was almost lost.

One might expect that after 1991, the Jewish monument would enter its safest time.

The opposite happened.

Regular maintenance ceased. The plaster began to fall off. The old brickwork was exposed. The monument gradually fell into a state of disrepair.

At some point, specialists came to a decision that today sounds almost incredible:

the old obelisk was proposed to be dismantled, and a new memorial sign installed in its place.

Housing services were instructed to prepare documentation and estimates for dismantling.

And then the monument was saved by a completely prosaic thing — money.

When they started counting, it turned out that dismantling the huge old brick structure would be expensive.

Restoring it turned out to be more rational.

If the estimate had been slightly different, today we might be looking not at the obelisk of 1925, but at a modern replacement.

Autumn 1998: the decision was made to keep the old brick.

The real salvation began in autumn 1998.

Funding was sought from Vadim Rabinovich, who then headed the All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress. He allocated the first funds.

Later, the city got involved, and local builders helped.

Technical issues were handled by Vladimir Suslov and Yefim Shraybman.

The work was not cosmetic.

The damaged plaster was removed from the obelisk.

Damaged bricks were cleaned and replaced.

The structure was reinforced.

After that, it was replastered.

The work was carried out, in particular, by the enterprise “Vlata”, headed by Vladimir Trofimov.

Therefore, today’s object is not a “new creation based on 1925”.

Inside it, the original brick structure has been preserved.

This is one of the most important things I managed to find out.

1999–2001: around the old obelisk, a completely new memorial appears.

In 1999, the Jewish charitable fund “Hesed Besht” began operating in Khmelnytsky.

After saving the structure itself, the second stage began — creating a space of memory around it.

It was at this moment that the memorial was born in the form we see in the 2026 video.

Four bronze bas-reliefs appeared.

Four memorial plaques appeared.

The territory was paved.

A metal fence was installed.

The design of the fence incorporated menorahs.

The fence design is associated with the artist Israel Giora Moiseev.

In the central part of the complex, a Star of David was arranged, filled with a large granite stone — a kind of small memorial mound.

The area around the mass grave took on the appearance that is easy to mistake for the original today.

But between the original obelisk and this design — about three-quarters of a century.

The Hebrew on the monument is genuine, but it is also a later layer.

The TV story says that the inscriptions are in Ukrainian and Hebrew.

This is confirmed by photographs.

In the 2019 photo near the memorial, a plaque is clearly visible: Ukrainian text on the left, Hebrew on the right.

So there is no doubt here.

But the historical and architectural documentation of the city provides a more complete picture: the memorial elements use Ukrainian, Hebrew, and English.

Therefore, the statement “on the monument Ukrainian and Hebrew” is true, but does not fully describe the linguistic design of the complex.

And even more importantly: these plaques themselves do not belong to 1925, but to the reconstruction of the late 1990s — early 2000s.

The modern memorial literally speaks simultaneously in several historical languages.

The brick speaks the language of 1925.

The Soviet passport — the language of 1972.

Bronze and Hebrew plaques — the language of Jewish revival after the collapse of the USSR.

Why are 1998, 2000, 2001, and even 2004 mentioned?

If you simply search for the date of the monument’s reconstruction, a new confusion arises.

In one source — 1998.

In another — 2000.

In a third — 2001.

Even 2004 is mentioned.

At first glance, someone is mistaken.

After comparison, the chronology becomes clearer.

1998 — the beginning of saving the old obelisk.

1999 — the creation of ‘Hesed Besht’ and the continuation of work within a new organizational framework.

2000–2001 — the formation of the current complex, installation of memorial elements, and landscaping.

A detailed chronicle names October 2001 as the moment of the complete restoration of the monument and mass grave.

The final finishing was done by the company ‘DITA’, and the landscaping is associated with ‘Vlata’.

And the 2004 mentioned in some publications, judging by the sequence of events, refers not to the beginning of saving the original structure, but to later activities or a generalized description of the completed project.

Therefore, writing in one line ‘the monument was reconstructed in 2004’ means erasing several different stages.

The oldest part and the newest part literally stand one above the other.

There is almost a visual historical construction in this memorial.

Inside — brick from 1925.

Outside — restoration from 1998.

On it — artistic elements from the turn of the century.

Nearby — slabs with Hebrew.

Around — landscaping from 2000–2001.

And beneath all this — people killed in 1919.

This is not a monument of one date.

This is a layered history of memory.

And therefore, Sergey Yesunin’s words about a ‘memorial pantheon’ here are perhaps more accurate than the simple definition of ‘obelisk’.

‘The only one in Ukraine’ — that’s something I didn’t repeat.

The report claims that the structure is the only monument in Ukraine dedicated to the victims of the Jewish pogrom.

This part, after verification, I would not repeat in the article as an established fact.

There are other memorial signs and memorials to the victims of Jewish pogroms in Ukraine — in different cities and towns.

The uniqueness of Khmelnytsky lies elsewhere.

Here, a early interwar obelisk, installed in 1925 directly over the mass grave with community and victims’ families’ money, has been preserved, and then a large modern Jewish memorial was formed on its basis.

This is stronger than a dubious attempt to win a competition with the word ‘only’.

And the formulation by Channel 33 about the oldest memorial complex of the Jewish community was precisely the reason for this investigation.

2014: a swastika appeared on the pogrom monument

The story did not end after the beautiful reconstruction.

Presumably on the night of March 28, 2014, unknown individuals applied neo-Nazi symbols to the memorial.

The episode was included in the monitoring of anti-Semitism by the Association of Jewish Organizations and Communities of Ukraine.

It resulted in an almost mocking historical circle: a structure placed over the grave of people killed as a result of anti-Semitic violence, 95 years later itself becomes the object of anti-Semitic vandalism.

But the monument remained again.

February 2026: the place is still alive, not just listed

In February 2026, on the 107th anniversary of the Proskuriv pogrom, the Jewish community of Khmelnytsky gathered again at the mass grave.

People read prayers, remembered the deceased, lit candles.

So, in front of us is not a decorative object that municipal services paint every few years.

It continues to perform exactly the function for which the families of the deceased collected money one hundred and one years ago.

Between the first generation of relatives and the people who came here in 2026, there is almost no living human chain.

There is a monument.

And now the strangest thing: what is the monument officially called today?

I specifically looked into current documents.

And I found that there is no single answer.

In the Soviet protection record, the object was called:

‘Mass grave of the victims of the Petliura pogrom’.

This wording was fixed by decision No. 66 of March 11, 1972.

In the documents of Khmelnytsky, already independent Ukraine, another name appears:

‘Mass grave of the victims of the Proskuriv pogrom’.

This is how the object is indicated, for example, in the municipal program of Khmelnytsky for 2022–2027.

But the current open city list goes even further.

In it, line No. 41 looks almost sterile:

No. 1 — ‘Mass grave’.

Further:

1919;
monument — 1925;
authors — local craftsmen;
brick, cement;
height — 7.4 m;
decision No. 66 of 11.03.1972.

here it is on Google Maps – https://maps.app.goo.gl/RR9e22Qkwr1fgXny9

So the word ‘Petliura’ is no longer there.

The word ‘Proskuriv’ is also not there.

Jews — also not there.

Only ‘Mass grave’ remains.

Was there an official renaming? I did not find a document.

The first temptation is to write: Ukrainian authorities renamed the monument.

But how to confirm it?

I searched for the corresponding decision.

I did not find it.

There is no document that would say something like: ‘rename the “Mass grave of the victims of the Petliura pogrom” to “Mass grave”‘.

Therefore, making a political conclusion about the conscious ‘erasure of Petliura’ or, conversely, ‘erasure of the Jewish theme’ based on one table is not possible.

We see another, more strange fact:

several official municipal systems use different names for the same monument.

And this is not my play on words.

Identifiers match.

Height 7.4 m.

Decision No. 66.

Protection number 1.

Address.

This is one object.

Even the address in official databases is different.

Here bureaucratic archaeology becomes relevant again.

Old address:

Tolstoy Street, 7/1.

But Lev Tolstoy Street in Khmelnytsky was renamed.

Today the memorial is located at:

Prince Svyatoslav the Brave Street, 7/1.

The modern cultural list already uses the new address.

And the city set of open data continued to show Tolstoy, 7/1, despite the database update in 2026.

Therefore, a search query ‘Proskuriv pogrom monument Khmelnytsky’, ‘Mass grave of the victims of the Petliura pogrom’, ‘Jewish memorial Tolstoy Street’, ‘Mass grave Prince Svyatoslav the Brave’ or ‘Proskuriv pogrom memorial 1925’ can lead to different cards and names, although it is about the same place. This is not a set of SEO synonyms — this is the confusion that the documents themselves create today.

In the modern state register, I did not find it as a separate line.

I checked the list published by the Ministry of Culture of the State Register of Immovable Monuments of Ukraine for the Khmelnytsky region.

In the version updated on June 13, 2025, I did not find a separate line for the Proskuriv memorial.

But this does not mean that it can be demolished tomorrow and that the protection status is no longer there.

Here the transitional structure of Ukrainian legislation works.

The monument was taken on state record back in 1972, that is, under the legislation that existed before the current Law of Ukraine ‘On the Protection of Cultural Heritage’.

Old protected objects do not automatically turn into nothing just because their card has not yet been transferred to the new system.

And this is especially interesting right now.

In 2026, Ukraine creates a new electronic registry — and has made provisions for such monuments

On January 28, 2026, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine launched an experimental project of a new information system “State Register of Immovable Monuments of Ukraine”.

Its structure specifically provides a field for:

the monument’s protection number, registered under the legislation that was in effect before the current law.

That is, monuments like ours are not a technical anomaly that no one noticed.

The state explicitly provides for the existence of objects from the old registry and a mechanism for their transfer to the modern digital system.

For the Proskuriv mass grave, such an old anchor remains:

No. 1, decision No. 66 from March 11, 1972.

At the time of this review, I did not find a document:

• on the exclusion of the monument from protection;
• on the refusal to include it in the State Register;
• on the deprivation of status;
• on the decommunization of this particular object;
• on the official renaming.

Therefore, the most accurate description of the current state sounds not too impressive, but honest: the monument continues to be on the local protection register based on the 1972 decision, and I have not yet found its separate modern state card.

And another 0.437 hectares, which are easy to overlook

The monument has not only a point on the map.

The historical and architectural documentation of Khmelnytsky defines a protected area for it of about 0.437 hectares.

This is no longer a question of a beautiful obelisk.

It is about the space associated with the mass grave and cultural heritage.

And here, the history of the disappeared Jewish cemetery around it is especially important: the physical space of memory is always larger than the structure itself.

Why today’s monument cannot simply be dated to “1925”

After all this review, I would generally be cautious about a museum label consisting of one line:

“Monument to the victims of the Proskuriv pogrom. 1925.”

Yes, 1925 is its birth date.

But the current complex consists of at least several eras.

1919 — mass grave.

1925 — brick community obelisk.

1941–1944 — survived German occupation.

1950 — photograph of the monument still next to Jewish tombstones.

1972 — Soviet state protection status.

1990s — destruction and real threat of dismantling.

1998 — beginning of the rescue of the old obelisk.

1999 — “Hesed Besht”.

2000–2001 — bas-reliefs, slabs, menorahs, Hebrew, Star of David, and modern memorial space.

October 2001 — completion of the main reconstruction.

2014 — neo-Nazi vandalism.

2026 — new commemorative ceremony and simultaneously a new era of digital state registration.

And between all these dates, the brick laid by masters in 1925 continues to stand.

A hundred years later, the debate is not only about the deceased but also about the language of memory

That is why the fresh four-minute report turned out to be more interesting to me than it initially seemed.

In it, Serhiy Yesyunin talks about the massacre.

But the monument itself also tells about how different generations explained this massacre to themselves.

The families of the victims in 1925 created a Jewish pantheon without Soviet symbols.

In 1972, the Soviet authorities turned it into a “mass grave of the victims of the Petliura pogrom”.

After the restoration of Ukraine’s independence, the official language introduced the “Proskuriv pogrom”.

In the 21st century, Hebrew, menorahs, and the Star of David appear on the old brick.

And in the current city table of 2026, all this is unexpectedly reduced to two words:

“Mass grave.”

What is more correct?

For computer registration, perhaps two words are enough.

For history — categorically not.

Under this line are at least a thousand documented human fates, the community’s memory of 1600 dead, 960 orphans, people who tried to save neighbors, seven decades of Soviet history, a disappeared cemetery, reconstruction after the threat of demolition, and one hundred and one years of attempts not to let February 1919 turn into just a number.

That is why NANews — News of Israel will continue this topic not through the convenient choice of “who was good and who was bad”, but through documents and people.

The Proskuriv pogrom cannot be used to declare Ukrainian history inherently anti-Semitic.

But it cannot be dissolved in a beautiful story of Ukrainian-Jewish friendship either.

In the same Ukraine of 1919, there were Semesenko and his killers, Kachurovsky and Polozov, Konovalets’ investigation, and the Jewish Kurin of Lejnberg.

And in Khmelnytsky, a hundred years later, there stands a monument on which all these contradictions are literally layered one on top of the other — with brick, bronze, Ukrainian words, and Hebrew letters.

What I have not yet been able to establish

After all the review, there are questions to which I consciously do not invent answers.

I did not find a document explaining why the Germans did not destroy the obelisk during the occupation.

I did not find a separate administrative act by which the Soviet name “victims of the Petliura pogrom” was officially replaced first with “victims of the Proskuriv pogrom” and then simply with “Mass grave”.

I did not find confirmation that the investigation initiated after the pogrom along Konovalets’ line ended with judicial punishment of the organizers specifically for the mass murder of Jews.

I cannot prove without reservation that the person mentioned in the history of the structure I. Korenblit is indeed Israel Korenblit, although such identification seems likely.

And I did not repeat the claim of the “only monument in Ukraine” to the victims of the Jewish pogrom because it does not withstand scrutiny.

These are not weak points of the article.

In my opinion, this is where the line between memory and legend lies.

---

33 Channel, August 27, 2026 — “Bloody History of the Oldest Memorial Complex of the Jewish Community”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nogB7LLgTVE

…
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Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

The CIA Director warned Russia not to attack NATO during a rare visit to Moscow on August 25. New data shows: the main focus was on Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, and the second sensitive topic was Russian assistance to Iran.

Author: Pavel Shveiko

Moscow, Russia — August 25, 2026. CIA Director John Ratcliffe warned Russia not to attack NATO during an unannounced visit to the Russian capital. Moreover, a detail that was not known in the first hours after the trip is now revealed: the American side was not talking about an abstract ‘NATO in general.’ According to Politico, the main focus was on three specific countries — Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Simultaneously, Ratcliffe demanded that Moscow reduce military and economic support to Iran.

This significantly changes the understanding of the whole story.

As of August 26, it was only possible to confidently talk about the fact of the rare trip by the director of American foreign intelligence, contacts with Russian special services, and the existence of a new American assessment of the NATO threat. Now several American media independently report: the warning about NATO was indeed one of the tasks of the visit. ABC News confirms this version with reference to its own sources, and The Wall Street Journal links the trip to new intelligence assessments of the risk of a limited Russian attack on a US ally.

For NAnews — News of Israel another detail is important here. In one closed conversation, the Americans linked two directions, which are conveniently viewed as different wars: the European — Russia, Ukraine, and NATO — and the Middle Eastern — Russia, Iran, the US, and Israel.

I grew up in Ukraine and live in Israel, so I consider this connection central. Not because any conflict should automatically be ‘tied to Israel,’ but because this connection was made by the American side itself: in Moscow, the CIA chief simultaneously spoke about the security of NATO’s eastern flank and Russian support for a state that is at war with Israel and the US.

Ratcliffe did not meet with Putin — but the warning reached him

First, an important clarification to the formulations that are already spreading in headlines.

John Ratcliffe did not meet with Putin personally.

On August 26, 2026, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that the CIA director spoke with representatives of Russian special services. According to Peskov, Putin was then fully briefed on the outcomes of these contacts. The Kremlin did not disclose the content of the negotiations.

Therefore, the phrase ‘Ratcliffe warned Putin’ oversimplifies what happened. It would be more accurate to say: the CIA chief conveyed a warning to the Russian leadership through the intelligence channel, after which the content of the negotiations was communicated to Putin.

The method of delivering the message was also unusual.

An American military transport C-17 took off from the Washington area, made a stop in Riga, and on the morning of August 25, 2026, headed to Moscow. According to open flight tracking data, the plane left the Russian capital about eight and a half hours later. The Washington Post also geolocated a video of a motorcade in central Moscow published on social media.

This does not resemble a casual phone conversation between mid-level officials.

But the unusual nature of the trip does not imply that Washington received a ready Russian plan for a new war. I consciously separate these things: the visit and the warning are confirmed by several sources; a specific Kremlin order to attack a NATO state has not been publicly established.

Why Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania were specifically named

Politico cites a source familiar with the content of the negotiations: the meeting was primarily intended to warn Russia against further escalation regarding the Baltic states. This refers to Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

For the Israeli reader, it is useful to look at the map here, not just the name NATO.

Estonia and Latvia have land borders with Russia. Lithuania is located near the Russian Kaliningrad region and Belarus. Between Lithuania and Poland lies the narrow Suwalki Corridor — the territory through which the Baltic states have a land connection with the main part of NATO space.

Kaliningrad itself is a Russian enclave, separated from the main territory of the Russian Federation and located between Lithuania and Poland.

This creates a geographical knot where Russia, Belarus, and NATO countries are literally next to each other. A local provocation here does not require a Russian army march across half of Europe.

That is why American intelligence, as previously reported by WSJ, talks not only about a classic invasion. A wider spectrum is considered — from a cyberattack to a limited ground operation. The meaning of a potential action may not be so much in capturing a large amount of territory as in testing the political reaction of allies.

What it means to ‘test NATO’ and why Article 5 is not a magic button

Here it is worth explaining a term that is often used too freely.

NATO — the North Atlantic Alliance, a defensive alliance of European and North American states. Its foundation is Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty.

In simplified form, its meaning is this: an armed attack on one ally is considered an attack on all.

But this does not imply an automatic scheme ‘attacked Lithuania — within five minutes all NATO armies start the same war’.

NATO’s official explanation states that each ally is obliged to provide assistance, but the form of necessary actions is determined independently. It may include military force, but the treaty does not establish a single pre-written military response for all participants. Article 5 has been formally applied only once in NATO’s history — after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, against the US.

And here arises the space for a dangerous experiment.

What is considered an armed attack if it is not a hundred Russian tanks with flags?

What to do with a major cyberattack?

With sabotage?

With a drone?

With armed people without obvious state affiliation?

With a small captured piece of territory if Moscow simultaneously declares that Russian troops have nothing to do with it?

That is why a limited provocation may be potentially more interesting for the Kremlin than a full-scale invasion. It tests not only NATO’s army but also the political ability of 32 countries to quickly agree on what exactly happened and how far they are willing to go in response.

This is already an analytical conclusion from the nature of the described risk, not a report on an adopted Russian plan.

The Baltic states have their own reasons for concern

Ratcliffe’s warning did not arise in a vacuum.

On August 6, Reuters reported: Lithuanian intelligence believes that Russia is considering using captured Ukrainian drones for provocations against the Baltic region states. Lithuanian Defense Minister Robertas Kaunas spoke about such a risk.

This is a scenario of the so-called false flag operation — an action organized in such a way that responsibility appears to belong to another party.

Let’s imagine the practical meaning. A Ukrainian-type drone appears over a NATO state. The first photos appear on social media. Moscow declares: ‘This is Ukraine.’ Kyiv denies it. Technical expertise begins, politicians demand evidence, part of society argues about whom to believe.

Even without a big war, the adversary gains the main thing — time, uncertainty, and internal conflict among allies.

On July 30, three Baltic European Commissioners, together with representatives from Poland and Finland, sent a letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen about the ‘deteriorating security situation,’ including increased airspace violations and drone intrusions. Today RFE/RL linked this accumulated concern with Ratcliffe’s subsequent visit on August 25.

However, the same material contains a limitation that cannot be discarded for the sake of a scary headline: Baltic diplomats do not speak of a proven inevitable full-scale Russian invasion.

This is a fundamental difference.

‘Russia will attack NATO’ — not yet an established fact

Searches are already appearing with the formulations ‘Russia will attack NATO,’ ‘Putin is preparing an attack on the Baltic states,’ ‘Ratcliffe warned Putin,’ ‘when Russia attacks Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania’.

All these queries relate to today’s news, but not all describe an established fact.

Something else is established.

On August 25, Ratcliffe was in Moscow.

He spoke with Russian special services.

Putin was informed of the content of the negotiations.

Politico, WSJ, CBS, and ABC, citing sources, report that the American director warned Russia against an attack or escalation regarding NATO.

Politico specifically names Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

American intelligence has indeed revised previous assessments and allows for a limited Russian operation against a NATO state in the coming years.

But there is no public evidence of an approved Kremlin order to ‘attack the Baltics’ at this time.

I do not have access to closed American intelligence information and therefore do not intend to turn the probability from an intelligence assessment into an accomplished fact. But after the personal delivery of the warning by the CIA director, the probability is clearly perceived in Washington seriously enough to discuss it through one of the most sensitive communication channels with Moscow.

Trump says almost the opposite

This story has another line that does not allow for a convenient unambiguous version.

US President Donald Trump publicly downplayed the significance of the trip.

In an interview on August 26, he called it ‘semi-routine’, meaning approximately ‘semi-routine,’ and stated that Washington wants to achieve the end of Russia’s war against Ukraine.

When Trump was asked if the visit was related to a possible Russian test of NATO or increased pressure on Iran, the president responded negatively.

But several media outlets, using different sources, describe a different picture.

WSJ: Ratcliffe warned Russia not to attack NATO.

ABC: sources confirm the warning about NATO and say that the topic of Iran was raised.

Politico: the goal was primarily to warn against escalation against Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania; Moscow also received a demand to reduce military and economic support to Tehran.

Here you cannot simply choose the more liked version and discard the second.

Perhaps Trump is consciously describing the public diplomatic part of the negotiations, while sources talk about the closed agenda of the intelligence services. Perhaps different participants highlight different topics of one meeting. It is also possible that part of the information from anonymous sources is incomplete.

To date, there is no public American protocol of the meeting — readout, as it is called in Washington.

Therefore, the contradiction remains part of the story itself.

The CIA Director warned Russia to reduce assistance to Iran

The second part of John Ratcliffe’s mission in Moscow directly concerns Israel.

According to Politico, during the negotiations on August 25, 2026, the CIA director urged the Russian side to reduce military and economic support to Iran. Moreover, this is not just a supposition about a possible topic of conversation: the publication refers to a source familiar with the content of the negotiations and separately to a British official informed about the trip.

From the published details, it follows that the US demand was quite specific.

According to the British official, Ratcliffe urged Moscow to stop supplying Iran with weapons and defense technologies. Simultaneously, he warned the Russian side against an overly harsh reaction to the expansion of American sanctions against states continuing economic relations with Tehran.

Thus, during one visit, the CIA director conveyed at least two different signals to Moscow.

The first concerned European security directly: not to undertake escalatory actions against NATO members, with special attention given to Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

The second concerned the Middle East: not to strengthen Iran with weapons, defense technologies, and economic support.

For the Israeli reader, this part of the Moscow negotiations is especially important. Washington, judging by the published information, discussed Russian assistance to Tehran not at a separate diplomatic meeting months later, but included the issue of Iran in the agenda of the rare personal visit of the CIA director to Moscow.

At the same time, it is necessary to separate the reports of sources from the officially confirmed part of the trip.

The Kremlin confirmed Ratcliffe’s visit and his negotiations with Russian colleagues through the intelligence line, but did not disclose the topics of conversation. There was no personal meeting with Putin. Dmitry Peskov stated that the Russian president was then briefed on the content of the negotiations.

The CIA itself has not published a public report on the negotiations.

Moreover, Donald Trump on August 26 attempted to significantly downplay the significance of what happened. He called Ratcliffe’s trip ‘semi-routine’ — ‘semi-routine’ and stated that the US is trying to achieve the end of Russia’s war against Ukraine. When asked about versions linking the trip to a possible NATO threat and the situation around Iran, Trump publicly rejected this interpretation.

