An emotional Hachnasas Sefer Torah for the zechus of Ukrainain soldiers took place in Kyiv with the participation of members of parliament, presidential advisers, army commanders, heads of Jewish kehillos, and Jewish soldiers. At the start of the event, the Rav of the Ukrainian army, HaRav Hillel Cohen, introduced the activities of a number of Jewish organizations that have been active in Ukraine since the start of the war – assisting Jewish and non-Jewish refugees, providing humanitarian aid, and rescuing the sick and elderly, among other activities. The event was attended by the mayor of Uman, who praised the use of Jewish hotels in Uman for streams of refugees from eastern Ukraine in the first months of the war – all free of charge.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday issued a Chanukah greeting to Ukrainian Jews and Jews around the world. “I bless the Jewish community in Ukraine and all the Jews in the world with a happy Chanukah,” Zelensky said. “A few were victorious over many, the light won over the darkness – so it will be this time.” “Chag Chanukah Sameach,” he said in Hebrew. “Glory to Ukraine!” (YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)

Pope Francis on Saturday declared as martyrs a Polish couple who were executed by German police during World War II for hiding Jews in their farmhouse. A farmer and beekeeper, Jozef Ulma, and wife Wiktoria in the Polish town of Markowa hid several members of the Jewish community, who were being hunted down during the German occupation of Poland. An informant apparently betrayed them, and the Jews were killed by police in March 1944. The couple were then shot to death along with their six young children, the oldest of whom was 8 years old. Recognition of martyrdom would permit the couple to be beatified, the last formal step before possible sainthood.

Rabbi Moshe Margaretten of Brooklyn, the head of the non-profit Tzedek Association, met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenzsky in Kyiv on Wednesday evening. The meeting was arranged by the president’s father, Oleksandr Zelensky, who has been impressed by Margaretten’s humanitarian work, including assisting Ukrainian refugees and sending dozens of ambulances to Ukraine. During the meeting, Rabbi Margaretten conveyed warm regards from several US senators who promised that they would support the transfer of additional aid to Ukraine. Margaretten also gave a gift to Zelensky – a silver mezuzah engraved with his name.

A British man last week was sentenced to prison for 16 years after being found guilty for killing two Israelis and injuring three others in a hit-and-run in Ramsgate, Kent in August. Nitesh Bissendary, 30, initially fled the scene of the accident but later returned to the scene in order to retrieve the cocaine from his car. He was found to have been driving under the influence of cocaine. The jury, who was informed that Bissendary had been previously convicted of driving under the influence of cocaine, unanimously found him guilty of causing death by dangerous driving and causing injury by dangerous driving. Noga Hirschfeld, 37, a’h, who lived in Cambridge with her family and was five weeks pregnant at the time of the crash, was killed along with her father, Prof.

Vladislav Shein, z’l, a 21-year-old member of the Jewish kehilla in Dnipro, Ukraine was killed last month at the war front. “The Federation of Jewish Communities in Ukraine mourns the death of a hero,” a statement from the federation said. “He was sent to the front and there he sacrificed his life for the independence and freedom of Ukraine.” The news of his death reached the Jewish kehilla only in the past few days, and since then, the limmud Torah and the recital of Kaddish in several shuls have been dedicated l’illui nishmaso. His friends said that Vladislav registered as a volunteer already in the first days of the war. From time to time, when he went on leave, he would come to shul, put on tefillin and daven.

The Chabad house in Abuja, Nigeria, led by Rabbi Israel and Haya Ozan, held an event celebrating its tenth anniversary, dedicating a new wing of its Beis Chabad modeled on 770. A Hachnasas Sefer Torah l’illui nishmas HaGaon HaRav Chaim Kanievsky, z’tl was celebrated as part of the event. The Sefer Torah was donated by the philanthropist Reb Dov Ziskin of New York. The event was attended by shluchei Chabad throughout Africa, including the Ivory Coast and Ghana, as well as shluchim from the US, members of the local Jewish kehilla, and even local non-Jews. The singers Amir Dadon and Micha Shitrit were brought in especially from Israel to sing for the crowd during the celebration and seudas mitzvah. (YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)

Australia on Monday announced a $1 million reward for information on the 40-year-old unsolved cases of the bombings of two Jewish targets, The Guardian reported. On December 23, 1982, a bomb exploded in front of the Israeli consulate in Sydney, injuring two people. Later on the same day, a bomb planted in a car in the parking lot of the Jewish Hakoah Club exploded but fortunately, it did not detonate properly and no one was injured. The bomb was believed to have been intended to destroy the entire building, which at the time was full of hundreds of people for a Maccabiah event. Investigators believe that the attacks, the first international terrorist attacks in Australia, were carried out by Palestinian terrorists.

In the course of the International Conference of Chabad-Lubavitch Shluchim in New York, HaRav Shmuel Kaminetsky, the Chief Rabbi of the Ukrainian city of Dnipro, revealed that thanks to the intervention of HaRav Berel Lazar, Russian forces avoided attacking his city throughout the war. According to the report in the newspaper Merkaz HaInyanim, HaRav Lazar, the Chief Rabbi of Russia, made a personal request to Russian President Vladimir Putin that Dnipro be spared from attacks due to the presence of a large Jewish kehilla there.

Many Jews from Ukrainian cities now in Russian-occupied areas are worried about their relatives who remained behind, JTA reported. Many left behind elderly parents who could not or would not leave when their children did. “We can’t talk about the war,” said Moshe, whose elderly mother is in Kherson, a city in southern Ukraine that has been occupied by the Russians since early in the war. “I don’t want to make things difficult for her. I think that people are listening in.” Moshe is currently in Vinnytsia, a town in western Ukraine. “She doesn’t want to leave,” he adds. “It is not because the Russians are there now that she wants to stay.