This results in an unusual discrepancy.

Officially Washington has not disclosed the content of the negotiations, the Kremlin is also silent, and Trump speaks mainly about Ukraine.

According to Politico and other American media, the closed agenda was broader: NATO, the Baltic states, and Russian support for Iran.

I would therefore not write that the US has already achieved any agreement from Moscow regarding Iran. At the moment, it is publicly unknown what exactly the Russian side responded to Ratcliffe, whether it agreed to reconsider relations with Tehran, and whether any counter-conditions were put forward.

The practical result of the trip is also unknown.

But the very fact that the issue of Russian assistance to Iran, according to sources, was raised by the CIA director personally in Moscow, shows the level of Washington’s concern.

And only after this arises the next question, already directly important for Israel:

what exactly is Russia giving Iran today and why is the US trying to force Moscow to reduce this cooperation?

Why Iran appeared in the conversation about the Baltic states

At first glance, Iran seems like an alien element here.

In fact — no.

Russia and Iran signed the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Agreement on January 17, 2025. In the official text, the relationship is directly defined as long-term and strategic.

But cooperation has long gone beyond diplomatic declarations.

Iran transferred Shahed to Russia, which were then massively used against Ukraine. Russia, in turn, provided Tehran with various types of support.

In April 2026, Reuters reviewed a Ukrainian intelligence assessment, according to which Russian satellites conducted imaging of objects in Middle Eastern countries, including Israel, and the obtained information could help Iran in target selection. Moscow denied part of such accusations. The same assessment described cooperation between Russian and Iranian cyber groups.

This is already a direct Israeli context.

NAnews — News of Israel previously detailed how the military cooperation between Moscow and Tehran turned Russia’s war against Ukraine into a source of practical experience, which then returns to the Middle East. Iran and Russia: how the war in Ukraine became a testing ground for a future war against Israel and the USA

Now a new fact is added to this chain: the CIA director, who came to warn Moscow about a possible escalation against NATO, simultaneously demanded a reduction in Russian support for Iran.

Washington, judging by these reports, also considers the two threats not as completely isolated from each other.

Ukraine, the Baltics, Iran, and Israel are beginning to compete for a single American security system.

There is another connection here, less noticeable but very important for Israel.

WSJ draws attention to the state of American weapons stocks. The US simultaneously supports Ukraine, must ensure the defense of NATO allies, and is engaged in a protracted confrontation with Iran. In August, the American publication separately wrote that the consumption of missiles and other high-tech munitions in different theaters creates pressure on American deterrence capabilities.

For Israel, this is no longer a theoretical European problem.

If Washington has to simultaneously count interceptors for the Middle East, support Ukraine, and prepare for a potential NATO crisis in the Baltics, these conflicts begin to compete for the same production capacities, missiles, air defense systems, intelligence resources, and political attention.

This is one of those cases where the world map is deceiving.

Haifa is far from Tallinn.

Tel Aviv is far from Vilnius.

But a Russian drone at the border of Lithuania and Russian data that may be useful to Iran in the Middle East pass through the same larger system of Moscow’s relations with the West.

That is why an Israeli should look at Ratcliffe’s warning not as news about three small European countries somewhere near Russia.

The previous visit of the CIA head to Moscow ended quite differently from what Washington wanted.

There is another date that is hard to get rid of.

November 2021.

At that time, the CIA director was William Burns — a former American ambassador to Russia. President Joe Biden sent him to Moscow after US intelligence received data on the preparation of a large-scale Russian attack on Ukraine.

Burns was supposed to show the Russian leadership how much Washington knows about military planning and warn about the consequences.

On February 24, 2022, Russia still began a full-scale invasion.

Ratcliffe became the first known CIA director to visit Moscow after Burns’ visit.

It is impossible to equate these events.

In 2021, the Americans had a specific intelligence picture of the preparation for a big war. In August 2026, it is about assessing a possible limited action against NATO, not a publicly confirmed invasion plan.

But one lesson from 2021 is already known for sure.

The very fact that the CIA director personally brings a warning to Moscow does not mean that Moscow will necessarily listen.

And this is perhaps the most unpleasant historical detail of the current trip.

Yesterday the main question was “why did he come”. Today the question is already different.

On August 26, NAnews separately analyzed Ratcliffe’s unusual visit and two intelligence lines around it — a possible new Russian mobilization and a change in the American risk assessment for NATO. At that time, the content of the negotiations was still unknown. The CIA head flew to Moscow amid warnings about Russia and NATO

In a day, the situation changed.

Now the main question is no longer “why did the CIA director fly to Moscow?”.

We received a fairly specific answer from several sources: Washington warned Moscow about NATO, and in the most detailed version — specifically about the Baltic countries. Iran was raised in parallel.

The next question is much more complicated:

what exactly did American intelligence see if a personal visit from the CIA director was needed to deliver the warning?

There is no public answer to it yet.

And here I would look not at new loud statements, but at actions.

Will additional Russian units appear near the Baltic direction?

Will there be new provocations with drones?

Will sabotage and cyberattacks in Europe intensify?

Will Russian support for Iran change after the American warning?

Will new mobilization decisions follow within Russia?

And finally — will Moscow behave more cautiously after Ratcliffe’s visit or, as after Burns’ warning in 2021, decide that the cost of escalation can be accepted?

So far, the established fact is simpler than any forecast: on August 25, 2026, the CIA head came to Moscow to talk with a state that is waging war against Ukraine, is in a strategic partnership with Iran, and is now considered by American intelligence as a source of a possible direct test for NATO.

For Israel, there is no “foreign European front” in this story.

If Moscow is simultaneously capable of pressuring NATO countries and strengthening Tehran, then the question of Israel’s policy towards Russia ceases to be solely a matter of diplomatic balance.

It becomes part of Israel’s own security.

Editorial source verification: Politico, August 26, 2026; The Wall Street Journal, August 6, 25, and 26, 2026; Reuters, August 6, 25, and 26, 2026; ABC News, August 26, 2026; The Washington Post, August 25–26, 2026; RFE/RL, August 27, 2026; official NATO materials on Article 5; official text of the Russian-Iranian treaty from January 17, 2025; previous NAnews materials.

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Benjamin Netanyahu wrote to Volodymyr Zelenskyy on the 35th anniversary of Ukraine’s independence on August 24, but the document became public only on the evening of the 26th, when the Ukrainian president himself showed it. The letter contains two details that go far beyond a protocol congratulation: a direct definition of Iran as a common threat and a handwritten line about a brief meeting between the two leaders in Washington. Netanyahu’s office had not reported the congratulation until that time.

Author: Stas Shifer

Jerusalem, Israel — August 27, 2026.

If you are looking for “Netanyahu congratulated Ukraine,” “Netanyahu’s letter to Zelenskyy,” or “Iran is a common threat to Israel and Ukraine,” two dates are immediately important here. The letter from the Israeli Prime Minister’s office is dated August 24, 2026, Ukraine’s Independence Day, but Volodymyr Zelenskyy published it on X only on August 26 at 17:43. It was only after this publication that the document entered the open information field.

I received warm congratulations for the people of Ukraine from Prime Minister @netanyahu of Israel. Our countries share deep bonds – between our people in the first place, but also in the economy, culture, and other areas. It is therefore good to hear of Israel’s desire to… pic.twitter.com/WjhLg37ai6

— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) August 26, 2026

In the letter, Netanyahu congratulates Zelenskyy and Ukrainians on the 35th anniversary of independence, talks about building a strong independent state in the face of serious challenges, notes Ukraine’s national unity, courage, and resilience, and wishes the country a “future of freedom and lasting peace”. But the most politically substantive phrase is not in the final wish: the Israeli Prime Minister directly writes that Israel and Ukraine face a “common threat from Iran”.

I separately checked the public Israeli side of this story. As of the preparation of the material on August 27, I did not find a separate publication with this letter among the available messages from the Prime Minister’s office on gov.il, in Netanyahu’s official Telegram, or in the available output of his official X. This does not prove that the document was deliberately not published: such a conclusion would require an explanation from the office itself. But the available public chronology looks exactly like this — the letter is dated August 24, and Zelenskyy made it publicly available on the evening of the 26th.

For NANews — News of Israel | Nikk.Agency this changes the angle of the story. We are not just looking at another festive address to Kyiv, but a document that the Ukrainian side decided to make public itself — and in which Netanyahu connects relations with Ukraine to the central theme of Israeli security, Iran.

And what happened in previous years: did Netanyahu congratulate Ukraine at all?

I separately looked at previous Ukrainian Independence Days — and Netanyahu’s current letter looks even more interesting.

In 2025, among the officially listed congratulations from world leaders from Israel was President Isaac Herzog. In the list published on August 25 by the Office of the President of Ukraine, Netanyahu is not mentioned. This does not prove that there was no non-public letter, but I did not find a public congratulation from the Prime Minister.

In 2024, the situation was similar. I also did not find a public congratulation from Netanyahu on Independence Day. However, a few days later, on August 28, Netanyahu himself called Zelenskyy. The conversation already concerned the war, the situation in the Middle East, and support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. Moreover, The Times of Israel separately noted an interesting detail: the Israeli side did not publish its own message about this conversation at all — Kyiv reported it.

So the current story with the letter, which we learn about from Zelenskyy, already has some parallel.

But 2023 is especially indicative.

Then, around the absence of a personal congratulation from Netanyahu, there was real irritation in Kyiv. Israeli Hebrew-language media retold a message from the public broadcaster Kan: an unnamed Ukrainian official complained that Netanyahu did not personally congratulate Ukraine on Independence Day.

According to this source, a message from the official account of the Prime Minister’s office appeared late in the evening, but the Ukrainian side perceived it quite differently:

“A tweet from the Prime Minister’s office account late at night is not a congratulation from a friend”.

The story then developed against the backdrop of another painful issue — the annual trip of tens of thousands of Israeli Hasidim to Uman for Rosh Hashanah. Kyiv discussed possible restrictions for Israelis, and dissatisfaction with Netanyahu’s government’s attitude was cited as one of the reasons for the tension.

2022: Netanyahu is not the Prime Minister — Israel is led by Yair Lapid. And he congratulates Zelenskyy on Independence Day only on September 1, after the holiday. Moreover, this was their first phone conversation after Lapid took office as Prime Minister.

It turns out to be almost a mirror image.

2023: in Kyiv, they ask — why didn’t Netanyahu personally congratulate Zelenskyy?

2024: I do not find a public congratulation; a few days later, Netanyahu calls Zelenskyy, and the Ukrainian side is the first to report the conversation.

2025: Herzog publicly congratulates Ukraine, Netanyahu is absent from the official Ukrainian list of congratulating leaders.

2026: Netanyahu not only congratulates. He writes a personal letter, talks about Ukraine’s courage, wishes it freedom and lasting peace, calls Iran a common threat to Israel and Ukraine, and even personally adds a line about meeting Zelenskyy in Washington.

And yet the familiar oddity arises again: the Israeli side itself does not publicly show the letter — we see it only on August 26, when Zelenskyy publishes the document.

For comparison: when in 2021 Naftali Bennett was the Prime Minister of Israel, there was no mystery with the timing. On August 24, he personally called Zelenskyy and congratulated Ukraine on the 30th anniversary of independence. The Office of the President of Ukraine reported this on the same day at 14:14.

Therefore, the current question becomes broader than just “where did the letter wander for two days?”

I am more interested in another: why, after several years when Netanyahu’s personal public congratulation was either absent or at least not a noticeable part of public communication, in 2026 he writes such a warm and politically substantive letter — but again does not publish it himself?

Coincidence? A feature of the office’s work? Changed attitude towards Ukraine? Internal Israeli politics before the elections? New significance of Ukrainian experience for Israel after the war with Iran?

There is no answer yet.

But now we at least see that the two-day pause in 2026 is not the only oddity in the history of Netanyahu’s congratulations to Zelenskyy.

The letter from August 24 appeared with Zelenskyy only on the 26th

The chronology is important because congratulations from the leadership of Israel did not come in one package. On August 24, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar publicly congratulated Zelenskyy, his Ukrainian colleague Andriy Sybiha, and the Ukrainian people. NANews has already analyzed this address by Sa’ar: the minister spoke about the resilience of Ukrainians, freedom, and lasting peace, but did not directly mention Russia in the congratulation.

The next day, Zelenskyy separately thanked Israeli President Isaac Herzog. He wrote about solidarity, trade, ties between people, and the upcoming 35th anniversary of diplomatic relations. This story was also analyzed separately by NANews.

It is easy to confuse two anniversaries here. On August 24, 2026, Ukraine celebrated 35 years of Independence. And the 35th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Israel and Ukraine will only come in December: Israel recognized Ukraine’s independence on December 25, 1991, and diplomatic relations were established the next day.

And only in the evening of August 26 did Zelenskyy show Netanyahu’s letter.

Therefore, the wording “Netanyahu congratulated Ukraine on August 27” would be incorrect. The congratulation is dated the 24th. But for the general public, the document itself became visible two days later.

Why did this happen?

I do not find grounds to invent an answer. The letter could have been ordinary diplomatic correspondence that was not initially intended to be published immediately. A political decision not to bring the Ukrainian topic into the Prime Minister’s communication on August 24 is also possible. But there is no confirmation of any of these versions in open sources now.

This is exactly the boundary where fact ends and hypothesis begins.

What Netanyahu actually said — and what is not in the letter

The document itself is short, but its composition is more interesting than a standard congratulation.

First, Netanyahu talks about three and a half decades of Ukrainian independence and building a strong state despite severe trials. Then he links the current anniversary to Ukraine’s continued defense of its national security and speaks of national unity, courage, and resilience.

After this, Israel appears: historical ties, the desire to continue joint work and make the two countries even closer.

And only then — Iran.

Netanyahu writes:

“Our two countries face a common threat from Iran”.

The Prime Minister then explains his thought: Tehran’s destabilizing activities, he says, threaten security far beyond the Middle East, and Israel intends to continue countering this threat and achieving greater stability.

This is a strong political formulation.

But turning it into a headline “Israel and Ukraine created an alliance against Iran” would be wrong. The letter does not announce a military agreement, arms supplies to Ukraine, intelligence sharing, a joint air defense system, weapons production, or a new sanctions package.

There is not even a date for the next full meeting between Netanyahu and Zelenskyy.

It turns out to be an interesting construction: the political formula has become stronger, practical commitments — not yet.

In Zelenskyy’s response, there is another detail. The Ukrainian president thanked Netanyahu, wrote about the deep ties between the peoples, the economy, culture, and Israel’s desire to strengthen relations, and concluded with hope for fruitful joint work for greater security.

But the word “Iran” Zelenskyy did not repeat in his own text.

I would not turn this into a sign of disagreement. There is no basis for such a conclusion. It is merely a difference between two public formulations — and that is why it should be preserved, not smoothed over by retelling.

The phrase about Iran did not arise out of nowhere

For an Israeli who does not follow Ukrainian politics daily, the very construction “common Iranian threat to Israel and Ukraine” may initially seem strange.

Ukraine is in Europe and is at war against Russia. Israel builds a significant part of its security strategy around Iran’s nuclear program, missiles, drones, and Tehran-supported armed structures in the Middle East.

But between these two wars, there has long been a technological bridge.

Shahed — a family of Iranian-developed one-way attack drones: the device carries explosives and itself becomes part of the munition. Russia began to massively use such drones against Ukraine in the fall of 2022, and then deployed the production of its own Russian versions.

Therefore, for Ukrainians, the word Shahed became part of the everyday air war long before the current stage of the confrontation between Israel and Iran. Reuters noted that Russian forces launched thousands of such devices at Ukraine, and Russian production gradually became independent.

But the political rapprochement between Kyiv and Jerusalem on this topic also did not begin yesterday.

On July 23, 2025, Foreign Ministers Gideon Sa’ar and Andriy Sybiha in Kyiv officially agreed to start a strategic dialogue between Israel and Ukraine on the Iranian threat. Sybiha is Ukraine’s Foreign Minister, that is, Sa’ar’s direct Ukrainian counterpart. During the same negotiations, the parties discussed security, cyberspace, defense technologies, medicine, energy, agriculture, and trade.

In February 2026, after a conversation between Zelenskyy and Herzog, the official website of the President of Ukraine again directly linked Iran with the Russian war. Kyiv reminded that the Iranian regime supported Russia and supplied it with Shahed for attacks against Ukrainians.

In the spring, the connection became even more complex. Zelenskyy publicly claimed that now Russia was helping Iran, including supplying Russian versions of Shahed and transferring intelligence information. Reuters reported these statements. Here a caveat is required: the Ukrainian president’s statement about a specific current transfer of equipment or intelligence does not equal independent confirmation of each individual operation.

At the same time, the strategic cooperation between Moscow and Tehran is no longer an assumption. In January 2025, Russia and Iran signed a 20-year strategic partnership agreement, providing for closer cooperation in defense and security, military-technical sphere, joint exercises, and interaction of special services. It is also important to clarify the opposite: the agreement does not automatically obligate to enter the war on the partner’s side.

That is why I would not turn Russia and Iran into a formal unified military bloc modeled on NATO.

NANews recently analyzed this link between Russia, Iran, Israel, and Ukraine separately. Netanyahu’s letter adds a new detail to the already existing picture: the formula of a common Iranian threat now comes not only from Ukrainian diplomats.

The handwritten line returns us to Washington

At the bottom of the official letter, there is something that is usually not in diplomatic documents of this kind.

Netanyahu added in blue pen:

“I enjoyed meeting you, however briefly, in Washington”.

That is: “I enjoyed meeting you in Washington, albeit very briefly”.

This small note returns the story to July 28, 2026.

Then Zelenskyy and Netanyahu were simultaneously in Washington. Their teams tried to organize a full bilateral meeting, but in the end, it did not take place. The Times of Israel initially reported attempts to coordinate negotiations, and later — about a short personal conversation and handshake between the two leaders before the farewell ceremony for American Senator Lindsey Graham.

Before that, Netanyahu and Zelenskyy had not met in person since September 2023 and, according to the Israeli publication, had not spoken by phone since January 2025. Therefore, the words however briefly here acquire additional meaning: the Israeli Prime Minister himself decided to note even this very short contact.

NANews wrote about the Washington day when Trump separately received Zelenskyy and Netanyahu. In the White House, the Ukrainian president discussed his own war and Ukraine’s defense, the Israeli Prime Minister — primarily Iran. There was no full-fledged trilateral negotiation format.

But nearby, an episode occurred that was not planned as a separate diplomatic summit: Zelenskyy and Netanyahu talked personally.

On the same day, Sa’ar called Sybiha and again discussed the Iranian threat with him. The Ukrainian minister also accepted an invitation to visit Israel. The Times of Israel noted both details in its chronicle of that day.

If you put the events in the correct order, there is no sudden “turn of Israel towards Ukraine” on August 24.

Another sequence emerges: the strategic dialogue on Iran was launched back in 2025; in 2026, the topic became much more practical due to the development of the war around Iran; in July, ministerial contacts revived, and a short personal conversation between Netanyahu and Zelenskyy took place; now the formula of a common threat appeared directly in the Prime Minister’s letter.

Russia makes this formula less abstract for Israel

There is a simple way to verify Netanyahu’s diplomatic formulation: look not at the congratulatory card, but at the events around it.

On the night of August 27, already after Zelenskyy’s publication, Russia conducted another large-scale air attack against Ukraine. Reuters, citing Ukrainian authorities, reported 258 drones, as well as ballistic and other missiles. Strikes and falling debris affected several regions, infrastructure facilities, a school, and a medical institution.

However, here one cannot make the reverse mistake and automatically sign all 258 devices with the word “Iranian”.

Russia has long been producing its own derivatives of Shahed. Moreover, different types of drones, including decoys, can be used in a specific mixed attack. Therefore, the correct connection looks like this: Iranian technology has become one of the most important elements of the Russian air war, not “Iran personally launches every Russian drone at Ukraine”.

It is in this difference that the real value of Ukrainian experience for Israel appears.

Reuters in March 2026 visited the production of Ukrainian interceptor drones — cheap devices that were created specifically to destroy attacking drones. Against the backdrop of the war around Iran, Ukrainian companies reported interest from the US and Middle Eastern countries. One of the manufacturers estimated the ability to produce up to 50,000 interceptors per month, with part of the production capacity potentially being used for export without reducing Ukrainian needs.

The cost also changes the military math. According to Reuters, individual Ukrainian interceptors cost about several thousand dollars or even around a thousand dollars, while a PAC-3 missile for Patriot can cost about $4 million. These are not interchangeable means: Patriot is also intended for much more complex targets, including ballistic missiles. But against cheap attack drones, the economics of interception becomes a separate strategic issue.

For Israel, it is here that the words “common threat” cease to be a diplomatic metaphor.

Ukraine has accumulated a mass of combat experience in detecting low-flying targets, organizing mobile fire groups, using cheap interceptors, protecting energy, and distributing air defense means. Israel has accumulated its own experience in countering Iranian missiles and drones.

This is not yet a joint system.

But it is already an understandable area where the two countries have something to talk about besides congratulations.

What the letter changes — and what will have to be checked further

After the events of August 24–26, relations look warmer, but I would not yet announce a new Israeli policy towards Ukraine.

Sa’ar publicly congratulated Ukraine. Herzog received Zelenskyy’s gratitude and the wording about the “friendly people of Israel.” Netanyahu in his letter took another step in the security sphere and called Iran a common threat.

These are three different levels of communication, not one collective decision of the Israeli government.

But there is still a shift.

Previously, it was the Ukrainian side that especially persistently proved to Israel that Russian-Iranian cooperation links two wars through drones, missiles, technologies, and exchange of experience. Now a similar logic is used in his own formulation by the Prime Minister of Israel.

This does not mean that Netanyahu agreed with Ukraine’s demands for weapons. It does not mean that Israel has changed its policy towards Russia. Nor does it mean the emergence of a common Israel-Ukraine front.

But it is no longer just a Ukrainian argument.

For NAnews — News of Israel | Nikk.Agency the next check will therefore be very specific. Will Sibiga’s visit to Israel take place? Will the strategic dialogue on Iran receive a permanent working format? Will there be projects to counter drones, civil defense, infrastructure protection, or exchange of technological experience? Will these issues be raised in December when Israel and Ukraine will already celebrate the 35th anniversary of diplomatic relations?

And there remains one more question in today’s story: why did a letter with such substantive wording about Iran not appear on Ukraine’s Independence Day in Netanyahu’s public communication?

I deliberately do not turn the absence of the found publication into proof of political intent.

But this detail cannot be discarded.

As of August 27, 2026, the established sequence looks like this: the letter was signed by Netanyahu on August 24; Zelensky published it on August 26 at 17:43; in the document, the Prime Minister of Israel called Iran a common threat to both countries and personally reminded of the brief meeting with the Ukrainian president in Washington.

Therefore, this story no longer fits into the standard three lines of a festive greeting.

Behind one letter are almost three years of rare personal contacts between Netanyahu and Zelensky, the dialogue on Iran launched back in 2025, Russian-Iranian military-technical cooperation, Ukraine’s experience of war with Shahed, and the still unanswered main question: will the convergence of interests between Israel and Ukraine turn into concrete cooperation or remain a strong diplomatic formula on paper.

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Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

From the editors of NAnews: The ties between Israel and Ukraine are not built only through diplomacy, aid, or security cooperation. Since 2022, thousands of people have carried professional experience, business connections, and technological knowledge between the two countries. In this guest column for NAnews, Mark Ginsberg looks at how Ukrainian immigrants have become part of Israel’s tech ecosystem — and whether that human bridge could outlast the wars that created it.

By Mark Ginsberg
Mark Ginsberg is an Israel-based digital marketer and commentator on technology and artificial intelligence, with over two decades of firsthand perspective on the country’s innovation economy. Originally from South Florida and now based in Efrat, he analyzes the growth of Israel’s tech ecosystem and the broader implications of AI on business, policy, and society.

Two Wars, One Arrival Hall

When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Israel absorbed tens of thousands of Ukrainian immigrants alongside a larger wave from Russia. Immigration hit a 23-year high that year, with more than 70,000 new arrivals, many of them engineers, developers, and founders who packed careers into suitcases. The community of Israelis with Ukrainian roots, which NAnews has covered for years, suddenly included thousands of technologists who could build companies in two languages and handle two business cultures without a translator. They arrived into an Israeli tech sector that was itself entering a period of contraction and then war.

That collision produced something neither country planned for, a working bridge between two economies under fire.

The bridge is real, and it runs in both directions.

Engineers Who Understand Both Battlefields

Israel’s technology sector has spent the past decade selling the world defenses it built for its own threats, and the past two years showed how that experience travels.

Ukrainian engineers who joined Israeli firms brought fluency in the realities of drone and electronic warfare, the daily testbed of the Ukrainian front. Israeli companies, blocked by regulation from selling defense products directly to Kyiv, have still built channels into Ukraine’s defense-tech scene, and the Jerusalem Post reported that Jerusalem is now shifting from humanitarian aid toward forward-looking defense tech cooperation between the two countries. Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha confirmed in July 2025 that Kyiv and Jerusalem intend to launch joint projects in security and technology. The people best positioned to staff those projects are the immigrants who hold both contexts in their heads.

A defense technology sector that has become a shield for others grows stronger when it absorbs engineers who spent years thinking about the threats on the other side of the continent. None of this was the plan when these families boarded flights in Warsaw and Bucharest. It is the result.

What the Bridge Carries Now

The traffic is wider than defense. Ukrainian-Israeli teams work in cybersecurity, agricultural technology, and medical systems, fields where Israeli firms had already built a global reputation and where Ukrainian STEM graduates are historically strong. Innovation flowing out of Israel has become one of the country’s main strategic exports, and the diaspora engineers now inside that pipeline give Ukrainian product thinking a seat at the table. American firms have noticed.

US defense planners talk openly about wanting integration with allied innovation, and the list of allies producing battlefield-tested technology now includes both Israel and Ukraine.

Both wars are winding down at different speeds, and the bridge now faces its real test. Some immigrants will return to rebuild Ukrainian industry, and Israel should wish them well, since the strongest version of this relationship is two healthy tech sectors with dense personal ties between them. Others will stay, build companies in Herzliya and Haifa, and keep the corridor open from the inside.

The scenario to watch is the middle one, the founder who commutes between Kyiv and Tel Aviv with investors in both. Ten years from now, the most important tech relationship in the region may not be traced back to any treaty. It will be traced back to the 2022 arrival hall, and the thousands of engineers who walked out of it into both futures at once.

From the editors of NAnews: Ginsberg’s argument points to a relationship that is still taking shape. The technological connection between Israel and Ukraine is not yet a single organized system, and its long-term scale remains uncertain. But the people who moved between the two countries after 2022 have already created professional networks that did not exist in the same form before the war.

For NAnews, that is the part worth watching next: whether these personal and professional ties turn into lasting companies, joint projects, investment channels, and research partnerships. If they do, one of the most durable consequences of the 2022 migration wave may be something neither government originally designed — a working technological bridge between Israel and Ukraine.

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Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

Google Title: Russia attacked Ukraine with 162 drones: a 4-year-old girl died in Chernihiv

At night, Russia sent 162 drones of various types to Ukraine, including jet-powered Shahed. Ukrainian air defense reported 134 targets shot down or suppressed, but simultaneously confirmed hits at 18 locations. In Chernihiv, one drone hit a residential building: a woman and a four-year-old girl died.

The queries ‘Russia’s attack on Ukraine on August 26, 2026’, ‘162 drones over Ukraine’, ‘strike on Chernihiv’, and ‘jet-powered Shahed’ describe one night, but not the same number. 162 is the number of drones launched in the morning report of the Ukrainian Air Force, 134 is the number of targets that air defense considered shot down or suppressed by 08:00, and 18 is the number of locations where hits were recorded. These figures cannot be mechanically subtracted from each other.

Author: R.Verter

August 26, 2026. Around five in the morning, a Russian drone struck a private residential house in Chernihiv, a regional center about 140 kilometers north of Kyiv. Three people were in the house. A fourteen-year-old girl was hospitalized. During search operations, rescuers found a 49-year-old woman and a four-year-old girl dead. The house was almost destroyed by fire, which also affected outbuildings and a nearby store.

I start with Chernihiv, not with the number of launched devices. The figure 162 looks good in the headline and allows for comparing one mass attack with another. But it is insufficient for understanding what is happening. This night involved different types of drones, electronic suppression, jet targets, reports of ballistic threats, strikes on several regions, and very different consequences on the ground.

162 drones — and the figure 134, which is easily misleading

According to the Ukrainian Air Force, the air attack began around 18:00 on August 25. Russia launched 162 drones of the Shahed, ‘Gerbera’, ‘Parody’, and other types. Among the Shahed, the military specifically noted jet variants. Launch areas were near Kursk, Orel, and Primorsko-Akhtarsk in Russia, as well as in occupied territories — in the Donetsk and Gvardeiskoye areas in Crimea.

By 08:00, the Ukrainian military reported 134 drones shot down or suppressed. A UAV is an unmanned aerial vehicle; in everyday Israeli speech, the closest understandable word is כטב”ם. But the wording ‘shot down or suppressed’ is crucial here.

Some devices are indeed destroyed by fire: anti-aircraft means, mobile groups, aviation, or other systems. Some may be neutralized by electronic warfare — a complex of means that interfere with the drone’s navigation and communication. For the Israeli reader, it is important not to imagine each ‘suppression’ as a classic interception by an air defense missile.

There is also a second arithmetic trap. From 162, you cannot simply subtract 134 and write: ’28 drones broke through’. The Air Force reported hits at 18 locations and debris falling at three more. One location can receive more than one hit; some targets may be lost, fall, or be finally classified only after the first report. The morning report itself was called preliminary.

For NAnews — Israel News, this difference is also important because the Israeli audience is used to seeing air defense effectiveness in percentages. The Ukrainian reporting formula is arranged differently, and the conditions of war do not allow transferring one Israeli interception indicator to the Ukrainian situation without reservations.

In Chernihiv, one drone hit a private house

In the morning statistics, Chernihiv is one of the 18 hit locations. On the ground, it looks completely different.

City authorities reported that after the strike, a private residential house caught fire. The fire almost destroyed the building. Inside were a 49-year-old woman and two girls — four and fourteen years old. I deliberately do not call them mother and daughters or sisters: in the official reports published by this hour, which I checked, the age and number of people in the house are indicated, but family relationships are not recorded in all reports. Adding them myself would be wrong.

The fourteen-year-old girl was taken to the hospital. During search and rescue operations, the bodies of the woman and the four-year-old girl were found. The State Emergency Service of Ukraine — SES, roughly corresponding in function to the Israeli fire and rescue service כבאות והצלה in terms of rescue and firefighting operations, confirmed two dead and one injured child.

The Chernihiv City Council indicated the age of the deceased woman — 49 years. This same figure is now cited by other sources with reference to local authorities. Therefore, the previous version that appeared in some retellings about 39 years should not be used as equivalent.

August 26 was declared a Day of Mourning in Chernihiv. The city ordered the lowering of state flags and the cancellation of entertainment events.

At this point, it is especially noticeable why I do not like turning air defense reports into a sports score. Even a high percentage of neutralized devices does not answer the question of where the one that could not be stopped hit.

Chernihiv region: if you look not at one night, but three days

The strike on August 26 looks different if you open police reports not only for this morning.

On August 24, a Russian drone hit a multi-story residential building in Chernihiv. According to preliminary police information, 16 people were injured. Among them were children aged 12 and 17. Ukrainian bomb technicians initially identified the device used as ‘Geran-5’.

That same evening, the strike hit the center of Mena — a small town in the Chernihiv region. For the Israeli reader, this name itself says little: Mena is located about 65 kilometers east of Chernihiv and is the administrative center of the local community. ‘Community’ in the Ukrainian administrative system is a municipal territorial association; the closest Israeli reference is a local municipality or regional administrative unit, although legally the systems are different.

In Mena, the police initially reported 12 injured, including four children. Administrative buildings, residential houses, shops, and cars were damaged.

The next night, around three o’clock on August 25, drones attacked Koryukivka. A 15-year-old girl was injured there and taken to the hospital. Enterprises, residential houses, and transport were damaged.

This results in a sequence that cannot be seen in the single figure ‘162’: August 24 — children among the injured in a multi-story building in Chernihiv and in Mena; August 25 — a fifteen-year-old injured in Koryukivka; morning of August 26 — a fourteen-year-old girl in the hospital and a four-year-old deceased in Chernihiv.

I do not turn this sequence into a statement about a specifically chosen Russian tactic against children — there is not enough data for such a conclusion. But as a factual chronology of civilian consequences in one region, it is significant in itself. And this is already the part of the material that disappears if limited to the morning air defense report.

Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk region show why ‘drone attack’ is too simple a name

While rescuers were working in Chernihiv, air targets continued to be recorded in other parts of Ukraine.

In Kharkiv, authorities reported drone strikes on urban areas. Separate attention was drawn to reports of jet drones. This is important not because of a new loud term, but because of interception practice: a jet device flies differently than the usual propeller-driven Shahed, and the air defense crew has a different time window for detection and reaction.

At night, the Air Force also warned of a ballistic threat and reported a ballistic missile heading towards Sumy. This is a separate class of weapon. I do not include such a missile in the number of 162 drones and do not mix these episodes into one statistic.

The same must be done with the Dnipropetrovsk region. According to regional authorities, overnight Russian forces attacked three districts more than 20 times with drones, artillery, and an aerial bomb. In Nikopol, a 26-year-old woman was injured; an agricultural enterprise, market, apartment buildings, and cars were damaged. In Pavlograd, a 20-year-old woman was injured, and a private house was damaged. A fire broke out in the Synelnykove district.

Here, another Ukrainian military term appears — KAB, which means a guided aerial bomb. It is dropped by an aircraft; it is not a type of Shahed. For residents of frontline Ukrainian regions, a drone, artillery shell, and KAB can appear in one daily report, but technically these are three completely different threats.

This distinction had to be explained in previous materials of NAnews — Israel News. For example, in an article about the strike on Ukraine on August 20, it was about a combination of drones and missiles, and on August 21 — about a new large drone wave. If you put these episodes next to August 26, you see not a repetition of the same attack, but a constant change in the combination of attack means.

Jet-powered Shahed: a Ukrainian problem that Israelis are already familiar with

The word Shahed does not need to be explained from scratch to Israelis. In April 2024, during a direct attack by Iran on Israel, among more than 300 launched aerial means, there were about 170 drones. Israel then acted not alone: part of the targets were intercepted by Israeli aviation and air defense systems, part by allied forces even before the targets entered Israeli airspace.

But from this, one cannot conclude that Ukrainian air defense should show the same result. Geography, territory depth, availability of aviation, density of air defense means, the number of simultaneously protected objects, and international participation are completely different.

There is another connection, and it is much more useful for understanding what is happening. The Iranian line of drone technologies, which first became obvious to many Israelis precisely through Shahed, has been developing within the Russian war against Ukraine for several years. Russia is not just using a familiar basic concept. New variants are appearing, routes, altitudes, navigation methods are changing, false targets and jet devices are being used.

‘Gerbera’ and ‘Parody’ are also important not because the reader needs to remember two more names. A decoy drone can make the air defense system treat it as a potential threat: the target needs to be seen, tracked, classified, and a decision made on how to respond to it. In a mass attack, the load is created not only by explosives but also by the sheer number of objects in the air.

This is where the Ukrainian experience should be read in Israel carefully. Not as an instruction ‘they have it — so will we’, but as a long testing ground for changing drone warfare. Some technologies and suppliers overlap, defense systems and conditions do not.

What is confirmed by the morning of August 26 — and where the facts end

By 08:00, the Ukrainian Air Force confirmed 162 Russian drones and 134 targets shot down or suppressed. Hits were confirmed at 18 locations and debris falling at three. The attack was still ongoing at the time of this report.

In Chernihiv, the death of a 49-year-old woman and a four-year-old girl and the hospitalization of a 14-year-old girl were officially confirmed. A direct drone hit on a residential house and the subsequent fire were confirmed.

The longer Chernihiv chronology is also confirmed: August 24 — 16 preliminarily injured after a strike on a multi-story building, including two children; the same day — 12 injured in Mena, including four children; August 25 — a 15-year-old girl injured in Koryukivka.

In the Dnipropetrovsk region, local authorities confirm two injured and more than 20 attacks by various means — not only drones. In Kharkiv, the use of jet drones was recorded. A ballistic threat was also announced at night.

However, the exact number of drones that physically reached their targets cannot be determined from the formula ‘162 launched — 134 shot down or suppressed’. This arithmetic cannot determine the number of warheads that exploded on the ground. The morning report does not provide such data.

Therefore, at this stage, I would leave exactly this boundary: it is known how many air targets the military recorded, how many they preliminarily consider neutralized, how many locations received hits, and what human consequences local services have already confirmed. Everything beyond this boundary requires further official clarifications.

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Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

The Chief Rabbi of Kyiv, Yonatan Markovich, came to the anti-corruption court and offered to personally vouch for Irina Mudra. Moshe Asman responded with the phrase: “This is not the position of the Jewish community as a whole.” I analyzed why Asman is not Markovich’s superior, what connected Mudra with the rabbi long before the criminal case, and why 150 million hryvnias brought this story directly to Israel.

Author: Pavel Shveiko

On August 25, 2026, Moshe Reuven Asman publicly reacted to the decision of the Chief Rabbi of Kyiv, Yonatan Binyamin Markovich, to act as a guarantor for Irina Mudra — the former deputy head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, for whom the High Anti-Corruption Court was selecting a preventive measure. Asman formulated the most important phrase on August 25, 2026 in a comment to RBC very clearly:

“Rabbi Markovich’s statement about his readiness to act as a guarantor was his own initiative and is not the position of the Jewish community as a whole.”

I separately checked the structure of rabbinical organizations, the history of Markovich’s relationship with Mudra, and what was happening simultaneously in the anti-corruption court. It turned out that the short formula “the Chief Rabbi of Ukraine condemned the Chief Rabbi of Kyiv” is rather misleading here. Asman indeed uses the national title, Markovich — the capital one, but this is not a “superior-subordinate” system. Moreover, in Ukraine, there has been competition among several religious centers for the right to use the very concept of “Chief Rabbi of Ukraine” for decades.

If you are looking for who is more important — Asman or Markovich, why the Rabbi of Kyiv vouched for Irina Mudra, what exactly Asman said, whether it is related to the Jewish community of Ukraine, and what Timur Mindich has to do with it in Israel, all these questions indeed relate to one story. But they cannot be mixed: personal trust of a rabbi is not proof of innocence, suspicion by NABU is not yet a verdict, and Jewish origin or ties with Israel are not the subject of criminal charges at all.

What exactly did Asman say — and why there are two different boundaries in his statement

In a comment to RBC-Ukraine, Asman did not demand punishment for Markovich and did not state that the Rabbi of Kyiv had no right to become a guarantor at all. The wording was more subtle. According to Asman, when a person during a high-profile court case reminds of their religious status, it can be perceived by society as using the authority of the religious community. He called such a mixing of roles erroneous and stated that he categorically does not support it.

This is a significant difference. Markovich could trust Mudra personally. He could believe that she would not hide and would fulfill the court’s requirements. The Ukrainian Criminal Procedure Code just provides for personal guarantees of people whom the court is ready to trust. But Markovich explained his trust not only by professional acquaintance: in court, the community, prayer, his relationship with Mudra as a rabbi were mentioned. After this, the personal recommendation inevitably acquired a religious dimension.

Asman tried to cut it off. Not “Markovich has no right to have such an opinion,” but “this is Markovich’s opinion, not the collective position of the Jews of Ukraine”.

But then he drew a second boundary — in the opposite direction.

Asman stated that he categorically condemns the wave of anti-Semitism that, in his assessment, arose after Markovich’s decision. He emphasized: the act of an individual rabbi does not give the right to insult the Jewish people, spread anti-Semitic stereotypes, or accuse the entire community. At the end of his statement, three principles appeared: the law should be the same for everyone, responsibility should be personal, anti-Semitism has no justification.

Here I deliberately do not turn Asman’s words about the “wave of anti-Semitism” into independently established statistics by us. The source records that Asman characterized the reaction this way. For a separate conclusion about the scale of anti-Semitic manifestations, it would be necessary to study a mass of publications and comments. But the principle of his statement does not change from this.

In essence, Asman refused two collective generalizations at once. You cannot say: “since Markovich is the Chief Rabbi of Kyiv, it means the Jewish community vouched for Mudra.” But you also cannot say: “since the rabbi vouched for the suspect, it means the responsibility lies with the Jews.”

In a short news story, these two thoughts easily turn into one. For me, their separation is the first important detail that cannot be discarded from this story without losing meaning.

Markovich did not intend to pay for Mudra: what does the guarantee mean

On August 24, Yonatan Markovich personally came to the High Anti-Corruption Court of Ukraine. HACC is a separate specialized court created to consider criminal proceedings on corruption at a high state level. For an Israeli reader, there is no exact analogue here: it is not just another district court and not a division of the regular police.

Markovich offered to take Mudra on personal guarantee.

This did not mean that he was going to deposit 20 or 150 million hryvnias instead of her. Personal guarantee in the Ukrainian criminal process is an independent preventive measure. The guarantor undertakes before the court to control the fulfillment of procedural obligations by the suspect and to assist in their appearance upon summons. The court, in turn, must decide whether a specific guarantor deserves sufficient trust.

Markovich stated that he had known Mudra for several years and was confident in her. At the meeting, it was mentioned that she came to the community, came to pray, and maintained a connection with the rabbi. He said that, in his conviction, Mudra would not let down the community, him personally, or the state. Reports of his speech confirm that the court separately clarified whether the rabbi understood the obligations of a guarantor. Markovich answered affirmatively.

There was more than one guarantor. Therefore, representing Mudra’s defense as a story built solely on Markovich’s religious authority would also be incorrect. But it was the rabbi’s participation that gave the meeting a public dimension that would not have arisen around an ordinary former colleague or acquaintance.

The court ultimately did not agree to leave Mudra only under guarantee.

On August 25, HACC sent her into custody for 60 days with the possibility of posting bail in the amount of 20 million hryvnias. This is about 1.33 million shekels or $448 thousand at the exchange rate on August 25. The prosecution requested an alternative bail of 150 million hryvnias — approximately 10 million shekels or $3.36 million.

The difference between 20 and 150 million is also important. The court did not support the entire financial risk assessment proposed by the prosecution, but also did not consider the personal trust of the guarantors sufficient grounds for a milder measure.

This is not a verdict for Mudra.

In Ukrainian news lexicon, the words “arrested,” “taken into custody” easily create the impression that guilt has already been established. Here we are only talking about a preventive measure during the investigation. Mudra disputes the charges, and the final conclusion about her guilt can only be made by the court after considering the evidence.

For NANews — News of Israel this separation is also fundamentally important because Israel appears further in the material. The surname of a person living here, the family ties of the suspect with Israel, and the biographies of the two rabbis should not imperceptibly turn into a substitute for evidence.

Who is more important — Asman or Markovich: Israeli logic does not work here

When I first saw the two titles side by side — “Chief Rabbi of Ukraine” and “Chief Rabbi of Kyiv,” — the most obvious answer seemed simple: the chief of the country should be above the chief of the city.

For a person living in Israel, such logic is natural.

We have the Chief Rabbinate of Israel — a state-organized system. The Council of the Chief Rabbinate operates on the basis of law, has specific powers in the field of kashrut, rabbinical qualifications, the preparation of dayanim, and other religious issues. The council includes two chief rabbis of Israel, and one of them is also connected with the leadership of the rabbinical court system. This is a real institutional structure enshrined by the state.

In Ukraine, there is no such unified state pyramid of Jewish religious authority.

And this is not a nuance of terminology.

History shows that the title “Chief Rabbi of Ukraine” has been used for decades by representatives of different structures. Yaakov Dov Bleich was widely recognized as the Chief Rabbi of Kyiv and Ukraine back in the early 1990s. Then in 2003, the national title was received by Azriel Haikin, associated with another Chabad structure. In September 2005, Moshe Reuven Asman was elected Chief Rabbi of Ukraine — and this decision immediately caused a public dispute. JTA then described the situation with a formula almost incredible for an Israeli reader: “one country — three chief rabbis”.

The reason was not that someone forgot to cancel the old appointment.

Different religious associations, communities, and Hasidic networks defined differently who exactly had the right to represent the Jews of Ukraine. The position of Chief Rabbi there gave public weight, access to state leaders, and a symbolic role as a community representative, but did not arise from a single Ukrainian analogue of the Israeli law on the Chief Rabbinate.

And today this is not just a story from the archives.

Forward in 2022 detailed the ongoing rivalry between Moshe Asman and Yaakov Bleich for the national title. The publication directly noted that both appear in the media as Chief Rabbis of Ukraine. JTA later also called Asman one of several people claiming this title.

Markovich is in yet another position.

He is the Chief Rabbi of Kyiv and the official Chabad emissary in the Ukrainian capital. For more than two decades, he and his family have managed their own community infrastructure. Times of Israel in 2025 described his work with the Ukrainian army to create procedures that allow for Jewish burial of fallen soldiers; for consultations, Markovich met with the Chief Rabbi of the IDF, Eyal Karim.

There is also another detail here that I would not discard as a historical trifle. Asman himself is associated with Chabad but is not part of the official structure of Chabad emissaries in Ukraine, whereas Markovich is an official shaliach — an emissary of the movement in Kyiv. Forward noted this structural peculiarity, and old JTA publications show that relations between various Chabad centers in Ukraine and around the national title have long been complicated.

Therefore, the correct answer to the question “who is more important?” consists of two parts.

By the scale of the declared title, Asman is higher: Ukraine versus Kyiv. Administratively, Asman is not Markovich’s superior.

He cannot cancel his guarantee, remove him from the position of Chief Rabbi of Kyiv, or issue an order binding on his community just because he uses the national title.

This completely changes the meaning of the statement on August 25.

Asman spoke not as a superior publicly reprimanding a subordinate. He spoke as another influential Jewish leader and told society: do not transfer Markovich’s decision to all of us.

Why does Markovich trust Mudra at all: the story did not start in court

If you leave only the frame from HACC, you might decide that a well-known rabbi unexpectedly appeared in court and stood up for a high-ranking official.

But their relationship began long before Operation “Forrest Gump.”

In the previous material NANews — News of Israel I checked Mudra’s public Jewish biography with her interviews and official events. In an interview recorded on January 19, 2026 — about seven months before the searches — Mudra herself talked about her acquaintance with Markovich.

According to her, the rabbi once came to her office. They talked about Israel, and Markovich noticed that there was no mezuzah on the door.

During the next visit, he brought a mezuzah and installed it. Mudra said that after this, Markovich and his wife, Rebbetzin Inna, continued to visit her from time to time, and her family celebrates Jewish holidays. This backstory is detailed in the NANews material from August 25.

A completely different logic of guarantee emerges.

Markovich did not evaluate bank documents and did not conduct his own investigation. He vouched for a person he considered part of a familiar circle and with whom he had long-standing relationships.

This simultaneously explains his action — and shows the limit of such testimony.

If the rabbi knows that Mudra came to the community, fulfilled promises in personal communication, and regularly maintained contact, this may give him grounds to believe that she will appear in court.

But from this, it is impossible to conclude whether she knew the origin of the specific 150 million hryvnias, participated in a financial scheme, gave instructions to bank employees, or committed other actions mentioned by the investigation.

Personal trust answers one question.

Criminal proceedings — another.

Mudra also has real family ties with Israel. Her mother repatriated and lives in Rishon LeZion. Mudra’s daughter has Israeli citizenship and studied here. Ukrainian declaration data also included assets in the Israeli banking system. At the same time, I did not find confirmation of Mudra’s own Israeli citizenship, and in the previous check by NANews, we deliberately separated this unconfirmed media thesis from established family facts.

This is especially important now.

After Asman’s statement, it is very easy to build a toxic chain: Jewish official — Israel — rabbi — guarantee — money.

But the criminal case is not arranged like that.

The investigation speaks of specific actions by specific people. A family in Rishon LeZion proves nothing. A mezuzah in the office proves nothing. Israeli citizenship of the daughter proves nothing. Just as the rabbi’s guarantee itself proves nothing.

These circumstances explain the human and public part of the story. Evidence must explain the criminal one.

From 150 million hryvnias to Timur Mindich: why Israel stopped being just a biographical background

Irina Mudra held a position that an Israeli should also decipher.

Until August 19, she was the deputy head of the Office of the President of Ukraine. This is not an analogue of the office of the President of Israel. The Ukrainian Office of the President is an influential administrative-political center under the head of state, involved in decision preparation, legal policy, international processes, and interaction with other branches of power.

Before moving there, Mudra worked as the Deputy Minister of Justice. Among her public directions were the international legal responsibility of Russia, work with frozen Russian assets, and the creation of compensation mechanisms for Ukraine.

That is why her appearance among NABU suspects became a politically loud event.

The operation was given the code name “Forrest Gump.” NABU — the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine, a special body investigating corruption of high-ranking officials. SAP — the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, which procedurally accompanies such proceedings and supports the prosecution.

In one of the key episodes, the investigation speaks of 150 million hryvnias.

This is not a random round sum.

In June 2026, it was exactly 150 million hryvnias that were posted as bail for the former Minister of Energy, Herman Galushchenko — a figure in another high-profile case known as “Midas.”

The investigation’s version is that cash of alleged criminal origin needed to be processed through legal entities and banking infrastructure, turning them into non-cash money that could be transferred to an official court account.

I emphasize: this is the version of NABU and SAP, not an already established court fact of Mudra’s guilt.

But on August 25, this version received a new continuation.

At the hearing on the preventive measure for the head of Sense Bank, the SAP prosecutor stated that the cash for Galushchenko’s bail was given to Mudra by Timur Mindich. Publications from the hearing are dated August 25; it is about the same 150 million hryvnias.

According to the version presented by the prosecutor, Mudra was supposed to help find a mechanism for legalizing funds through banking operations.

Here Israel first appears not as the place of residence of the suspect’s mother and not as part of the rabbis’ biography.

Timur Mindich is in Israel.

And this is not a separate coincidentally matched plot. He is a figure in the “Midas” case, for which Ukraine has already sent an official extradition request to Israel. NANews tracked this procedure separately: documents, after correcting technical deficiencies, were sent to the Ministry of Justice of Israel on March 31, 2026, and on August 10, SAP head Oleksandr Klymenko said that the Ukrainian side is still waiting for a response.

At that moment, 132 days had passed.

The lack of a response cannot be called a refusal by Israel to extradite Mindich. We do not know this. The Israeli extradition procedure includes a legal review and, under certain circumstances, a court hearing.

But the new prosecutor’s statement on August 25 adds another material to the extradition plot: according to SAP, Mindich’s money now appears not only within “Midas” but also in the “Forrest Gump” episode, where Mudra is involved.

And here it is already impossible to reduce the story to “the rabbi stood up for the official.”

During the day, Markovich tells the court about personal trust and the community.

The court sends Mudra into custody.

Asman separates the rabbi’s act from the entire Jewish community.

And almost simultaneously, the prosecutor in another hearing names a person located in Israel as the alleged source of cash at the center of the criminal episode.

These events do not legally prove each other. But journalistically, they change the context.

Now any careless mixing of religion, Jewish identity, Israel, and criminal suspicions becomes even more dangerous.

Why the words “not the position of the Jewish community” are more important here than the dispute between two rabbis

After checking all the lines, I would not call what is happening a “split among the Jews of Ukraine.” There are no grounds for such a conclusion.

We have a specific decision by Yonatan Markovich, a specific public reaction by Moshe Asman, and a long-existing system of different Jewish centers, within which no national title creates a single administrative authority over all communities. The story of Irina Mudra should be resolved in a completely different plane — by the court, bank documents, conversations, testimonies, and other evidence, not by the origin of the participants.

Therefore, Asman’s phrase “not the position of the Jewish community as a whole” turned out to be more accurate for me than any headline about a conflict between rabbis. It simultaneously returns responsibility to the specific guarantor and protects the community from the collectivization of this responsibility. Markovich vouched in his own name. Asman has the right to publicly say that he does not share such a step. But neither of them turns the criminal case into a “Jewish case,” just as the appearance of Timur Mindich in the prosecutor’s version does not turn it into a case of the state of Israel.

And there remains a question that is now more important than finding out “who is the more important rabbi.” The court will have to figure out whether the chain described by SAP from Mindich’s cash through Mudra and banking infrastructure to the 150 million hryvnias bail existed, and Israel will have to decide on a separate procedure around the extradition request for Mindich.

Against this background, Asman’s statement establishes a useful boundary even before the future verdict: the law evaluates people’s actions personally. A religious community cannot be a collective guarantor or a collective defendant.

…
Ex-goalkeeper of ‘Maccabi Haifa’ Georgy Ermakov married Alexandra Mikolyuk from ‘The Bachelor’: Israel appeared twice in the history of this couple - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

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Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

The Israeli Foreign Ministry has begun preparations for the year 2030, which the authorities and church leaders of Jordan call the 2000th anniversary of the Baptism of Jesus Christ in the Jordan River. However, there is no unified decision from the Vatican, the Ecumenical Patriarchate, or all Christian churches regarding such a jubilee. Moreover, the date 2030 itself is historically contentious.

On July 15, 2026, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar ordered the creation of a special task force to prepare for events related to the supposed two-thousandth anniversary of the Baptism of Jesus Christ.

The group was headed by Ambassador George Deek, Israel’s special envoy for relations with the Christian world. In a statement from the Foreign Ministry, the event was described as having deep spiritual significance for more than two billion Christians. Israel expects that millions of pilgrims may arrive in the region.

At first glance, a logical question arises: why is the Foreign Ministry of the Jewish state involved in preparing for a Christian jubilee?

The answer is that Israel did not set the date, did not establish a religious holiday, and does not plan to conduct church rituals. The task of the Foreign Ministry is diplomatic contacts with churches, Christian organizations, religious leaders, and foreign governments, as well as coordination with other Israeli agencies ahead of the possible mass arrival of foreign citizens.

Israel joined an already existing project

The wording that the Israeli Foreign Ministry “began preparations for the celebration” creates the impression that it was Jerusalem that declared 2030 a jubilee year.

In reality, Israel joined an initiative that Jordan began promoting much earlier.

Jordanian shore and UNESCO site

The main center of future events, Jordan considers the place “Bethany Beyond the Jordan” — Al-Maghtas, located on the eastern bank of the Jordan River, nine kilometers north of the Dead Sea.

The archaeological area includes two main zones:

• Tell al-Kharrar, also known as Jabal Mar Elias, or the hill of the prophet Elijah;
• the area of the churches of John the Baptist near the river.

On the territory, remains of Roman and Byzantine churches, chapels, a monastery, hermit caves, water collection systems, and ancient baptismal pools have been discovered. In 2015, the site was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Most Christian denominations recognize this area as the probable site of Jesus’ Baptism by John the Baptist.

On the opposite, western bank of the Jordan is Qasr al-Yahud, located in the Jericho area on the West Bank and under Israeli administration.

The Jordan at this point is quite narrow: pilgrims on both banks essentially look at each other. But each bank promotes its own version of pilgrimage infrastructure and its own access to the Baptism site.

This is where religious history simultaneously turns into a matter of tourism, diplomacy, transportation, security, and international influence.

And Yardenit?

Yardenit is another well-known baptismal complex in the waters of the Jordan, located in northern Israel, near Kibbutz Kinneret, where the river flows out of Lake Kinneret and heads south.

It appeared in 1981 as a safe and convenient alternative to Qasr al-Yahud. After the Six-Day War of 1967, the traditional Baptism site of Jesus near Jericho ended up in a closed border zone: surrounded by minefields, military barriers, and free access for pilgrims was practically impossible.

In Yardenit, stairs and platforms for descending to the water, changing rooms, showers, places for worship, and group baptisms were equipped. Thanks to this, the complex quickly became popular among Christian pilgrims from around the world.

However, Yardenit is not considered a historical site of the Baptism of Jesus Christ. The evangelical event is traditionally associated with Qasr al-Yahud on the Israeli bank and Bethany Beyond the Jordan on the Jordanian side. Yardenit is a modern pilgrimage center that arose due to the long-term lack of safe access to the traditional site.

A $100 million project appeared back in 2022

On December 13, 2022, it became known that Jordan is launching a master plan worth about $100 million, aimed at attracting approximately one million Christian pilgrims in 2030.

The project was not presented by the Vatican or an ecumenical council, but by a non-profit foundation created with the participation of the Jordanian state to develop the “Bethany Beyond the Jordan” area.

The chairman of the foundation, businessman and former Jordanian Minister of Labor Samir Murad, explained that the area should retain its spiritual and natural character. The developers abandoned the idea of building luxurious five-star hotels and chose the concept of a “biblical village,” which should remind pilgrims of life two thousand years ago.

The first phase of the project was estimated at approximately $15 million. The second — up to $85 million.

The plan included creating comfortable tent accommodations, affordable lodging for pilgrims, establishments with local organic food, a three-star hotel, restaurants, a shopping area, a museum, a wellness center, botanical gardens, and a nature reserve on the bird migration route.

Electrical cables and communication lines were planned to be buried underground so that modern infrastructure would not disrupt the visual atmosphere of the historical site.

Nine religious organizations received the right to create their own facilities for receiving pilgrims. Among them was the World Baptist Alliance, cooperating with the Jordanian Baptist Convention.

At a dinner dedicated to the launch of the project, about 250 guests were present, including King Abdullah II of Jordan, his two sons, and the country’s prime minister. The Secretary-General of the World Baptist Alliance, Elijah Brown, stated that both phases should be completed by 2029 so that the area is ready for the 2030 events.

Thus, the first public presentation of the 2030 date was primarily associated with a specific Jordanian investment and pilgrimage project.

How a tourist date turned into a religious initiative

The next stage began in January 2025.

At the beginning of the month, a new Catholic Church of the Baptism of Jesus was consecrated on the Jordanian side of the Jordan. The ceremony was attended by the Vatican’s Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, who arrived as a special representative of Pope Francis, and the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa.

The construction of the church took about 15 years. The first stone was previously blessed by Pope Benedict XVI in the presence of King Abdullah II and Queen Rania.

On January 28, 2025, Father Rifat Bader, director of the Catholic Center for Studies and Media in Jordan, stated in an interview with Vatican News that Jordan is beginning a five-year preparation for its “Great Jubilee.”

He explicitly said that in 2030, Jordan intends to celebrate 2000 years since the Baptism of Jesus. However, this was a statement from a representative of the Latin Patriarchate in Jordan, published by Vatican News, not a papal bull or an official act of the Holy See establishing a worldwide jubilee year.

In other words, the presence of high-ranking Vatican representatives gave the project significant ecclesiastical weight, but in itself did not turn 2030 into a mandatory jubilee for the entire Christian world.

Pizzaballa linked 2030 and 2033

On December 17, 2025, in Amman, at the Al-Husseiniya Palace, King Abdullah II met with Christian and Muslim religious leaders of Jerusalem and Jordan.

At this meeting, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa stated:

• 2030 should mark 2000 years since the Baptism of Christ;
• 2033 should mark 2000 years since the Resurrection.

Pizzaballa added that representatives of churches from around the world should come to Jordan, primarily to “Bethany Beyond the Jordan.”

Here, the overall structure of the project became visible: the period from 2030 to 2033 should be presented as a symbolic path from the Baptism and the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry to the crucifixion and Resurrection.

But even this statement was not a decision of all Christian churches. It was support for the Jordanian program from one of the most influential Catholic hierarchs of the Holy Land.

Official state support appeared on May 18, 2026

On May 18, 2026, King Abdullah II visited the Baptism site at “Bethany Beyond the Jordan” and opened the International Orthodox University Baptism Site International Orthodox University — BIO University.

This is a non-profit educational institution created by the Jerusalem Orthodox Patriarchate. The university is designed to accommodate 40 students, provides for the possibility of distance learning, and was supposed to start accepting students in September 2026.

During the event, the king instructed the Jordanian government to adopt and support the Baptism 2030 initiative.

And here is the precise answer to the question of who officially put forward the current initiative: it was proposed by the Council of Church Leaders of Jordan.

The chairman of the Council, Greek Orthodox Archbishop Christoforos Atallah, thanked the king for his support and stated the need to develop programs and strategic plans jointly with churches.

Cardinal Pizzaballa called 2030 not just a historical date, but an opportunity to strengthen unity, mutual understanding, and harmony.

The Anglican Archbishop of Jerusalem and Primate of the Episcopal Church of Jerusalem and the Middle East Hosam Naoum stated that the preparation should include infrastructure development, service improvement, staff training, and work with churches and Christian organizations worldwide.

The state plan of Jordan covers religious events, the development of pilgrimage routes, the promotion of “Bethany Beyond the Jordan” and other Christian sites, infrastructure renewal, and the creation of services for foreign visitors.

NANews — Israel News compared the dates: the Israeli task force appeared almost four years after the first public presentation of the Jordanian project and two months after King Abdullah II’s official directive.

What Israel was preparing on its shore

Israel was not just observing Jordan’s actions.

On February 10, 2026, after extensive reconstruction, the Qasr al-Yahud complex on the western bank of the Jordan River reopened.

The cost of the work amounted to 25 million shekels, or approximately 8.1 million dollars at the exchange rate at the time of opening. Funding was provided by the Israeli Ministry of Tourism and the Civil Administration, and the work was carried out by the State Tourism Company.

The project included:

• road and parking repairs;
• landscaping;
• construction of a prayer pergola;
• a large air-conditioned sanitary facility;
• hot showers and changing cabins;
• a wide wooden deck for safe access to the water.

There were also plans to create an air-conditioned hall for prayers and events in any weather and separate water access for people with disabilities.

Qasr al-Yahud is called the third most important Christian site in Israel and the West Bank after the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

Thus, by the time of the Foreign Ministry’s decision, infrastructure preparation on the Israeli side was already in full swing.

Why George Deek headed the task force

On April 23, 2026, Gideon Sa’ar appointed George Deek as Israel’s first special envoy for relations with the Christian world.

Deek is an Arab-Christian from Jaffa, a career diplomat, and a former Israeli ambassador to Azerbaijan. He became the first Christian to head an Israeli embassy. His father, Yousef Deek, led the Orthodox Christian community of Jaffa and Israel.

The appointment came amid a serious deterioration in Israel’s relations with some Christian leaders.

During military restrictions, the police did not allow Cardinal Pizzaballa and other high-ranking clergy to attend the Palm Sunday service at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. After international reaction, the authorities reversed the decision, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demanded that the patriarch be granted access.

Additionally, in April 2026, an IDF soldier was filmed smashing a statue of Jesus with a sledgehammer in the Christian village of Debel in southern Lebanon. The soldier and the colleague filming the incident were removed from combat duties and punished after an investigation. Catholic leaders of the Holy Land called the incident a grave insult to the Christian faith.

There were also reports of attacks by radical settlers on Christian communities in the West Bank and increasing cases of insults, spitting, and attacks on Christians in the Old City of Jerusalem.

Therefore, preparation for 2030 has not only tourist but also diplomatic significance for Israel. It is an opportunity to restore relations with Christian churches and demonstrate that the state guarantees freedom of religion and access to holy sites.

Who actually “declared” 2030

Based on the documents found, the following chain can be reconstructed.

On December 13, 2022, a Jordanian state-affiliated foundation publicly presented a $100 million project and named 2030 as the time to celebrate the two-thousandth anniversary of the Baptism.

In January 2025, representatives of the Catholic Church in Jordan announced the start of a five-year preparation for the “Great Jubilee.”

On December 17, 2025, Cardinal Pizzaballa publicly linked 2030 with the Baptism and 2033 with the Resurrection.

On May 18, 2026, King Abdullah II instructed the Jordanian government to support the Baptism 2030 initiative proposed by the Council of Church Leaders of Jordan.

On July 15, 2026, the Israeli Foreign Ministry joined the already existing project.

However, no single document was found by which the Pope, the Ecumenical Patriarch, the World Council of Churches, or any other body representing all of Christianity officially declared 2030 as the worldwide year of the two-thousandth anniversary of Christ’s Baptism.

Therefore, it is more accurate to speak not of a jubilee recognized by the entire Christian world, but of a Jordanian church-state initiative, supported by a number of influential Christian leaders and later picked up by Israel.

Why the date 2030 itself raises questions

The Gospels do not specify the exact calendar year of Jesus’ Baptism.

The main chronological reference is found in the Gospel of Luke. The beginning of John the Baptist’s ministry is attributed to the fifteenth year of the reign of the Roman Emperor Tiberius. Jesus’ Baptism occurred shortly after John’s ministry began.

The problem lies in how exactly to count the years of Tiberius’ reign.

His independent reign is usually counted from the death of Emperor Augustus in 14 AD. By this calculation, the fifteenth year of Tiberius falls between the second half of 28 and 29 AD.

A study by Andrew Steinmann, published in the Tyndale Bulletin in 2022, compares Roman, Jewish, and early Christian written sources, coins, and inscriptions. The author concludes that contemporaries counted Tiberius’ reign from 14 AD, and Jesus’ Baptism most likely occurred in 29 AD.

In scientific and theological literature, there are other calculations that date the beginning of the ministry to 28 AD or, when counting Tiberius’ co-regency with Augustus, to an even earlier period. But there is no exact historical basis specifically for the year 30.

If the Baptism occurred in 29 AD, the two-thousandth anniversary falls in 2029. To get 2030, one must assume a conditional date of Baptism in 30 AD.

Therefore, 2030 is not a proven historical date, but a convenient symbolic marker.

It allows for a clear four-year concept:

2030 — Baptism and the beginning of ministry;
2033 — crucifixion and Resurrection.

For an international pilgrimage campaign, such a scheme is convenient. For strict historical chronology, it remains controversial.

Conclusion

The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs has indeed begun preparations for the events of 2030, but Israel did not invent this anniversary.

The date appeared in the public domain no later than December 2022 as part of the Jordanian development project ‘Bethany Beyond the Jordan’. It was then supported by Catholic, Orthodox, and Anglican leaders of Jordan and Jerusalem. In May 2026, King Abdullah II turned the Baptism 2030 initiative into a state program.

Israel joined later when it became clear that Jordan intended to turn the eastern bank of the Jordan into a global center for Christian pilgrimage.

On the western bank, Israel has already invested 25 million shekels in the reconstruction of Qasr al-Yahud, created the position of a special envoy for relations with the Christian world, and is now forming a diplomatic infrastructure to work with churches and future pilgrims.

Therefore, behind the religious formulation are several processes: faith, historical memory, relations with the Christian world, restoration of Israel’s reputation, competition with Jordan, and the struggle for a huge international pilgrimage flow.

And the year 2030 itself remains primarily a symbolic, church-tourist, and politically convenient date, rather than an indisputably established two-thousandth anniversary of the Baptism of Jesus Christ.

…
Ex-goalkeeper of ‘Maccabi Haifa’ Georgy Ermakov married Alexandra Mikolyuk from ‘The Bachelor’: Israel appeared twice in the history of this couple - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

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Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

In his address on the 35th anniversary of independence, Volodymyr Zelensky linked the fates of specific Ukrainians with the production of long-range weapons and the refusal to give up Donbas. His words about ‘Flamingo’ missiles, possible Russian mobilization, and Putin’s mortality require separating the political signal from the confirmed fact.

Zelensky announced mass production of ‘Flamingo’ and the refusal to give up Donbas

Victoria Katsman

Kyiv, Ukraine — August 24, 2026. In the morning address on the occasion of the 35th anniversary of independence, Volodymyr Zelensky spoke not only about the front and armaments. In 21 minutes, he connected in one speech those freed from captivity, teachers, athletes, military personnel, Ukrainian missiles, strikes on Russian targets, and the demand for partners to stop waiting for the war to end on its own.

The address was delivered on the 1643rd day of the full-scale Russian invasion. This number is important not as a calendar formality: independence, which in 1991 was perceived as an accomplished political fact, is now confirmed daily by people, weapons production, the work of cities, and the decision not to agree to an imposed division of the country.

It is easy to extract three loud quotes from the speech — about ‘Flamingo’, Donbas, and Putin’s mortality. But then its internal structure disappears. Zelensky first showed the people for whom the state exists, then listed the tools of resistance, and only after that moved on to warnings to Russia and the outside world.

The teacher who went for the wounded

One of the central heroes of the address was 29-year-old Vladyslav Polishchuk, call sign ‘Teacher’, commander of the assault company of the 475th separate assault regiment CODE 9.2. Before the full-scale war, he taught in Zaporizhzhia, and in 2022 he voluntarily went to serve.

During one of the operations, two Ukrainian soldiers were wounded. Initially, they tried to evacuate them using an NRC — a ground robotic complex, that is, an unmanned platform capable of delivering ammunition or evacuating people. The robot was attacked by a Russian FPV drone — a small device controlled by the operator via video signal almost from the first person.

Then Polishchuk got into a pickup truck and went to the wounded himself. According to his story, in some sections, the car accelerated to about 160 kilometers per hour, and the entire operation took about 30–40 minutes. He believed that another 10–15 minutes of waiting could have cost the soldiers their lives.

On August 19, 2026, Vladyslav Polishchuk was awarded the title of Hero of Ukraine. Zelensky included this episode in the festive address not for military romance. The story shows that behind technological terms — robots, FPV drones, and evacuation means — there is still a person who has to make a decision after the equipment has stopped working.

Next to the military man in the speech appeared 18-year-old gymnast Taisia Onofriychuk. At the 2026 World Championship, she scored 30.700 points for her hoop exercise, ahead of Italian Sofia Raffaeli by two-tenths. For Ukraine, this became the first individual gold in the world championship in rhythmic gymnastics since Anna Rizatdinova’s victory in 2013.

The teacher behind the wheel of a pickup and the gymnast on the podium exist in completely different realities. But Zelensky deliberately put them in the same row: the state, according to his logic, is preserved not only by the front line. It continues to live when a person returns the wounded, when an athlete performs under the Ukrainian flag, and when a family meets a freed captive in their own yard.

What does the promise of mass ‘Flamingos’ mean

The most notable military part of the address was the statement about the FP-5 ‘Flamingo’ missile. Zelensky made it clear that it should no longer be about individual tests or rare applications, but about mass production and regular use of Ukrainian long-range weapons.

The FP-5 is described by the developer Fire Point as a Ukrainian ground-launched cruise missile with a declared range of up to 3000 kilometers. In open publications, its warhead mass is estimated at about one — 1.15 tons. These are characteristics declared by the manufacturer and presented in open materials; they do not yet mean that every parameter and every supposed combat application is independently confirmed.

A cruise missile flies most of its route in the atmosphere along a controlled trajectory. It differs from a ballistic one in the nature of the flight: a ballistic missile, after acceleration, travels a significant part of the way along a high arc and approaches the target at high speed, leaving the missile defense system very little time to react.

The speech mentioned Moscow, Tuapse, Tula, Ryazan, Omsk, and Olenya airbase. This list cannot be read as a statement that all the named targets have already been hit specifically by ‘Flamingo’ missiles. Zelensky was talking about the geography of Ukrainian strikes in general and that the new complex should expand the country’s capabilities.

He also divided strikes of medium depth and so-called deep strikes — operations on targets far beyond the front line. The first are primarily aimed at warehouses, headquarters, airfields, and logistics directly supporting Russian troops. The second allows impacting oil refineries, military industry, strategic aviation bases, and other targets deep in Russia.

In August, several Russian regions indeed reported queues at gas stations and restrictions on fuel sales. But it would be wrong to explain the entire deficit solely by Ukrainian attacks. The market was simultaneously influenced by damage and shutdowns of refineries, planned repairs, seasonal demand, transportation problems, and state price regulation.

This is where the line between a political statement and verifiable reality lies. Zelensky seeks to show that the war is returning to those who expected to watch it on TV. How massive the FP-5s will become and how sustainable their effectiveness will be will depend on serial production, components, navigation, the ability to overcome Russian air defenses, and the quality of intelligence data.

Why Donbas was again at the center of the speech

Zelensky once again ruled out the transfer of Donbas as a price for a ceasefire. For the Ukrainian authorities, this is not only a matter of territory. Agreeing to a forcible change of borders would mean recognizing the principle that a state with greater military resources can gain captured land in exchange for a temporary pause.

For the Israeli reader, it is important not to mechanically transfer the Ukrainian situation to the Middle East. Geography, conflict history, international agreements, and military capabilities differ. However, the very dispute about what happens after rewarding aggression is well known to a society that constantly evaluates the cost of deterrence and the consequences of an unfinished war.

Zelensky did not present a new peace plan or name a date for the end of hostilities. His position was already: Ukraine should not agree to conditions that would allow Russia to restore its forces, consolidate the occupation, and return to war later.

Search queries ‘what did Zelensky say on August 24, 2026’, ‘what is the ‘Flamingo’ missile’, and ‘will Russia announce a new mobilization’ often appear together, although they require different answers. The first is confirmed by the full text of the address, the second by open technical data with a mandatory caveat about their origin, and the third remains a forecast by the Ukrainian president, not a published decision by the Russian authorities.

‘Russia wants mobilization’ — an assessment, not an announced decree

Zelensky stated that Russia is not striving for real peace and is preparing for further mobilization. In this form, it is an assessment by the Ukrainian side, based on the ongoing recruitment of military personnel, losses of the Russian army, and the absence of signs of the Kremlin abandoning maximalist goals.

At the time of the address, there was no official announcement of a new general mobilization in Russia. Therefore, the wording cannot be turned into an already accomplished fact. The political meaning of the statement is different: Kyiv warns partners that a pause without guarantees and pressure can be used by Russia to replenish units and launch a new offensive.

The phrase ‘Putin is mortal’ is also not a message about the health of the Russian president and does not contain a prediction of his death. It is a political metaphor: rulers and the regimes they create are not eternal, while the state and society must count on a longer historical distance.

This argument is addressed simultaneously to Ukrainians, the Kremlin, and Western capitals. Ukrainians are offered to evaluate resistance not only by the position of the front in a particular week. Partners are reminded that trying to adapt the entire European security system to the desires of one Russian leader cannot be a long-term solution.

Controversial line about Dnipropetrovsk region

In some early textual transcripts of the address, there was a phrase about the complete liberation of the Dnipropetrovsk region. In the current official text of the speech, this line is absent. Therefore, it cannot be asserted that it is part of the final version of the presidential speech.

Two days before Independence Day, Zelensky said that about ten square kilometers and three small settlements remained under Russian control in the region. Even this assessment needs careful reading: the line of combat contact changes, and the concepts of ‘cleared’, ‘liberated’, and ‘under stable control’ do not always describe the same military situation.

For a journalistic text, this is not a minor editorial detail. Between ‘almost liberated’ and ‘completely liberated’ lies the fate of specific villages, the positions of units, and the safety of people who may remain near the fighting. That is why the later official version of the document is more important than the most striking early quote.

‘Shaheds’, interceptors, and a debate familiar to Israel about the cost of protection

Zelensky separately spoke about the development of Ukrainian interceptor drones. He cited a figure of more than 90% of ‘Shaheds’ destroyed, but it should be perceived as the president’s declared assessment, not as the unchanging effectiveness of Ukrainian air defense in all attacks and in all directions.

‘Shaheds’ in Ukraine refer to Iranian-developed strike drones, the Russian localized versions of which received the designation ‘Geran’. Russia changes their design, communication channels, altitude, and tactics of use. Simultaneously, reactive strike devices and complexes like the S8000 ‘Banderol’ appear, while ballistic missiles remain a separate, significantly more complex threat.

For readers of NANews — News of Israel, this part of the address is especially understandable. Israel also faces combined attacks, where cheap drones can be launched together with cruise and ballistic missiles, forcing the defense to simultaneously track targets with different speeds and trajectories.

The main problem here is not reduced to the interception percentage. If the attacking side can massively launch relatively cheap devices, and the defender is forced to respond with expensive missiles, an economic war of attrition arises. Therefore, Ukraine is developing cheaper interceptor drones, mobile fire groups, electronic warfare means, and its own long-range systems.

The Ukrainian and Israeli experiences cannot be declared identical, but there is a real technological connection between the theaters of war. Iran transferred the original Shahed platform to Russia, the Russian army refined it under conditions of large-scale use, and the accumulated experience can return to Iranian structures.

On the pages of NANews — News of Israel, we have already analyzed this connection in the article ‘Iran and Russia: How the War in Ukraine Became a Testing Ground for Future War Against Israel and the USA’. Zelensky’s new address adds another layer to this topic: the defending country is trying not only to shoot down aerial targets but also to deprive the enemy of the ability to endlessly produce and launch them.

Decisions by the US and European countries to release missiles, air defense systems, and ammunition therefore affect several regions at once. The same shortage of production capacities is felt by both Ukraine, repelling daily Russian attacks, and Israel, which needs to maintain a reserve of means to counter Iran and its allies.

Why I read this speech through the fates of people

I am originally from Ukraine and belong to the Jewish diaspora. For me, the connection between Ukrainian and Israeli reality does not pass through convenient political analogies, but through families, languages, memory, concern for people, and understanding of how quickly the words ‘distant war’ cease to correspond to reality.

I am not a military expert and cannot determine the real characteristics of a missile or the state of a specific position from open video. Therefore, in this material, I compared the official text of the address, the message about the awarding of Vladyslav Polishchuk, the open results of the World Rhythmic Gymnastics Championship, statements about the situation in the Dnipropetrovsk region, and published data on the FP-5. Where there is only a statement by the president or manufacturer, I maintain this boundary and do not present it as an independently established fact.

I think something else is important. The festive speech could have been constructed as a set of slogans about inevitable victory. Instead, its framework was people forced to act in circumstances where guaranteed salvation does not exist: a teacher goes for the wounded after the robot is defeated, an athlete steps onto the international podium, and engineers try to turn a single product into a series.

It is this human layer that cannot be replaced by a list of weapons. Without it, ‘Flamingo’, interceptor drones, and long-range strikes turn into a catalog of equipment, although their political meaning is determined by whether they will give people time — to evacuate the wounded, take cover during an alarm, save a city, and not accept the loss of their land as a final verdict.

…

I did not hear in this address a promise of an easy finale. Zelensky spoke about mass production of weapons precisely because the war does not end with a beautiful formula, and Russia does not show readiness to abandon the captured territories and the use of force.

The words that Ukraine will not fall in this speech are not based on optimism or Putin’s biology. They are based on the country’s ability to survive a specific day: produce an interceptor, find parts for a missile, return a person from captivity, evacuate two wounded, and not erase from the official language the difference between ‘almost’ and ‘completely’.

For me, this is the main meaning of the 35th Independence Day of Ukraine. Independence has ceased to be only a date, a border, or a state document. It has become a daily, costly, and very human work that cannot be done once and considered finished.

…
Ex-goalkeeper of ‘Maccabi Haifa’ Georgy Ermakov married Alexandra Mikolyuk from ‘The Bachelor’: Israel appeared twice in the history of this couple - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

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Yair Lapid on Ukraine: ‘Russia is an ally of Iran’ and ‘if we return to power, we will do much more than we did then’ - September 20, 2026 - Новости Израиля

On August 23, 2026, the CEO of JNF-KKL Eurasia, Igal Yasinov, recorded a congratulatory message in Ukrainian to Ukraine from the ‘Ukraine’ forest in Israel’s Negev. I checked the history of this place—from the Odessa Grove of 2014 and Petro Poroshenko’s olive tree to the memorial stele, fires near Dorot, and the old Google Maps point by which the Ukrainian section can be searched today.

Author of NANews – Israel News: Pavel Shveyko

On August 23, 2026, on the eve of Ukraine’s Independence Day, the CEO of JNF-KKL Eurasia, Igal Yasinov, recorded an address to Ukrainians from the ‘Ukraine’ forest in the Negev. At first glance, it’s a few minutes of festive video. But the place chosen for the recording changes the meaning of the address: Yasinov stands among the trees of a project he was involved in more than ten years ago. The official website of JNF-KKL Eurasia still lists his position as the organization’s CEO.

“Look around, trees grow slowly, but they withstand storms.

This is exactly how Israel is. This is exactly how Ukraine is. This is exactly how people are, who continue to build the future even under shelling.

Today I congratulate the worthy Kharkiv, I congratulate Ukraine on Independence Day. I greet everyone who believes in freedom more strongly than the enemies believe in their weapons.

Eternal memory to those who gave their lives for freedom. Glory to the heroes defending Ukraine today. Glory to the heroes defending Israel today. Glory to Ukraine and glory to Israel.

Peace to our countries. And may the day come when our children know the sound of the wind in the trees better than the sound of sirens.

Friends, we are united. Victory to us!”

JNF-KKL is the Jewish National Fund, in Hebrew קרן קיימת לישראל, Keren Kayemet Le-Israel. The organization has existed since 1901; today its areas include forests and the environment, water, land development, education, tourism, and research projects. Therefore, the word ‘forest’ in this story is not a conditional name for a monument: it is indeed about a KKL project within the Dorot forest massif in the Sha’ar HaNegev Regional Council. KKL itself has called it both יער אוקראינה-דורות — ‘Ukraine-Dorot Forest’ and ‘Ukraine Grove’ within the Dorot forest at different times.

I was born and raised in Ukraine, and Israel became my new home.

Therefore, for NANews — Israel News, I decided not to limit myself to retelling the congratulation. I compared the transcript of the current video with KKL materials from 2015, 2017, and 2018, the ‘Ukrainians in Israel’ page about the planting on April 6, 2016, publications of the World Odessa Club about the events of 2014, and reports from Israeli media about the fires in the Dorot forest.

The biography of Yasinov himself also turned out to be part of this story: Kharkiv in his address is not a Ukrainian city chosen by an editor, but the place of his birth.

It is in such a comparison that details are discovered that are not in the short congratulation. For example, in December 2015, KKL planned to transfer the presidential olive tree to the Ukrainian forest for the upcoming Tu BiShvat, but the documented planting took place only on April 6, 2016. And the official KKL material from 2018 again tells about the transfer of one of the olives to Dorot. This is no longer a smooth anniversary chronicle, but a story where documents from different years have to be read side by side.

Why August 23 turned out to be no less important for a native of Kharkiv than the 24th

Yasinov’s address does not start with Kyiv or even Independence Day. He talks about Kharkiv: the city where he was born, where liberation from Nazi occupation was once celebrated, and which during the current war lives again under sirens and explosions. In the video transcript, it sounds: ‘August 23 for Kharkiv is not just a date.’ After this, Yasinov talks about the ability of Kharkiv residents to withstand ‘then’ and ‘now’.

The Israeli reader needs context here. August 23 in Kharkiv traditionally marks City Day and the day of liberation from Nazi occupation in 1943. Ukrainian official regional sources continue to associate this date with both events. At the same time, there is a separate historical discussion around the wording ‘liberation on August 23’: the fighting around the city did not end in one moment, so today Ukrainian historians discuss how accurately the Soviet calendar formula describes what happened on the ground. For Yasinov’s speech, something else is more important: for a person of his generation, this date has been part of Kharkiv’s memory for decades.

And on August 24, 1991, the Verkhovna Rada of the Ukrainian SSR adopted the Act of Declaration of Independence of Ukraine. This is not analogous to Israel’s Yom Ha’atzmaut in calendar logic—the two countries have completely different historical trajectories—but for an Israeli, the function of the holiday is clear: it is the main state day of modern Ukraine. In 2026, it marks 35 years since the adoption of the Act.

Therefore, the sequence in the address is not accidental: on August 23, Yasinov remembers his city, and then talks about the state. ‘And the next day Ukraine will celebrate Independence Day,’ he continues. In his speech, the holiday is immediately associated not with a parade or official protocol, but with the price of freedom during the war.

Former Knesset member from Kharkiv: who is Igal Yasinov

Igal Yasinov was born on April 27, 1966, in Kharkiv, then part of the Ukrainian SSR, and repatriated to Israel in 1993 from independent Ukraine. He is now 60 years old. In the current video, he says he has lived in Israel, ‘in Holy Jerusalem,’ for more than 33 years, and draws a personal conclusion from this: Kharkiv and Jerusalem are closer to each other today than they seem on the map.

Before his current work at KKL, Yasinov went through Israeli parliamentary politics. In the elections on January 28, 2003, the secular party ‘Shinui’ received 15 mandates; Yasinov was fifteenth on its list and entered the 16th Knesset. For a reader who does not remember the political map of Israel in the early 2000s: ‘Shinui’ was a secular middle-class party that advocated, among other things, for limiting religious pressure on civil life. Yasinov himself spoke about ecology, student rights, reservists, and workers’ rights in interviews before the elections.

In the Knesset, he also dealt with aliyah issues. Here the word aliyah means the repatriation of Jews to Israel based on the Law of Return. On the current official KKL page, among Yasinov’s previous positions, chairmanship in the structure supporting scientist-repatriates is indicated; he was also part of the leadership of the organization of teacher-repatriates. Therefore, working with immigrants from the former USSR appeared in his biography long before his current position at JNF-KKL Eurasia.

His political career ended quite unusually. On February 1, 2006, Yasinov left ‘Shinui’ and created the ‘Ha-Olim’ faction—the name can be translated as ‘Repatriates’. During the same period, it merged into the ‘National Unity — Our Home Israel’ bloc, after which ‘Our Home Israel’ separated into an independent parliamentary faction. The official Knesset database maintains this sequence by dates.

After parliamentary politics, his work became increasingly connected with KKL. Over the years, he held leadership positions in the fund, and today the official structure of JNF-KKL Eurasia calls him the CEO. Therefore, the phrase from the current video ‘I had the honor of leading its creation’ about the ‘Ukraine’ forest, I decided to verify not as a beautiful memory of a former politician, but by the documents of the time itself.

From the Odessa Grove to 1200 dunams: how the Ukrainian forest appeared in the Negev

The first trace leads to April 2014, and this is important: the official ‘Ukraine Forest’ project took shape later, but Ukrainian trees appeared in this place earlier. On April 23, during the international OdessAviv festival, the creation of the Odessa Grove began in the north of the Negev, designed for about a thousand trees. Publications of the World Odessa Club and ‘Evening Odessa’ of that time directly call it the beginning of the future Ukrainian forest.

It is here that a direct connection with Yasinov appears.

The World Odessa Club wrote that the decision to lay the Ukraine forest was made at the initiative of the former Kharkiv resident Igal Yasinov, who headed the relevant direction of the fund, and the Odessa Grove became the first stage. The head of the Israeli branch of the club, documentary filmmaker Boris Sobolev, insisted on the grove project and, according to the club itself and the Odessa press, paid for the planting of a thousand trees. This allows us to draw an important line: Sobolev’s funding of the Odessa Grove is documented, but I found no basis to attribute to him the funding of the entire future ‘Ukraine Forest’.

The first olive tree was planted in honor of Mikhail Zhvanetsky. The ceremony was attended by Yasinov, Sobolev, and a representative of the World Odessa Club, Arkady Kreimer; there also appeared a tree on behalf of Odessa and a tree in memory of Boris Litvak, an Odessa philanthropist, creator of the famous Children’s Rehabilitation Center ‘House with an Angel’. In one of the reports of that time, an almost everyday detail was preserved: when Yasinov was asked what connection he himself had to Odessa, he replied that his grandmother Sofia Mostovaya was an opera singer there.

Why Odessa became the first city within the Ukrainian project is explained not only by the activity of the modern Odessa community. In today’s video, Yasinov also mentions two other people. In Odessa, Yona Krementsky was born, elected as the first head of KKL after the fund’s creation in 1901; KKL writes that he led it until 1907 and was one of the people who turned the idea of a national fund into a practical organization.

There, too, was born Ze’ev Jabotinsky, one of the most influential Zionist leaders of the 20th century, founder of Revisionist Zionism and the BETAR movement. For the Israeli reader, Jabotinsky is well known from the streets, parks, and political history of the country; the connection of the first head of KKL with Odessa is much less known.

But it is important not to confuse causes and later explanations. Sources from 2014 show the direct role of the World Odessa Club and Sobolev in the appearance of the grove. The historical link with Krementsky and Jabotinsky is real, but I did not find a 2014 document in which it is named as the reason for the choice of name. In the current address, Yasinov adds this historical layer twelve years later.

In December 2015, the scale becomes different.

The official JNF-KKL already writes about the ‘Ukraine Forest’ with an area of 1200 dunams in the Sha’ar HaNegev Regional Council. For an Israeli, a dunam is a familiar unit of area; 1200 dunams correspond to about 120 hectares, and it was the figure of 120 hectares that Ukrainian reports on the project cited. In publications from the Ukrainian side of those years, it was called the first forest in Israel dedicated to another state.

On December 22, 2015, the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko planted an olive tree during an official visit in the Grove of Nations of the Jerusalem Forest. This is another object, in Jerusalem, and should not be confused with Dorot. At the same time, Poroshenko planted an additional seedling in a special vessel; the official KKL reported that later the Ukrainian ambassador Gennady Nadolenko was to plant it in the יער אוקראינה-דורות, the ‘Ukraine-Dorot’ forest in Sha’ar HaNegev.

Here begins the first small mystery of chronology.

KKL in December 2015 wrote that Nadolenko would plant this seedling on the nearest Tu BiShvat—the Jewish New Year of Trees, when plantings are traditionally held in Israel. However, the source ‘Ukrainians in Israel‘ records the ceremony only on April 6, 2016. Tu BiShvat had already passed by that time. This means the original calendar changed, although the reasons for the postponement are not explained in the available publications.

On April 6, Nadolenko transplanted the presidential olive into the ground, and the staff of the Ukrainian embassy planted the first seedlings nearby, which became part of the ‘Ukraine Forest’. Yasinov then reported that by Ukraine’s Independence Day, it was planned to install a board with the forest’s name. A small post already stood at the presidential tree, which they planned to mark on Google Maps so that, as Yasinov said, anyone could find ‘a piece of Ukraine on Israeli soil’.

It turns out to be a rare opportunity to see the project not in hindsight. In 2014, participants only talked about the future Ukrainian forest. In December 2015, KKL already names the area and official location. In April 2016, embassy staff indeed stand there with seedlings, and Yasinov promises to put the name on the map. In August 2026, he is again among these trees—only now they do not need to be imagined as a plan.

Poroshenko’s olive, the Ukrainian language, and the fire in Dorot: the story after the first planting

The Ukrainian line of KKL continued beyond Dorot. On May 15, 2017, Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman planted an olive tree in the Grove of Nations in Jerusalem. Yasinov led the ceremony and separately explained why it was held in Ukrainian: KKL wanted to show respect for the Ukrainian state and remind of the first head of the fund, Yona Krementsky, born in Odessa. This is an important detail—the Ukrainian language was used by KKL in an official ceremony long before the current congratulation.

The next documented date of the forest itself is October 29, 2018. The official JNF-KKL reported a ceremony in southern Israel in the Dorot forest and for the first time clearly formulated the project’s structure: ‘part of the Dorot forest massif is a specially planted grove bearing the name of Ukraine’. Therefore, arguing whether this is a ‘forest’ or a ‘grove’ is essentially pointless. The name ‘Ukraine Forest’ became attached to the project, and territorially the Ukrainian memorial part is located within the larger Dorot forest.

On that day, a memorial stele was unveiled at the site of the established olive tree associated with Poroshenko’s visit. Ambassador Gennady Nadolenko, staff of the Ukrainian embassy, representatives of KKL, the public, and the media were present. And here appears the second discrepancy between archival texts, which I would not cover up for the sake of a beautiful chronology.

The 2016 source directly states that Nadolenko already transplanted Poroshenko’s olive into the ground on April 6, 2016. KKL in the 2018 material formulates the story differently: it was decided to transplant one of the two olive trees planted by the president in Jerusalem in 2015 into the Ukrainian grove, after which it talks about the stele at the site where the tree took root. From the available texts, it is unclear whether it was about a second relocation of the tree within the project, about the other of the two olives, or just an inaccurate retrospective formulation by KKL. Therefore, the two dates—2016 and 2018—are better left as two documented stages, rather than inventing a missing explanation between them.

Another phrase from the current address also had to be checked separately. Yasinov says: ‘This forest also came under fire, but it withstood and continues to grow’. I did not find reliable confirmation of a direct rocket hit specifically in the Ukrainian grove after October 7, 2023, so such a conclusion cannot be made on behalf of the editorial office.

But the Dorot forest did indeed burn as a result of attacks from the Gaza Strip. In July 2018, Israeli media reported fires caused by incendiary balloons and kites; on July 30-31, a fire broke out in the Dorot Forest in the Sha’ar HaNegev Regional Council. The fires were extinguished by firefighters, KKL staff, and aviation. Thus, a forest massif affected by attacks, of which the Ukrainian grove is a part, is documented; a separate hit directly on the Ukrainian stele or presidential olive is not documented.

For NANews — Israel News, this distinction is fundamental. The speaker’s phrase remains part of his address, while the fact we verified has narrower boundaries. As soon as these two things are mixed, the symbolic story begins to replace the documentary one.

Where the ‘Ukraine’ forest is located and how to find the Ukrainian grove yourself

The most practical part of this story has been preserved thanks to publications from April 2016. When Yasinov said that Poroshenko’s tree would appear on Google Maps, the Ukrainian embassy indeed provided a link to a point near the Ukrainian section. The old ZN UA publication preserved the message about the link itself; the coordinates of the historical point are 31.5215, 34.6711.

Here it is on Google Maps – https://maps.app.goo.gl/cTrRY59ii1andyEQ7

You should orient yourself to Dorot Forest — יער דורות, in the Sha’ar HaNegev Regional Council — מועצה אזורית שער הנגב, near Kibbutz Dorot. A regional council is an Israeli form of local government that unites several small settlements, mainly kibbutzim and moshavim; it is not a separate city. The area is located in the western part of the northern Negev, near Sderot and the Gaza Strip.

If the navigator does not understand ‘Ukraine forest in Israel’, it does not mean the object has disappeared. We tried searching for יער אוקראינה-דורות, then יער דורות, and for the memorial point itself, we entered the coordinates 31.5215, 34.6711. The last option is more reliable than the old name because small groves and memorial sites of KKL are not always displayed the same way in Google Maps and Waze.

That is why queries like ‘where is the Ukraine forest in Israel’, ‘Ukraine Dorot forest’, ‘how to get to the Ukraine forest in the Negev’, and the Hebrew יער אוקראינה-דורות can lead to materials that at first glance contradict each other. On the KKL 2015 page, the name ‘Ukraine-Dorot Forest’ appears, in 2016 Ukrainian sources simply talk about the ‘Ukraine Forest’, and in 2018 KKL itself clarifies that it is a Ukrainian grove within the Dorot forest massif. This is one location with historically formed name variants, not three different Ukrainian forests.

For a car trip, it is more reasonable to first build a route to Dorot / יער דורות, and the last kilometers — already to the historical point of the Ukrainian section. The area is connected to the regional road 334, passing near Dorot. We would not promise that an ordinary passenger car can always drive right up to the stele: we did not find a separate modern KKL tourist page describing the approach specifically to the Ukrainian grove.

We also checked the current KKL page with warnings for travelers on August 23, 2026. It lists a number of closures and restrictions in the southern forests, but there is no separate notification of the Dorot forest closure at the time of verification. This should still not be perceived as an indefinite guarantee: Sha’ar HaNegev is located near the Gaza Strip, so before the trip, it is necessary to recheck KKL messages and current Home Front Command instructions.

‘Kharkiv and Jerusalem are closer than they appear on the map’: what remained behind the festive congratulation

The most political part of the three-minute video begins after the personal story. Yasinov says that Ukrainians and Israelis know what an air raid alert is, waiting for news from loved ones on the front, night explosions, and the need to lead children to shelter. For an Israeli, this experience does not need to be translated into the language of abstractions: it is about the same minutes when the family goes to the mamad—a protected room in the apartment—or to a public shelter.

Then he says: ‘The same Iranian and Russian weapons in the hands of terrorists bring death’. After it, Yasinov puts Kharkiv, Jerusalem, Kyiv, Be’er Sheva, Sumy, and Tel Aviv in one row.

But the connection itself did not come out of nowhere. Russia and Iran have become military partners over the years of wars, and since 2022, Ukraine regularly faces Iranian-origin strike drones used by Russian forces. Israel, for its part, directly encounters Iranian weapons, technologies, and Tehran-supported armed structures. That Yasinov connects these two realities in one address is already the political content of the congratulation, which is lost if only the phrase ‘congratulated Ukrainians on the holiday’ is left from the video.

Equally important is where these words are spoken from.

Yasinov did not just come to a Ukrainian KKL event. In 2014, his name appears near the Odessa Grove and the idea of the future Ukrainian forest. In 2015, he participates in Poroshenko’s ceremony. In 2016, he explains how to find the new section on Google. In 2017, he conducts a ceremony with Prime Minister Groysman in Ukrainian. In 2026, he returns to this same plot already as the CEO of JNF-KKL Eurasia. This is a sequence that cannot be seen in the shortest video.

At the end of the address, Yasinov talks about trees: they grow slowly, withstand storms, and continue to grow. Then he wishes that children someday know the sound of the wind in the trees better than the sound of sirens.

After checking the archives, this phrase is perceived not as an independent metaphor. The first trees of the Odessa Grove were planted in April 2014; the official history of the large Ukrainian project continued in 2015-2016; in 2018, a stele appeared near the olive, and the Dorot forest in the same period indeed burned after incendiary attacks from Gaza. Therefore, the address on August 23, 2026, can be dated to one day, but the history of the place from which it was recorded is already more than twelve years.

Here is the ‘Ukraine’ forest on Google Maps – https://maps.app.goo.gl/cTrRY59ii1andyEQ7

…
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On June 28, 2026, a recording of the meeting of the project “Understanding Israel“, dedicated to religious movements and sectors in Israel, was released on the World Israel Beytenu channel.

It was not a dry lecture about terms.

The conversation between Sophie Ron-Moria and Levi Tabachnikov was an attempt to explain why it is impossible to truly understand modern Israel without understanding its internal religious and social groups: its politics, army, education, conflicts, elections, culture, and daily life.

The guest of the episode was Sophie Ron-Moria — a lawyer, journalist, publicist, writer, columnist for “Maariv”, and participant in discussions on Channel 9. In the conversation, she was presented as a representative of the national-religious environment, that is, religious Zionism — the sector often called “knitted kippahs” or dati-leumi in Israel.

The host of the meeting was Levi Tabachnikov. He defined the topic as part of the “Understanding Israel” series of meetings of the “Beytenu Olami” project, where various specialists and residents of the country help to understand how Israeli society, the state of Israel, and Jewish life within it are structured. Levi Tabachnikov is a reserve officer of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), a public and political figure. An immigrant from Donetsk (Ukraine), he is actively engaged in volunteer, human rights, and informational activities.

We recommend watching this video in full here it is – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZwmcFy1nQ8: the conversation turned out to be important for understanding how Israel is structured from the inside today — through religion, army, education, work, benefits, and the issue of collective responsibility after October 7.

For those who prefer reading, NANews — Israel News Nikk.Agency prepared extracts from the broadcast: we collected theses, figures, and fragments of the conversation that seemed most important and interesting for understanding the future of the Jewish democratic state.

The main conflict: not only security anymore, but the structure of the state

At the beginning of the conversation, Levi Tabachnikov set the framework: even if we exclude the Arab-Israeli conflict, relations with Muslim countries, and the Palestinian issue, there is a deep polarization felt within the Jewish society of Israel today.

According to him, it is not just about political disagreements, but about different ideas of what Israel should be.

Sophie Ron-Moria responded that over the past 10–15 years, especially after October 7, Israeli society has noticeably shifted to the right. The question of the future of Judea and Samaria, in her assessment, is largely in consensus today: most Israelis oppose territorial concessions.

That is why, according to her, the line of the main internal confrontation has changed.

If earlier the political debate often revolved around the question of creating a Palestinian state between the Jordan and the Mediterranean, now, when the majority does not support such an idea, the focus has shifted to something else: what the state of Israel itself should be.

It is about religion and the state, the status of different groups within Jewish society, military service, the education system, work, taxes, rights, and obligations.

Sophie Ron-Moria formulated her personal position very strictly: as a religious Jew since the age of 17, she is categorically against the creation of a religious state in Israel.

She emphasized that precisely as a religious person, she fears theocratic models and wants to do everything possible to prevent Israel from going down this path.

According to her, the current debate is about whether the Jewish state should develop according to the Western democratic model or move towards theocracy. At the same time, she reminded that modern theocratic states today mainly exist in the East and are Muslim.

She separately noted that in recent months the confrontation has especially intensified due to the issue of drafting ultra-Orthodox into the army.

Who is who: secular, traditional, religious Zionists, and Haredim

The conversation highlighted the main groups of Jewish society in Israel: secular, traditional Jews — masortim, national-religious or religious Zionists — dati-leumi, “knitted kippahs”, and ultra-Orthodox — Haredim.

Sophie Ron-Moria immediately clarified an important thing: “knitted kippahs”, religious Zionists, and dati-leumi are the same main group, although there are subgroups and significant differences within it.

To explain, she used an image from her book “Left, Right, Where’s the Side”. In the book, she says, there are chapters on key Israeli conflicts: judicial reform, right and left, ultra-Orthodox, gender segregation, military service, and the internal gradation of religious groups.

One of the chapters is called “Cats and Tigers”.

The meaning of this metaphor is simple: all tigers belong to the cat family, but not all cats are tigers.

Similarly, according to Sophie Ron-Moria, all Haredim are Orthodox, but not all Orthodox Jews are Haredim.

This is an important distinction because in Israeli politics and public discourse, different groups are often deliberately mixed, saying that all religious Jews are the same. Sophie Ron-Moria emphasized the opposite: religious Jews are different, and there is nothing unusual about that.

Haredim: not an ancient norm, but a 19th-century reaction

One of the central theses of the conversation concerned the origin of the Haredim.

Sophie Ron-Moria opposed the widespread notion that the ultra-Orthodox way of life existed in its current form always, almost since the time of Mount Sinai.

According to her, Haredim in the current understanding is a relatively new phenomenon in terms of Jewish history. Its beginning is associated with the 19th century and the reaction to the emancipation of Jews in Europe, the Napoleonic era, the opportunity for Jews to enter European society, receive education, professions, and attend universities.

Against this backdrop, the Haskalah movement — Jewish Enlightenment — emerged. And the reaction to it was radicalization in the opposite direction.

Sophie Ron-Moria even called the Haredim “reformists” — but not in the sense of a movement to ease religious practice, but as a reform towards a sharp tightening. In her formulation, if Reform Judaism moved towards easing, then Haredim is a reform towards adding prohibitions and restrictions.

She estimated the age of this phenomenon at about 150–200 years, emphasizing that Haskalah and Reform Judaism are even slightly older than the modern ultra-Orthodox movement.

She separately spoke about the radicalization of appearance and norms of modesty.

According to her, Italian Jewish women of the Renaissance looked much like their neighbors in Rome, Verona, and Florence: the wives of wealthy townspeople wore headgear but did not completely cover their hair and could wear open dresses with décolleté.

She also noted that in early 20th-century photographs, the wives of Chabad and Lithuanian rabbis looked very different from modern Haredi women: they wore wide-brimmed hats from under which real hair was visible. Men trimmed their beards short and wore light suits.

In her estimation, the sharp radicalization of appearance and everyday norms began after World War II.

Haredim numbers: how many there are, how they are divided, and where they live

The conversation included an estimate: today in Israel there are about 1,250,000 Haredim, that is, about one and a quarter million.

Moreover, more than 50% of Haredim are under 19 years old.

The reason is high birth rates. The conversation mentioned an estimate of about 6 children per woman.

Within the Haredi sector, Sophie Ron-Moria identified several main groups.

The Lithuanian direction — Litvaks, or Litai — about 29–32%.

Hasidim — about 30–35%.

Eastern, Sephardic Haredim — about 33–35%.

Chabad stands separately. According to Sophie Ron-Moria, Chabadniks are very visible, especially in public spaces, but in Israel, they are about 6%. In the diaspora, they are more noticeable and numerous.

There are also Haredim modernim, or “Haredim light” — about 11%. These are ultra-Orthodox who receive a matriculation certificate, go to study, sometimes serve in the army. Special Haredi military yeshivas already exist for them. The conversation mentioned that this group is close to Modern Orthodox in the USA, and some of these people are immigrants from Europe and the United States, accustomed to a different lifestyle.

The geography of Haredim in Israel was described separately.

In Jerusalem, according to the estimate mentioned, there are almost 300,000 Haredim.

Bnei Brak was named an almost entirely Haredi city.

Beit Shemesh — about 90,000 Haredim.

Modiin Illit — about 76,000.

Beitar Illit near Gush Etzion — about 59,000.

The conversation also mentioned Elad, Ashdod with about 57,000 Haredim, as well as Arad, Petah Tikva, Haifa, and Rehovot, where there are also noticeable Haredi groups.

Why Haredim conflict with Zionism

Levi Tabachnikov asked directly: is there a contradiction between Zionism and the Haredi worldview, and is the conflict between a Zionist Jew and an ultra-Orthodox Jew new?

Sophie Ron-Moria answered: the conflict is not new.

According to her, since the beginning of the Zionist movement, the ultra-Orthodox direction had theological objections to the creation of a Jewish state before the coming of the Messiah.

She referred to the so-called “three oaths” from the Ketubot tractate: “not to ascend ‘as a wall’ to the land of Israel”, “not to overly conflict with the nations of the world”, and “not to hasten the coming of the Messiah”. In the Haredi interpretation, these oaths conflict with Zionism.

This position, according to her, is shared by both Hasidim and Litvaks.

However, the leaders of Agudat Israel signed the Declaration of Independence of Israel. But, as Sophie Ron-Moria explained, they recognized the state more de facto than de jure: not as something that should have been created initially, but as a fact that already exists.

From this, according to her, grows the theological explanation for the refusal to serve in the army.

Sophie Ron-Moria reminded that Maimonides has categories of commanded wars. Among them are the war for the land of Israel and a defensive war. From the perspective of religious Zionists, these categories are relevant today because Israel is waging precisely such wars.

But Haredim, according to her explanation, claim otherwise: since the state of Israel, in their opinion, should not have been created before the coming of the Messiah, the wars of the state of Israel are not commanded wars for them.

She also emphasized an important symbolic point: in most ultra-Orthodox synagogues worldwide, prayers are said for the welfare of the countries where these communities live, and often for the welfare of the state of Israel. But in Israel, according to her, the prayer for the welfare of the state of Israel is recited only in the synagogues of “knitted kippahs”, that is, religious Zionists.

It’s not just Neturei Karta: what Sophie Ron-Moria said about the Haredi mainstream

The conversation separately mentioned that skepticism towards the state of Israel is not only the position of the radical group Neturei Karta.

Sophie Ron-Moria said that external observers are often tried to be explained: there are, they say, a few hundred Neturei Karta families, they do not take money from the state, and they express extreme anti-Zionism. But, according to her, the problem is broader.

She gave the example of the “Chinuch Haredi Atzmai” system — independent Haredi education, independent primarily from the state. According to her, this system maintains precisely the approach to the state that she described.

As an example, she told the story of an acquaintance who worked as an inspector at Ministry of Education exams. In the SHAS system schools, which she called less extreme than Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox schools, they sometimes take Ministry of Education exams and receive a partial matriculation certificate.

But before handing out the exam booklets to the children, the administration covered the emblem of Israel with special stickers so that the students would not see it. After submitting the works, the stickers were removed and the booklets were sent back to the ministry.

Sophie Ron-Moria called it absurd that such an education system is funded by the state of Israel.

Working Haredim: why their own mainstream doesn’t like them

A separate part of the conversation was devoted to “Haredim light” and working ultra-Orthodox.

Sophie Ron-Moria said that Haredim modernim are in many ways similar to Modern Orthodox in the USA. They can receive education, work, sometimes serve in the army. But the Haredi mainstream, according to her, treats them harshly and does not like them.

She explained this by saying that the two main ultra-Orthodox parties — SHAS and Yahadut HaTorah — actually represent the interests of non-working ultra-Orthodox.

A working Haredi, according to her, is often considered a second-class community member. He has no full political representation and is even considered less attractive on the marriage market.

In the early 21st century, there was an attempt to create the TOV party — a party of working ultra-Orthodox. It started at the municipal level, but, according to Sophie Ron-Moria, the SHAS party quickly showed it its place and effectively destroyed this project.

She also recalled the Poalei Agudat Israel movement, created in 1922. It was a working Haredi, but at the same time Zionist direction. It existed until the 1980s and then practically disappeared.

Money, army, and the state treasury: where Sophie Ron-Moria sees the solution

One of the questions from the comments concerned a possible plan for regulating relations between the state of Israel and the ultra-Orthodox sector.

Sophie Ron-Moria said that throughout her life in Israel, she waited for Israelis to wake up and start solving this problem. She arrived in Israel in 1989 and called the current moment almost “the coming of the Messiah” in the sense that society is finally beginning to see the problem.

Her solution was formulated simply: stop funding the ultra-Orthodox anti-state education system and the system that encourages adult men not to work and not to serve in the army.

She gave the example of a middle-class reservist with a small child.

According to her, such a reservist, who serves, works, and earns about 15,000 shekels net, may pay about 4,000 shekels a month for daycare.

His ultra-Orthodox peer, who never served in the army, may pay about 400 shekels for the same daycare — 10 times less — thanks to a special discount.

Sophie Ron-Moria emphasized that such a discount in a similar form exists for families where both parents work. But when one of the parents does not work and is considered an “eternal student”, such a benefit effectively exists only for the ultra-Orthodox.

She also said that in total, an ultra-Orthodox family receives about 5,000 shekels a month from the state through various mechanisms: scholarships, discounts, food vouchers, preferential housing acquisition, and other forms of support.

In her opinion, the state of Israel in this situation “shoots itself in the foot”: instead of encouraging those who serve in the army and replenish the treasury, it encourages those who do not serve and do not replenish the budget.

She reminded that Avigdor Lieberman, when he was finance minister, tried to cancel such a discount. The Supreme Court, BAGATZ, did not prohibit the idea in essence but indicated that the benefit could not be canceled immediately because the school year had already begun and suggested postponing the change to the next year. Then the government fell, and the reform was not completed.

Therefore, according to Sophie Ron-Moria, the state needs to stop prioritizing funding for non-working groups.

GMAHs and the state treasury

The conversation included a question about GMAHs — systems of interest-free mutual assistance and loans within the religious environment.

Sophie Ron-Moria explained that a GMAH is an organized issuance of interest-free loans.

Sometimes such structures exist as amutot, that is, non-profit organizations, and can receive state support. Sometimes they operate without such support.

But, according to her, GMAHs are not the system that supports the ultra-Orthodox world of Israel.

The main system that supports it is the state treasury.

Religious Zionists: “knitted kippahs” and their internal groups

After discussing the Haredim, the conversation moved to religious Zionists — “knitted kippahs”, dati-leumi.

Levi Tabachnikov reminded that this direction did not always exist in its current form, it was formed with difficulty, including through the ideas of Rav Reines and Rav Kook. But Sophie Ron-Moria suggested not delving into history, as it would require a separate two hours, and to move on to the current situation.

The main figure: according to her estimate, there are about 1,400,000 religious Zionists in Israel. That is, there are more of them than Haredim.

Within religious Zionism, she identified three main groups.

The first is Hardal, or Haredi-Dati-Leumi. This direction, in social and religious terms, largely resembles the ultra-Orthodox, but fundamentally differs from them in that it recognizes the state of Israel, serves in the army, and works.

According to Sophie Ron-Moria, Hardal was previously a small direction, but as a large group, it formed around the 1990s. Today, it makes up almost a third of the religious-Zionist sector and is growing faster because such families have more children.

The second group is the mainstream of religious Zionism, about 40–45%.

The third is liberals or modernim, more modern religious Zionists, about 28%.

Sophie Ron-Moria noted that it is more difficult to draw a boundary between the mainstream and liberals, while Hardal stands separately.

Settlers and ‘knitted kippahs’ are not the same thing.

One of the important clarifications in the conversation concerned the common confusion: not all settlers are religious Zionists, and not all religious Zionists are settlers.

Sophie Ron-Moria said that today about 600,000 Israelis live beyond the green line.

Of them, ‘knitted kippahs’ make up a little more than a third.

The rest are secular and traditional Israelis living in large settlements near the green line, such as Ma’ale Adumim and Ariel, as well as about 100,000 Haredim living in places like Beitar Illit and Immanuel.

Even among the settlements themselves, there are different types.

Efrat, Gush Etzion, Elkana were named as more liberal settlements.

Small settlements in the mountains, as well as some settlements in the Hebron area, she said, are more often associated with the Hardal direction.

When asked about the ‘hilltop youth,’ she replied that it is not the same as Hardal. The hilltop youth, she said, stands apart.

Smotrich does not represent all religious Zionists.

Separately, Sophie Ron-Moria explained the political confusion around the ‘Religious Zionism’ party of Bezalel Smotrich.

According to her, this party does not represent the entire religious-Zionist sector, but mainly the Hardal direction.

That is why, in her estimation, Smotrich’s party today balances on the edge of the electoral threshold. If it represented the entire mainstream of religious Zionism, it would enter the Knesset much more confidently.

Sophie Ron-Moria also reminded that many religious Zionists live within the green line: in Jerusalem, Modi’in, Ra’anana, Petah Tikva, in the south of the country, in Sderot, and other places.

Most ‘knitted kippahs,’ she said, do not live in settlements, although many sympathize with the settlement movement.

How to distinguish Hardal from other religious Zionists.

Sophie Ron-Moria explained that Hardal is distinguished primarily by lifestyle.

In Hardal families, she said, gender separation can begin as early as 3–4 years old. They have a strict dress code.

A Hardal man can often be recognized by a larger kippah and a beard.

A more liberal religious Zionist usually has a smaller kippah, and may not have a beard. She gave a personal example: her husband shaves his beard and does not shave only during mourning days when it is not allowed.

Women of different directions of religious Zionism also look different because the dress code within subgroups differs.

At the same time, Sophie Ron-Moria briefly noted that there are also conservative and reform communities in Israel, but they are relatively few, so they were not specifically discussed.

Torah and real life: the religious-Zionist response to Haredim.

Levi Tabachnikov formulated the ideological basis of religious Zionism through three concepts: the Torah of Israel, the land of Israel, and the state of Israel.

Sophie Ron-Moria responded that, considering the relatively new nature of the ultra-Orthodox movement, natural Judaism is not isolation from the world, but Torah im derech eretz, that is, Torah together with real life.

According to her, a Jew should not close himself behind walls out of fear that, looking outside, he will immediately begin to violate commandments.

She asked the question: if the Haredim say that a young man, upon entering the army, will remove his kippah, then what was he taught?

From her point of view, a Jew should be able to live in a world where not everyone is like him and maintain his faith and practice in real life.

As a religious example, she recalled the weekly portion ‘Shlach’ about the scouts. In her interpretation, the scouts largely expressed the approach that would later resemble the ultra-Orthodox: as if it is impossible to observe the Torah and simultaneously be a farmer, a warrior, a person of real life.

Such an approach, she said, was recognized as incorrect.

She also reminded that the Shulchan Aruch states: a man must support his wife and children, not remain a yeshiva student all his life while his wife works.

In her opinion, the lifelong model of ‘yeshiva student until gray hair’ contradicts the original approach of Judaism.

She emphasized: abroad, Jews do not live so massively because there is no state of Israel that could support a large number of yeshiva students all their lives.

Can Hardal become a separate sector?

Sophie Ron-Moria suggested that in 10 years, Hardal might stand out as a separate group.

She explained this with the criterion of marriages: if representatives of the subgroup mainly marry only among themselves, over time, this may become a separate sector.

According to her, today Hardalniks mainly meet and marry Hardalniks, liberals marry liberals, and a liberal can marry a girl from the mainstream. But such marriages between Hardal and liberal religious Zionism are significantly less typical.

Should the state support large Haredi families?

One of the listeners’ questions was whether it is really possible to reduce support for ultra-Orthodox families if they have many children.

Sophie Ron-Moria replied that the criteria for assistance should be the same for all large families — Haredi, religious-Zionist, traditional, or secular.

If a family is poor, social services should help them. But the father, she said, should go to work. If he does not work, he should not receive special benefits just because of belonging to the ultra-Orthodox sector.

She recalled Benjamin Netanyahu’s position when he was finance minister in Ariel Sharon’s government in the early 2000s: if you want to have children, work to support them.

Demography: ‘we are doomed’ or not yet.

Levi Tabachnikov raised the issue of alarming forecasts: many believe that the ultra-Orthodox will sooner or later become the majority, the economy will not withstand, the army will not withstand, and the state will find itself in a dead end.

Sophie Ron-Moria replied that one should not become Cassandra and make definitive demographic forecasts for Israel.

She recalled the story of Shimon Peres, who in 1989, discussing Judea and Samaria, said that if a million immigrants came from the Soviet Union, the issue would look different, but that would never happen. A year or two later, mass aliyah began, and that very million arrived.

Therefore, she said, Israel is a country where geopolitical and demographic forecasts often break. A new aliyah is possible, including from the USA.

But this does not mean that the problem can be ignored. Haredim also need to feed their children, and the system needs to change.

Can Torah study bring innovations to the economy?

One of the listeners asked if Torah study can become a factor in increasing productivity and innovation in Israel’s economy.

Sophie Ron-Moria replied: it can, but only if it is combined with the study of economics, computers, physics, mathematics, and other modern disciplines.

She rejected the widespread myth that a person who has only studied Gemara has trained his brain so much that he can easily catch up with everyone in the big world.

According to her, statistics show the opposite: those from ultra-Orthodox communities who later go to get a profession and education lag about a third behind their peers.

She emphasized that studying Gemara can indeed train thinking, but only in combination with modern education.

As an example, she recalled Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik, one of the leaders of Modern Orthodox, who advised young American Jews thinking of becoming rabbis to get a serious education and pursue a doctorate.

Can Haredim serve, work, and remain Haredim?

At the end of the conversation, a key question was raised: if the ultra-Orthodox have to accept the Israeli social contract — education, work, military service, participation in the general system of duties — can they remain Haredim?

Sophie Ron-Moria replied: yes, they can.

She reminded that in 1973, during the Yom Kippur War, military vehicles drove through Bnei Brak and took men from synagogues. At that time, a significant part of the ultra-Orthodox served in the army and worked. Families did not have 10–15 children, but 7–8.

According to her, the turning point came after 1977, when Menachem Begin came to power and a system of political confrontation between Likud and Labor arose, in which Haredi parties were constantly ‘bought off.’ It was then, in her estimation, that the quota once introduced by David Ben-Gurion was destroyed.

She also pointed to the diaspora: American Haredim work and remain Haredim. Moreover, in the USA and Europe, living a Haredi life is more difficult than in Israel because there is no such infrastructure and state support as in the Jewish state.

Therefore, it is possible to work, serve, and maintain a Haredi identity.

Personal experience of Sophie Ron-Moria.

Sophie Ron-Moria also talked about herself.

In the mid-1980s, when she was 15, she skipped classes and went to the Leningrad synagogue. There she got into Jewish circles, and at 17, she made teshuva and became religious.

She came to Israel in 1989 already as a religious person.

She admitted that Israeli Haredim were a shock to her. Haredim in Leningrad, she said, looked and lived differently.

She also talked about her son. She has three sons, the youngest is now 21 years old. He studies in a military yeshiva, shortly after October 7, he went to the army, fought in Gaza, then returned to the yeshiva and must go back to the army. He serves in combat units.

Sophie Ron-Moria emphasized: it is possible to live like this. Her son did not remove his kippah. None of her three sons removed their kippah.

According to her, if a young man removes his kippah when meeting another world, the question is not to the army, but to what he was taught.

Who is really afraid of change?

One of the last questions concerned the claim that secular or religious Zionists want to ‘break’ the Haredi way of life and force the ultra-Orthodox to stop being themselves.

Sophie Ron-Moria rejected this.

According to her, after October 7, when Israel so urgently needs soldiers, it is impossible to say that the issue of service is only an attempt to remake the Haredim.

She believes that the goal of secular and religious Zionists is not to destroy the Haredi way of life, but to establish fair participation in common duties.

The main fear, in her opinion, is within the Haredi leadership. It is the fear of contact with the outside world and the fear of losing control.

She gave an example of a Haredi college where she wanted to study law about 10 years ago. There was a strict dress code: stockings, sleeves below the elbow, restrictions on earrings, a ban on large jewelry, only pale pink nail polish, a ban on boots. Moreover, the rules applied not only inside the college but also outside.

In her opinion, such rules are needed not because outsiders want to remake the Haredim, but because the system itself is afraid: its women will see another way of life and want the same.

She also recalled the pandemic period when, according to her, ultra-Orthodox leaders demanded that Haredi boys not be housed with ‘knitted kippahs,’ fearing their influence.

The main reason for fear, in her opinion, is that a Haredi who goes to the army returns to the community already less dependent on ultra-Orthodox leadership. He can go to work, can vote for whom he wants, can make decisions independently.

It is the loss of control, she said, that scares the Haredi leadership the most.

After October 7, the position of religious Zionists changed.

In the finale, Levi Tabachnikov asked Sophie Ron-Moria if her position is a minority within the religious-Zionist sector.

She replied that if this question had been asked 5 years ago, she would have said: yes, it is a minority, about the same 27–28% of liberal and modern religious Zionists who do not want the Haredization of Israel.

But after October 7, she said, the situation has changed.

Today, Sophie Ron-Moria believes, most ‘knitted kippahs’ understand that it cannot continue like this.

What was once the position of a liberal minority within religious Zionism has become much closer to the sector’s consensus after the war.

Why this video is important for understanding Israel.

This meeting of the ‘Understanding Israel’ project shows that Israel’s religious map is much more complex than the usual division into ‘secular’ and ‘religious.’

Within the religious world, there are Haredim, religious Zionists, Hardal, mainstream, liberal Dati-Leumi, working ultra-Orthodox, Chabadniks, Litvaks, Hasidim, Sephardic Haredim, and other groups.

But the main conflict that runs through the entire conversation is not only religious.

It is a conflict about the social contract.

Who serves in the army.

Who works.

Who receives education.

Who pays taxes.

Who receives benefits.

Who recognizes the state of Israel not only as a fact but also as a value.

Who is ready to participate in the common fate of the country.

In this sense, the conversation between Sofi Ron-Moria and Levi Tabachnikov is important not only for those interested in religion. It is important for everyone who wants to understand why the debate about the Haredim, the army, and education has become one of the central issues of Israel’s future.

Because behind it lies not only the question of conscription.

Behind it lies the question: what will Israel be — a democratic Jewish state where different groups share common responsibility, or a country where one part of society serves, works, and pays, while the other receives special status and separate rules.

That is why without understanding the religious currents and sectors, it is impossible to understand Israel today.

We recommend watching this video in full here it is – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZwmcFy1nQ8 : the conversation turned out to be important for understanding how Israel is structured today from the inside — through religion, the army, education, work, benefits, and the question of common responsibility after October 7.

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Ukraine opposed the participation of DAU director Ilya Khrzhanovsky in the main competition of the 83rd Venice Film Festival. Khrzhanovsky was born in Moscow, but today, according to his own data, he is not a citizen of Russia: he holds citizenships of Israel, Germany, and the United Kingdom, and renounced his Russian passport in protest against Russia’s policies and the war against Ukraine. This is why a contradiction arises in the very first sentence of this story: Kyiv speaks of Russian cultural influence, while Russia officially considers the director himself a ‘foreign agent.’

For Ukraine, this dispute is not just about cinema and not just about Khrzhanovsky. After the full-scale Russian invasion, Kyiv consistently proceeds from the fact that the war is waged not only with missiles and tanks: simultaneously, Russia tries to maintain its presence in European culture, return artists and projects associated with it to international platforms, and gradually restore the feeling that dealing with the Russian state ‘as usual’ is possible again. Therefore, Ukraine views the appearance of DAU in the main competition in Venice through a broader framework — military aggression, cultural influence, and subsequent international legitimization do not exist separately for Kyiv. In this logic, the question is not ‘is this a good film?’, but ‘does a prestigious European festival help normalize people, money, and cultural ties formed within the Russian system?’

For those searching for ‘Ukraine demands to remove DAU’, ‘Ilya Khrzhanovsky Venice 2026’, or ‘Russian funding for DAU’, a clarification is needed immediately: in the joint statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine, there is no literal demand to ban the film. Kyiv writes that it does not call for censorship, but asks international cultural platforms not to legitimize projects it considers connected with the Russian state.

The 83rd Venice International Film Festival is one of the oldest and most prestigious film festivals in the world, organized by La Biennale di Venezia; films in the main competition compete for the ‘Golden Lion’. In 2026, it will be held from September 2 to 12 on the Lido island in Venice, Italy.

I, Elena Gunko, started analyzing this story not to justify Khrzhanovsky or argue with Ukraine. I was interested in something else: does the short formula ‘a Russian project received European legitimization’ withstand the test of dates. Not completely. But the director’s own version also requires adjustments.

What exactly Ukraine presents

On August 17, 2026, Ukrainian agencies called the inclusion of DAU in the main competition in Venice a reason for ‘deep concern’. As arguments, they cited former financier Sergey Adonyev, conductor Teodor Currentzis, Khrzhanovsky’s work on a project with Russian billionaires, and the filming of DAU in Kharkiv from 2008 to 2011.

But the dispute began before the world premiere. Venice lists DAU as a 195-minute film produced by Germany, France, and Sweden; the first public screening is scheduled for September 9. This means that Ukraine is currently assessing primarily the origin of the project and the biographies of the people around it, rather than the content of the new film.

It is important for me here not to substitute one question for another. Ukraine has the right to ask about the project’s money and connections. But the answer to this question is not yet equal to the answer to what is in the film.

DAU indeed had Russian money — but not only that

DAU began in the mid-2000s as a project about Soviet physicist Lev Landau and then grew into a huge artistic experiment. The main filming took place in Kharkiv from 2008 to 2011; various films and installations were later created from the accumulated material.

In 2015, Screen Daily wrote that the Russian Ministry of Culture demanded through the court to return 22.5 million rubles previously allocated for the production of DAU, plus about 8 million rubles in interest. In the same material, the project was called a co-production of Russia, Sweden, Germany, and France, and among the structures that supported it was the State Agency of Ukraine for Cinema — a Ukrainian state structure supporting film production.

Here I disagree with Khrzhanovsky’s maximally broad formula that the Russian state ‘did not finance the film’. But first, it is important to understand where this formula came from.

On August 21, 2026, four days after the joint statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine, Ilya Khrzhanovsky published on his Facebook page a large public response to the Ukrainian agencies.

The director consistently dismantled their claims in ten points and posted the text immediately in three languages — English, Ukrainian, and Russian. At the beginning of the publication, he thanked the Venice Biennale and the festival’s artistic director Alberto Barbera for their support, and then stated that the Ukrainian statement contains factual errors and distortions of the history of DAU’s origin, its funding, relations with the Russian state, and his own biography. The Ukrainian version of the response begins in the same publication separately, followed by the Russian one.

It is in this response that Khrzhanovsky claims that the Russian state did not finance the film and did not participate in its creation. The publication appeared on August 21 — this is also confirmed by Italian media, which quoted his Facebook post on the same day.

And here I have a reservation. If we are talking about the entire history of DAU, there was Russian state funding. However, if Khrzhanovsky is speaking specifically about the completion of the 2026 version and its current production structure, I have not found direct confirmation of Russian state funding for this version.

Khrzhanovsky himself formulates this even more narrowly: for the past seven years, according to him, DAU has not received money from the Russian state, Russian state institutions, companies associated with the state, or private investors currently living in Russia. Sergey Adonyev, as the director claims, financed the large artistic project DAU from 2008 to 2019 but did not pay for the completion of the film selected for the Venice competition.

Adonyev is currently under US sanctions. The American OFAC registry indicates his Russian and alternative Israeli citizenship, Israeli passport, and address in Herzliya. For me, this is another reminder: a passport proves little here; dates of money and real connection with the current production are needed.

Currentzis, Kharkiv, and old claims to DAU

Ukraine separately points to Teodor Currentzis. He received Russian citizenship in 2014 and worked for many years within the Russian cultural system. But Khrzhanovsky draws attention to the chronology: most scenes with Currentzis were filmed from 2008 to 2011 when he was a citizen of Greece. The director also acknowledges: Currentzis did not publicly support the war, but he also did not publicly oppose it.

The dispute with Kharkiv is even more complex. Ukraine believes that the city is shown through a Soviet lens that erases its Ukrainian identity. Khrzhanovsky responds that the closed ‘Institute’ was specifically created as a Soviet world, and the film’s theme is the destruction of personality by a totalitarian system.

The project also has a heavy prehistory. In 2020, Ukraine investigated the circumstances of the participation of children from a Kharkiv orphanage in the filming of DAU. Later, the production was closed: investigators reported that they found no signs of a criminal offense. For me, this is an important boundary — ethical questions about the project’s methods remain, but the investigation cannot be turned into a proven crime.

How ‘Babi Yar’ appeared in the dispute — and why Israel cannot be forgotten here

The Ukrainian statement reminds that Khrzhanovsky led a cultural project funded by Russian billionaires associated with the Kremlin. The director himself clarifies: it is about the Babi Yar Holocaust Memorial Center in Kyiv, where he was the artistic director.

Yes, among the donors were Mikhail Fridman and German Khan. But the center’s supervisory board was headed by Natan Sharansky; the events marking the 80th anniversary of the Babi Yar tragedy in 2021 were attended by the presidents of Ukraine, Israel, and Germany. The Ukrainian state publicly interacted with the center at that time.

That is why I would not call the entire project ‘Kremlin’ without reservations. There were Russian money and disputes around Khrzhanovsky’s concept, but there was also an official Ukrainian-Israeli line.

For NANews — News of Israel, this is not an accidental historical insert. We wrote in detail about how the Soviet authorities displaced Jewish memory of Babi Yar in the material ‘Soviet Ban on Memory’. We also talked about the current ‘Research Space’ in Babi Yar and separately analyzed why the history of the Holocaust in Ukrainian cities remains little known. These materials show why the dispute over who shapes the memory of Babi Yar is not foreign to Israel.

Khrzhanovsky today — a citizen of Israel and a Russian ‘foreign agent’

In the Ukrainian statement, Khrzhanovsky is called a director from an aggressor state. He was born in Moscow, and the early history of DAU is closely linked to the Russian cultural environment. But legally, the situation today is different.

Khrzhanovsky writes that he renounced Russian citizenship in protest against the war and is a citizen of Germany, the United Kingdom, and Israel. He recalls supporting Ukraine after the annexation of Crimea in 2014 and speaking out against the full-scale Russian invasion. Russia has listed him as a ‘foreign agent’.

I do not consider the status of ‘foreign agent’ a universal justification. A person can conflict with the Russian state and maintain old connections with people from the Russian elite. But if the current state network of influence is being discussed, the attitude of the Russian authorities themselves towards the director cannot be excluded from the analysis.

Director’s son Andrey Kh: from Russia to Israel, and then to Palestinian activism

There is another character in Ilya Khrzhanovsky’s Israeli story — his son Andrey Khrzhanovsky, born in 1998, known on social media as Andrey X or Andrey Kh. And his path turned out to be perhaps even more paradoxical than his father’s.

In February 2022, Andrey came from St. Petersburg to Israel to visit his grandparents. His return ticket was for February 24 — the day Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He did not return to Russia, applied under the Law of Return, and received Israeli citizenship. Before that, Andrey studied anthropology at University College London, engaged in journalism, and participated in Russian opposition activities. In the first months after the invasion, he said he raised money for Ukrainian charities and wrote for ‘Novaya Gazeta’.

But quite soon, the center of his activity was no longer Russia and Ukraine, but the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Andrey began traveling to Palestinian villages in Judea and Samaria — the West Bank in international terminology — and filming clashes between local residents and settlers and the IDF. Later, he practically moved there: in an interview with NEWSru.co.il, he said he lives among Palestinians and collaborates with organizations of so-called ‘protective presence’. The Irish Times in 2025 described him as an independent journalist and activist who is filming a documentary about the Palestinian village of Ras al-Auja and funds his work, including through donations from subscribers.

Andrey calls what is happening in Judea and Samaria ‘ethnic cleansing’, Israel — a system of ‘apartheid’, and the war in Gaza — ‘genocide’. These are his political definitions, not established facts in this article and not the position of NANews. Moreover, in a 2025 interview, he stated that he rejects the Zionist model of the state and believes that the existing political system should be radically changed. At the same time, he does not intend to renounce Israeli citizenship.

And he began to conflict with the Israeli authorities quite specifically.

In October 2024, the military detained him and several other journalists on the way to the Nablus area. Khrzhanovsky later claimed that the detainees were beaten, kept blindfolded, and left in the sun for several hours. This is precisely his version of events. Among the group was American journalist Jeremy Loffredo from The Grayzone, who previously worked at RT and was detained in Israel after publishing about the locations of Iranian missile falls.

This episode had a completely unexpected continuation. The Russian-speaking activist association ‘Compass’, with which Andrey was associated, after the story with Loffredo, excluded Khrzhanovsky himself. The organization explained the decision by saying that cooperation with a journalist from a publication it considered connected with the pro-Russian information environment contradicted its principle of rejecting any imperialism — including Russian.

For our article, this is an especially curious detail. While Ukrainian agencies today discuss possible Russian networks around the father, the son was already excluded from an ultra-left association for contact with a journalist whom his own associates considered connected with the pro-Russian agenda. The world of the Khrzhanovskys clearly resists attempts to neatly categorize it politically.

The loudest Israeli episode occurred in December 2024. Andrey published a video from Sderot, where he stuck a sticker with the Palestinian flag and the inscription Free Palestine on an object that simultaneously served as a memorial to IDF Captain Shilo Cohen, who died on October 7, 2023, in battle in Kibbutz Be’eri. After complaints and public reaction from politicians, Andrey was detained in Tel Aviv.

The police requested to extend his arrest for five days. Judge Sabina Cohen disagreed: she pointed out that the sticker itself did not pose a threat to public safety and was within the limits of freedom of expression. The court ordered Khrzhanovsky’s release, although it set bail at 15,000 shekels and banned him from visiting memorial sites for a month. The father of the deceased officer publicly called Andrey’s act malicious.

This was far from the only conflict with law enforcement. In a September 2025 interview with NEWSru.co.il, Andrey himself said that 13 administrative and criminal cases had been initiated against him, some of which had already been closed by that time. Among the remaining proceedings, he mentioned a case after an action at the Russian embassy in Tel Aviv, when he poured red paint on the building in protest against the war in Ukraine, as well as a civil lawsuit for 160,000 shekels from a settler accusing him of defamation. These are Khrzhanovsky’s figures and descriptions, not data from a single official registry, so they should be presented as such.

By 2025–2026, Andrey had turned this activity into a full-fledged media project. He regularly shoots videos from Palestinian villages, publishes them for an international audience, and appears in European media. In June 2026, The New Arab described him as a journalist and activist who has been documenting the actions of settlers and the Israeli army in the West Bank for over two years.

About Andrey himself, NANews has already reported. And a related topic — why part of the ultra-left anti-Israeli rhetoric can intersect with the Russian information agenda — NANews — News of Israel separately analyzed in the material about the slogan Free Palestine and the ‘Kremlin axis’.

I specifically do not make the political views and actions of the son an argument against Ilya Khrzhanovsky. That would be a typical manipulation by the principle of guilt by association. Moreover, father and son do not agree politically on everything: Andrey himself said that Ilya Khrzhanovsky does not share his position, although he supports him as a son.

But for the family’s biography, this line is important. The father renounced Russian citizenship, opposes the war, and became a Russian ‘foreign agent’. The son did not return to Russia after the Russian invasion, received an Israeli passport — and then became one of the most prominent Russian-speaking ultra-left critics of Israel itself.

This proves nothing about the funding of DAU.

But it clearly shows why the Khrzhanovsky family cannot be described with a single word ‘Russian’.

How Khrzhanovsky became an Israeli citizen and what connects him with Israel

I did not find the exact date of Ilya Khrzhanovsky obtaining Israeli citizenship in reliable open sources. But it is known that he had an Israeli passport before the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. In interviews, he said that he came to work in Kyiv on the Babi Yar Memorial Center already as an Israeli citizen and was processing a Ukrainian work permit with an Israeli, not a Russian passport.

Khrzhanovsky himself recalled that after receiving the Israeli passport, he asked acquaintances what he, as an artist, could do for Israel. Shortly after that, he was offered to participate in creating the concept of the Babi Yar Memorial Center, where he later became the artistic director.

At the same time, Israel did not become his only place of residence: Khrzhanovsky continued to work between Europe and Ukraine. On February 24, 2022, the war caught him in Israel, and after the invasion began, his elderly parents moved here. Today, his main base is considered Berlin, but Israeli citizenship in his biography is clearly not a formality.

Therefore, the formula ‘director from an aggressor state’ requires clarification: Khrzhanovsky was born in Moscow, but long before the current dispute, he had Israeli citizenship, and later renounced his Russian passport.

What remains after verification

After verification, I cannot call the Ukrainian statement unfounded. DAU had Russian state support, Adonyev indeed financed the project for many years, Currentzis is connected with the Russian cultural system, and there were serious disputes around Khrzhanovsky in Ukraine.

But I do not see a proven chain that would turn DAU 2026 into today’s project of the Russian state. For this, data on current money, control, management, or political order are needed. Old connections raise questions; they do not automatically answer them.

This is the main nuance. Ukraine looks at the entire twenty-year biography of DAU and sees the accumulated Russian infrastructure. Khrzhanovsky separates the current film from it and shows a new European production structure. Both sides choose a time frame that strengthens their argument.

After September 9, what almost all participants in the discussion currently lack will appear — the film itself. Then it will be possible to argue not only about passports, sanctions, old money, and Kharkiv as a filming location, but also about whether DAU really reproduces the Russian imperial lens or, as the director claims, shows the mechanism of totalitarianism.

Why Ukraine is fighting for culture at all

Here I understand Ukraine’s logic, even if I believe that specific accusations against DAU need to be checked much more accurately. The country has been living under full-scale Russian aggression for the fourth year and simultaneously observes how Russia continues to claim not only territories but also the right to determine what is considered ‘Russian’ in the history, culture, and memory of neighboring countries. Ukraine sees this as a continuation of the same imperial model: first political and military pressure, then appropriation of common history, language, artists, cities, and cultural heritage.

Therefore, for Kyiv, an international film festival is not a neutral showcase. When a film appears in the main competition in Venice, its author receives prestige, press attention, and symbolic return to the European cultural norm. This is what Ukraine calls the problem of legitimization: not necessarily direct Kremlin propaganda, but a gradual restoration of the acceptability of the Russian cultural environment while Russia itself continues the war.

There is also another reason. For decades, Russia represented Ukrainian writers, scientists, cities, and cultural achievements as part of a single ‘Russian’ or ‘Soviet’ space. After 2022, Ukraine reacts especially painfully to any situations where this framework, in its opinion, is reproduced without explanation that it is about Ukrainian territory and a separate Ukrainian history. That is why Kharkiv in DAU is not just a place of old filming for Kyiv.

But here I would still separate the principle and the specific case. Ukraine’s right to resist Russian cultural normalization is understandable to me. However, if a specific director or a specific film is called part of the current Russian network of influence, this already requires not a general logic of war, but specific evidence — modern money, control, institutional connection, or political order. This boundary in the DAU story seems important to me not to lose.

Sources: joint statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine; La Biennale di Venezia; public statement of Ilya Khrzhanovsky; Screen Daily; OFAC of the US Department of the Treasury; Suspilne Kharkiv; materials of NANews.

…
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The remark by Dolev Cohen about the Russian language caused a scandal even before the premiere of the new season of ‘Four Weddings’ on Kan 11. But behind the controversy over the unsuccessful TV promo lies a broader issue: Israelis simultaneously observe HAMAS in Moscow, Russian weapons with Hezbollah, Russia’s alliance with Iran, and Russian state symbols inside Israel and… Russian speech in their favorite supermarket.

On August 21, 2026, a few seconds from the advertisement for the new season of ‘Four Weddings’ on Kan 11 turned into a political scandal. 27-year-old Dolev Cohen from Ramla said to the camera: “Russians. I can’t hear this language. I can’t hear this language. I walk through the supermarket and various places, and it seeps into my brain.” In the same remark, she similarly mentioned Amharic once.

Original – “״Russians. I can’t hear the language. Can’t hear the language. I walk through the supermarket and places, and it seeps into my brain ״. ”

There were two days left before the season premiere. But the discussion was no longer about weddings. The fragment was reacted to by Avigdor Lieberman, Vladimir Bliak, and Evgeny Sova, the latter sent an official letter to the management of the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation. Then came a response from Kan 11, and on August 22, a defense from Dolev’s brother, Matan.

For me, Stas Shifer, this story is interesting not only because I write about politics, wars, and their impact on ordinary people. I was born in Ukraine, live in Israel, and understand too well one dangerous substitution: the attitude towards the state gradually transfers to the language, and from the language to the person. In the case of Russia, this substitution becomes especially noticeable today because Israelis receive a very contradictory set of signals daily.

On one hand, Moscow receives HAMAS, Russia has been deepening cooperation with Iran for years, and Hezbollah has Russian weapons found by the IDF. On the other hand, inside Israel, Russian diplomacy continues to talk about ‘Russian-speaking compatriots’, Russian flags appear, state holidays, familiar cultural visual series with the tricolor, ‘Russian’ treats, matryoshkas, and other symbols of Russia.

NANews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency has written about this gap more than once. And therefore, the main question for me is not ‘Is Dolev Cohen a racist or not?’. It is much more interesting to understand, why Russian speech in Israel is beginning to acquire a political tint at all — and whether it is related to the fact that society sees Russian politics not as neutrally as it is still often presented by official Israeli diplomacy.

What exactly did Dolev Cohen say and why did the scandal go far beyond reality TV

‘Four Weddings’ is an entertainment reality show on Kan 11. Four brides visit each other’s weddings, evaluate them, discuss what they see, and the events are accompanied by humorous voice-over text. The new season is set to start on the evening of August 23.

Therefore, it is important to understand the origin of the scandalous video. This is not an old post by Dolev that someone dug up ten years later. Not a fragment of a secretly recorded conversation and not an accidental leak.

The remark was chosen for the official promo of the program.

And this makes Dolev’s story simultaneously the story of Kan 11. If a public television channel takes an emotionally charged phrase about the language of hundreds of thousands of residents of the country and makes it part of the new season’s advertisement, the responsibility for the result can no longer be left only to the reality show participant.

The reaction followed quickly. Avigdor Lieberman, chairman of ‘Our Home Israel’, accused the corporation of giving racism a place in prime time and emphasized that racism cannot be turned into entertainment. For Yisrael Beiteinu, the topic is especially sensitive: a significant part of its electoral history is connected with aliyah from the former USSR and the Russian-speaking audience of Israel.

Vladimir Bliak, a deputy from ‘Yesh Atid — Together’, went further. He demanded to remove Dolev from the screen and apologize, asking Kan 11 a rather unpleasant question: would the corporation allow itself the same television entertainment if it were about another group of Israeli society?

Evgeny Sova from Yisrael Beiteinu translated the dispute from Facebook and X into an official plane. He wrote to the general director of the public broadcasting corporation Golan Yochpaz and demanded the removal of the video, an internal investigation, and an explanation of how such material even passed editorial selection.

And here begins the part of the story that cannot be lost behind political statements.

Kan 11 responded that the corporation opposes any racist statements and itself works against racism in Israeli society. According to the channel’s explanation, the controversial remark was taken from a longer humorous episode where Dolev criticizes herself, her family, and her own wedding, and the program host directly reacts to her manner of expression.

This is an important context. But it leaves a completely different question.

If the full episode contains criticism of these words, why was the part where it is not yet present left in the promo?

It turns out to be a rather strange construction. Kan 11 simultaneously says: do not judge by a short fragment because the full context is different. But it was Kan 11 itself that offered this short fragment to the viewer as an advertisement.

On August 22, another twist appeared. Dolev’s brother Matan wrote to journalist Daniel Amram that people, in his opinion, ‘went out of proportion’: his sister is not a racist, loves everyone, but just doesn’t like some languages. As an analogy, he said that he himself cannot calmly hear Arabic speech because it causes him flashbacks from Gaza.

This is still Amram’s message from Matan’s words, not a separate public interview with Dolev. But it unexpectedly brings the conversation to a place where no one initially intended to go.

The brother suggests separating the person from the emotional reaction to the language.

And can they be separated at all?

We do not know why Dolev is irritated by the Russian language — and it is not permissible to invent a political biography for her.

The easiest way to protect Dolev now is to come up with a convenient explanation for her.

Russia is waging war against Ukraine. Russia supports Iran. Iran attacks Israel and has been building a network of armed organizations around it for decades. Russia receives representatives of HAMAS. So, perhaps, the young Israeli woman constantly sees all this in the news, after which the word ‘Russian’ begins to cause her a negative reaction.

This is psychologically possible.

But Dolev did not say this.

In the published fragment, there is no mention of Putin, Ukraine, war, HAMAS, Iran, or Russian politics. She talks about a domestic situation: hearing the Russian language in the supermarket and other places and not wanting to hear it.

Therefore, it would be unfair to first accuse her of racism based on a few seconds of video, and then just as baselessly justify it with Kremlin politics.

However, there is a question that does not depend on her personal motivation at all.

What has the ordinary Israeli seen next to the word ‘Russia’ in recent years?

For the answer, no secret Mossad reports or closed meetings of the military-political cabinet are needed. Most of the picture exists in open access.

Russia began a full-scale aggression against Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Iran supplied Russia with Shahed and helped develop a drone war against Ukrainian cities. Russia then deployed its own production of these systems. In March 2026, Volodymyr Zelensky told CNN that now Russian-made Shahed are being supplied back to Iran and used against the US and Israel. Reuters reported this statement with the caveat that the origin of each specific device is not always possible to establish.

In July, even more unpleasant information appeared. Reuters, citing American and Western officials, wrote about Russian technical assistance to Iran, improving the accuracy of Iranian drones, and checking the possible provision of targeting data by Moscow. There was no final conclusion on individual attacks, but the broader military-technical assistance from Russia to Tehran was already considered a reality.

And this already concerns not only Ukraine.

For Israel, the boundary between European and Middle Eastern wars is becoming less and less noticeable.

We recently wrote about how Russia and Iran are trying to influence Israelis themselves through social networks. There, it was not about the opinion of a Ukrainian activist, but about a special report by the State Comptroller of Israel on countering foreign influence.

There is another symptom. In July, the issue of Russian media presence unexpectedly began to be raised not only by Ukrainians and not only by opposition activists. Right-wing Israeli channels began to ask why the state practically does not react to Russian informational influence.

That is, irritation is already arising within that part of Israeli politics, which is difficult to accuse of special love for Ukraine or the desire to use Russia only as a tool in the fight against Netanyahu.

This shift seems much more important to me than a few seconds of reality TV.

HAMAS goes to Moscow, the IDF takes out Russian ‘Kornets’ from Lebanon, and Russia works more closely with Iran

On June 10, 2026, a meeting took place in Moscow that is difficult to overestimate for our topic.

Deputy Foreign Minister of Russia Georgy Borisenko received Musa Abu Marzouk from the leadership of HAMAS. Gaza, ceasefire, humanitarian aid, the future of the region, and political settlement were discussed. Abu Marzouk thanked the Russian side for its diplomatic efforts.

For Moscow, this is a diplomatic channel.

For a person in Israel after October 7, the picture looks somewhat different.

HAMAS killed Israelis, kidnapped Israeli citizens, and held hostages. Israel has been trying to destroy the organization’s military infrastructure for years. And simultaneously, its high-ranking representative flies to the capital of Russia for an official meeting at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Moreover, HAMAS would like to see Moscow as a mediator for Gaza. We separately analyzed HAMAS’s attempts to promote Russia as a mediator, against which Israel objects.

Now let’s add Lebanon.

At the end of December 2024, the IDF showed journalists thousands of units of weapons captured from Hezbollah during battles in the south of the country. Among approximately 6,840 rocket-propelled grenades and anti-tank missiles were 340 Russian anti-tank missiles ‘Kornet’.

Here, the fact cannot be replaced with a convenient accusation. The presence of a Russian missile with Hezbollah does not in itself prove a direct supply of a specific batch of weapons from Moscow to the group. Russian systems have been supplied to Syria for decades, could be transferred through Syrian depots, and reach Lebanon by various routes.

But an IDF soldier entering a Hezbollah position is not engaged in diplomatic genealogy of a specific ‘Kornet’ at that moment.

He sees Russian weapons with Israel’s enemy.

In May, NANews detailed Hezbollah’s trophies and the Russian trace among the weapons that the IDF took from Lebanon. There, Iran, Russia, China, and older Soviet systems were found nearby — practically a material map of where Israel’s opponents were armed from.

And above this entire structure is Tehran.

On January 17, 2025, Russia and Iran signed a 20-year comprehensive strategic partnership agreement. It covers security, defense cooperation, military-technical interaction, exercises, and ties between security structures.

Neither Russia nor Iran formally signed a mutual military defense agreement. This is important. But the absence of an article in the style of NATO does not negate how close the relations between the two states have become.

It is here that the first serious dissonance arises for an Israeli.

The Israeli government has been explaining to society for years that Iran is a strategic threat. Israel strikes Iranian targets, destroys Tehran’s military capabilities, prepares for new attacks, and demands from allies not to allow Iran to obtain nuclear weapons.

Regarding Russia, a completely different vocabulary is used.

Although at the other end of this chain is the same Iran.

In Moscow — HAMAS, and two days later in Tel Aviv — 600 square meters of the Russian flag

And now to the most visual episode.

On June 10, HAMAS meets with the Russian Foreign Ministry in Moscow.

On June 12, on Russia Day, in one of Tel Aviv’s parks, dozens of participants unfold a Russian tricolor with an area of more than 600 square meters. Russian state sources described the participants as Israelis and ‘Russian-speaking compatriots’.

We have already analyzed these two news items in one article — ‘Russian Tricolor in Tel Aviv and HAMAS in Moscow’.

It is precisely next to each other that they look especially unpleasant.

Formally, everything is completely legal and belongs to different worlds. The Russian Foreign Ministry conducts diplomatic negotiations. People in Tel Aviv celebrate the national day of the state with which they associate themselves. The embassy holds an official reception. The program includes familiar cultural symbols: Russian folk visual series, matryoshkas, national treats, music, flags, talks about common history, and ‘compatriots’.

But mass perception rarely sorts all this into folders.

An Israeli scrolls through the same feed.

There, a HAMAS representative sits in Moscow.

There, the IDF shows Russian ‘Kornets’ found with Hezbollah.

There, Russia signs a long-term strategic agreement with Iran.

There, reports of Russian assistance to Iranian drone technologies and possible information exchange appear.

And then — Tel Aviv, a huge Russian flag, the Russian embassy, Russian state holidays, and the wording ‘Russian-speaking compatriots’.

And here it is worth making an important stop.

Russian-speaking Israelis are not ‘compatriots of Russia’ as a single political category. This is a Russian diplomatic formula, not a description of Israeli reality.

In Israel, Russian is spoken by immigrants from Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, Moldova, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and other countries of the former USSR. Many have lived here for decades. Their children serve in the IDF. Among them are supporters of Putin, his opponents, people with no relation to Russian politics, and Ukrainians whose homes were destroyed by the Russian army.

But to a person unfamiliar with post-Soviet history, Moscow’s diplomatic programs, and the differences between Russian-speaking communities, a completely different visual series is shown.

‘Russian-speaking compatriots’.

Russian ambassador.

Russian tricolor.

Russian holiday.

And the next day — again Russian language in the supermarket queue.

Thus, the cultural marker begins to dangerously approach the political one.

Moreover, the relations of the Russian state with Israel themselves are becoming less unambiguous. In June, we analyzed how the level of Russia Day in Israel has changed: once figures like Benjamin Netanyahu and President Reuven Rivlin attended such events, and in 2026 the main Israeli guest was Minister May Golan. This already shows a cooling.

But it is still not a break.

Russian diplomacy remains within the Israeli public space — and continues to work with the Russian-speaking environment in terms of its own state policy.

Israel calls Iran an enemy, but continues to speak much more cautiously about Russia

Here arises the second part of the dissonance.

Benjamin Netanyahu speaks about Tehran without diplomatic nuances. Iran is a threat to Israel’s existence, its nuclear program should not be restored, missile and drone capabilities should be limited, and the ‘axis of resistance’ should be weakened.

Russia, meanwhile, cooperates with the same Iran.

But the tone towards Moscow is different.

On December 8, 2025, Netanyahu said in the Knesset that he regularly talks with Putin, and long-standing personal relations with the Russian president serve ‘vital interests’ of Israel.

During the first years of the war against Ukraine, such caution had an understandable explanation. Russia controlled a significant part of Syrian airspace, and it was important for Israel to maintain the IDF’s freedom of action against Iranian arms supplies and infrastructure in Syria.

Since then, Syria has radically changed.

Russian presence has changed.

The war in the Middle East itself has changed.

Russia and Iran have become much closer than before February 2022.

Nevertheless, in July 2026, The Times of Israel diplomatic correspondent Lazar Berman still noted Netanyahu’s reluctance to seriously reconsider relations with Moscow, even in a situation where Ukraine and Israel are effectively confronting two sides of the same Russian-Iranian military alliance.

I see no evidence of the popular version that Netanyahu simply ‘banned talking about Russia.’ Such an order cannot be presented as an established fact.

But the observed fact is different: Israeli official rhetoric towards Moscow remains much more cautious than rhetoric towards Tehran.

And society notices this too.

Moreover, the issue is gradually emerging from the usual Russian-speaking or Ukrainian bubble. When NANews wrote about Russian journalist Sergey Pashkov and questions about Russian state media influence, the most interesting thing was not even Pashkov himself.

The question came from the right.

From an environment where they like to talk about national security, sovereignty, foreign influence, and the need to be tough on Israel’s enemies.

For such a voter, it is becoming increasingly difficult to explain one construction: Iran is dangerous; Hamas is dangerous; Hezbollah is dangerous; the Russian state media system and Moscow work closely with Iran and maintain contacts with Hamas — but for some reason, Russia should remain almost a separate topic.

Previously, this inconsistency was easier to attribute to the Ukrainian war and the Syrian necessity.

In 2026, it is more difficult to do so.

Especially since the State Comptroller of Israel has already separately raised the issue of Russian and Iranian influence in the digital space.

So it’s long been not just about the emotions of Ukrainians.

It’s already about Israeli security.

How the Kremlin turns into the Russian language — and why the wrong person starts paying for Russia’s policy

Now we can return to the Dolev supermarket.

Russia is far away.

The Kremlin is far away.

Putin appears in the news.

The strategic agreement with Iran is a document of dozens of pages. The transfer of technologies, diplomats’ negotiations, arms routes from Syria to Lebanon, intelligence contacts — these are complex things.

The Russian language next to the checkout does not seem complex.

And here the most primitive psychological transfer can work:

Russia is waging an aggressive war against Ukraine. Russia cooperates with Iran. Iran is at war against Israel and supports its enemies. Hamas comes to Moscow. Hezbollah finds Russian weapons. Russian diplomacy inside Israel talks about ‘Russian-speaking compatriots.’ Russian state flags appear at public events.

After this, the word ‘Russian’ for part of society begins to mean more than just a language.

The problem is right here.

Because the next step is already false.

Kremlin → Russia’s policy → the state of Russia → Russian language → Russian-speaking person.

There is no political connection between the fourth and fifth links.

A person near Dolev in the supermarket may be an Israeli from Kyiv.

Or from Odessa.

Or Kharkiv.

Or Riga.

Or Chisinau.

May be a person who left Russia itself precisely because they do not want to have anything to do with Putin’s regime. May serve in the IDF. May raise money for Ukraine. May have relatives under Russian missiles.

The Russian language does not issue a passport, political views, or attitude towards Israel.

This is the paradox of the current story.

Hatred of the Kremlin’s policy does not require irrational explanations. After Bucha, Mariupol, the war against Ukraine, Moscow’s contacts with Hamas, the strategic alliance with Iran, and Russian weapons with Israel’s opponents, there are more than enough reasons to critically view the Russian state.

But if this hatred transfers to a person just because they spoke Russian, the original political logic already disappears.

And therefore, I still do not want to end this story with a verdict on Dolev Cohen.

Maybe she really just doesn’t like the sound of the language.

Maybe there is personal experience behind this reaction.

Maybe political news has nothing to do with it.

Until Dolev herself explains this, everything else will be speculation.

But the scandal accidentally opened a more serious topic.

Israeli society increasingly sees Russia alongside those whom the state of Israel itself calls enemies. At the same time, official policy continues to treat Moscow much more cautiously than Tehran, and Russian diplomacy within Israel itself still actively associates the state of Russia with the concept of ‘Russian-speaking compatriots.’

Perhaps it is from such a contradiction that the very everyday transfer we saw in the Kan 11 promo video is born.

Not necessarily with Dolev personally.

But in society — quite possibly.

And if this really starts to happen, the problem is no longer in a few seconds of ‘Four Weddings.’

The problem is that the bill for the Kremlin’s actions may gradually begin to be presented to a person who simply speaks Russian in an Israeli supermarket.

And this will not be a victory of Israel over Russian influence.

It will be yet another consequence of Russian influence itself.

…
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The third episode of the project “Know Ours” about Ukrainians in Israel.
“This video was filmed before October 7, 2023. But the war in Israel put our activities on pause.”

Kyrylo Karetniuk – a Ukrainian who moved to Israel in 2009, served in the army, worked, and became a politician. Importantly, the interview is not about Kyrylo’s political sphere and is not of an agitational nature. The goal is to reveal the personality outside of political life and tell another story of an influential Ukrainian in Israel.

Host – Kateryna Trushyk.
Filming, editing, sound – Olena and Alex Ginzburg.
Haifa, Israel.

Kateryna Trushyk:

“The war in Israel has disrupted the plans of many people.

Elena Ginzburg, Alex Soundman Ginzburg, and I planned to develop our project about Ukrainians in Israel and Israelis helping to bring Ukraine closer to victory.
We had a list of heroes and heroines with whom we planned to record interesting interviews.

October 7, 2023, changed our plans.

We hope to still implement them and reveal and open many true heroes who do a lot of important work for both Ukraine and Israel.

The video that will be released today was recorded before October 7, 2023.

This is the third episode of the project “Know Ours”.

The hero of the interview is Kyrylo Karetniuk (קיריל קארטניק) – a Ukrainian who moved to Israel in 2009, served in the army, worked, and became a politician.
Importantly, our interview is not about Kyrylo’s political sphere and is not of an agitational nature.

Our goal is to reveal the personality outside of political life and tell another story of an influential Ukrainian in Israel.”

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The Federation of Jewish Communities of Ukraine on August 21, 2026, reported on the participation of Rabbi Yakov Sinyakov in an event marking the third anniversary of the 7th Rapid Reaction Corps of the Air Assault Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

The event itself took place earlier — on July 17, 2026, in Dnipro. The date is not accidental: the command of the 7th Corps was established on July 17, 2023.

For a reader in Israel, the name of the corps commander or the number of the Ukrainian military unit may not mean much by themselves. However, the presence of Sinyakov changes the perspective. Before us is an Orthodox Jewish rabbi who did not come to the military as an honorary guest: he serves within this structure and heads its chaplaincy.

Sinyakov’s story speaks to a broader issue that is not always visible from Israel. Ukrainian Jews, along with other citizens of the country, found themselves inside the war against Russian aggression — some serve in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, some work as volunteers, helping the wounded and military families, some support the fighters as a rabbi or chaplain. Therefore, Sinyakov in the uniform of the 7th Corps is not an exotic detail of the ceremony. It is one example of how the Jewish community of Ukraine defends the country together with the entire Ukrainian society from the war started by Putin’s Russia.

Anton Pshedynsky writes for NANews – News of Israel about international security, Russia’s war against Ukraine, and how Ukrainian events intersect with the Israeli agenda. In this story, such an intersection is literally in one frame: Ukrainian paratroopers, the war in the east of the country, and a rabbi representing the Jewish community of Ukraine.

7th Air Assault Corps: three years from headquarters to battles for Pokrovsk

Air Assault Forces of Ukraine, a separate branch of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The corps is a larger structure that unites several combat units and provides unified command over them.

A direct parallel with the IDF should not be drawn here: the structure of the two armies differs. But the principle is understandable to the Israeli reader. This is the level at which separate brigades, artillery, reconnaissance, unmanned systems, communications, and logistics must work not each on its own, but as a single mechanism.

In three years, the 7th Corps has come a fairly rapid way. Its command was created in the summer of 2023, when the Ukrainian army was already living in a state of large-scale war. In 2024, it operated in the Vuhledar and Kurakhove directions. In the first half of 2025 — in the Novopavlovsk and part of the Pokrovsk direction.

Since July 2025, one of the key areas for the corps has been Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region.

This is important to explain separately. For a person who follows the war from Israel only through major headlines, Pokrovsk may look like another point on the map of Donbas. In fact, the area of the city has long remained one of the directions where Russia tries to advance at the cost of constant attacks and large resources.

At the anniversary, the corps commander, Brigadier General Yevhen Lasyichuk, summed up the past year. Dozens of servicemen received state and departmental awards, and the corps units were separately noted for their combat work.

Lasyichuk is a Hero of Ukraine. Before being appointed corps commander, he headed the 25th Separate Airborne Sicheslav Brigade and has been fighting against Russia since 2014.

The motto of the anniversary itself was in Ukrainian: «Робимо вітер» — «We make the wind».

Not the most headquarters-like formulation. But it quite accurately coincides with the image the corps is trying to build around itself.

FPV drones, robots, and “technodesant”

The 7th Corps uses its own concept — “technodesant”.

Behind it is not some separate new branch of the military. It’s about something else: airborne units are trying to integrate FPV drones, ground robotic systems, digital control systems, electronic warfare, and their own technical developments into regular combat work more quickly.

This is what Lasyichuk calls one of the directions of the corps’ development.

In 2026, an Innovation and Technology Center appeared within the unit. The corps also reported on developments related to the “friend or foe” recognition system, the use of radars, exoskeletons for specific artillery and logistics tasks, and its own digital solutions for combat management.

Here, a topic appears that is understandable to Israel without long explanations.

After October 7, the IDF also faced a war where a cheap drone, a small engineering team, or a quick software update can change the situation faster than the purchase of an expensive platform designed for years.

The Ukrainian experience is not identical to the Israeli one. The scale of the front is different, the enemy is different, the structure of the army is different.

But the problem is very similar: military bureaucracy simply does not have the right to move slower than technology.

Who is Yakov Sinyakov

Against this background, the figure of Yakov Sinyakov looks almost like a contrast.

Next to FPV, robots, and artillery systems — a rabbi.

But within the corps itself, no contradictions are seen here.

Yakov Sinyakov, religious name Yakov Pinchas, is associated with the Federation of Jewish Communities of Ukraine. After the start of the full-scale Russian invasion, he traveled to Ukrainian servicemen as a volunteer, bringing aid and providing spiritual support.

In the summer of 2025, he received the official status of a military chaplain of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and later headed the chaplaincy of the 7th Corps.

NANews — News of Israel wrote about the appointment of Yakov Sinyakov back in October 2025. For Ukraine, it was an unusual appointment: an Orthodox Jewish rabbi received a regular role within a regular combat unit.

The very word “chaplain” in the Israeli context can also be easily misunderstood.

In the IDF, there is a Chief Military Rabbinate with a long-established system of religious support for the army. In Ukraine, military chaplaincy in its current form is much younger and has been developing especially rapidly after the Russian invasion.

Sinyakov, meanwhile, works not only with Jewish servicemen.

His work includes conversations with fighters, psychological and spiritual support, helping people after heavy combat episodes, and accompanying servicemen of different religious views.

During Passover, he came directly to the Ukrainian military.

In April 2026, NANews reported how Sinyakov brought everything necessary for Passover to the front line. For a small Jewish community within a multi-million warring country, this perhaps says more than any official formulation about “interfaith dialogue”.

Ukrainian Jews defend the same country they live in

For the Israeli reader, behind the name of the Ukrainian corps and military abbreviations, it is easy to miss the main point. Jews of Ukraine in this war are not bystanders and not a community existing separately from the rest of the country around synagogues, holidays, and humanitarian centers. They are part of Ukrainian society, and the Russian invasion entered their lives just as it did the lives of millions of other Ukrainian citizens.

Ukrainian Jews serve in the army, engage in volunteering, help evacuees and the wounded, support the families of servicemen. The Federation of Jewish Communities of Ukraine has been conducting extensive humanitarian work since the start of the full-scale war. Yakov Sinyakov shows another side of the same story — the direct presence of the Jewish community within the Ukrainian army.

He is not an invited rabbi who came to the paratroopers for one ceremony. Sinyakov wears the uniform of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, works with servicemen, and heads the chaplaincy of the corps that participates in battles against the Russian army. Therefore, his presence at the third anniversary of the 7th Corps is not a symbolic gesture and not a beautiful photo for a report. For the unit itself, he is one of their own.

This is especially telling against the backdrop of Russian propaganda, which from the first days of the invasion justified the war by the need for some “denazification” of Ukraine. Meanwhile, representatives of the Jewish community of Ukraine themselves serve in the armed forces of the country that Russia allegedly intended to save from this “Nazism”.

This does not mean that all Ukrainian Jews have the same attitude towards the Ukrainian authorities or that the entire community participates in the war. People have different political views, life circumstances, and attitudes towards what is happening — just like in Israel. But a Russian missile or Shahed does not choose a victim by nationality and does not find out their attitude towards the government.

This is the essence of Sinyakov’s story. He remains a rabbi, a Jew, and a representative of his community while serving Ukraine. There is no contradiction here: for some Ukrainian Jews, defending the country and preserving Jewish identity have long become part of one life.

Why this is important specifically for Israel

The message from the Federation of Jewish Communities of Ukraine is quite routine: the 7th Corps turned three years old, servicemen received awards, the commander spoke about the development of the unit, and Yakov Sinyakov was among the participants of the ceremony.

But for Israel, the human context of this photograph is important.

Israel often sees Ukraine through the lens of war, relations with Russia, arms supplies, diplomatic disputes, or political statements. Sinyakov’s story shows another Ukraine — one where Jewish life continues not only in the synagogues of Kyiv, Odesa, and Dnipro. It exists within the army, in units that have been on the front line for months.

Behind the number “7th Corps” today stand the Pokrovsk direction, thousands of servicemen, FPV drones, robotic systems, their own engineering developments — and the chaplaincy headed by an Orthodox Jewish rabbi.

For Ukrainian soldiers, this is no longer a sensation, but part of the everyday reality of war.

And for the Israeli reader, this is perhaps the simplest way to understand the position of Ukrainian Jews today: they are not next to this war. They are inside a country that is at war, and together with other Ukrainians, they defend it from Russian aggression.

Sources: Federation of Jewish Communities of Ukraine; official materials of the 7th Rapid Reaction Corps of the Air Assault Forces of Ukraine; official materials of the Air Assault Forces of Ukraine.

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