Chanukah of hope for Ukraine’s Jews

Some miracles come with fireworks and fanfare, like the Red Sea parting or Sully Sullenberger’s Hudson River landing. Chanukah, which starts tonight, marvels at a quieter, hardworking phenomenon, celebrating resilience and faith over shock and awe.

Rather than the stunning military victory over the Seleucid Empire, we Jews focus on a tiny amount of oil in the ancient Temple’s menorah. Meant to last one night, it stretched to eight — the kind of terrestrial miracle that fits our times.

With the protracted crisis in Ukraine, rising global inflation, and a persisting pandemic, the greatest miracle is to stubbornly push forward and do good. I’ve learned this lesson from two brave women powering Ukraine’s Jewish communities through blackouts, air raids and sub-zero temperatures.

I met them in Moldova when I was documenting the crisis response work of my organization, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC). I was joined by colleagues from Mykolaiv and Kharkiv, Khmelnytskyi and Lutsk, Ukrainian cities dominating headlines and places you couldn’t find on a map.

Each has decided to stay put, risking her life every day to take care of others.

For Anna Shalko, our meeting in Chisinau was her first time leaving Ukraine since Feb. 24. Once a taekwondo instructor at Kharkiv’s Jewish community center, she now dons a flak jacket, delivering canned goods and other essentials to bedridden seniors.

“They say a person can get used to anything, and now I’m used to constant sirens and emergencies,” she said. “But we keep going, and we’ll continue as long as we’re needed. Helping each other means that we’re alive.”

Anna was compelled to do more early in the crisis. She walked past shuttered pharmacies and supermarkets, imagined the plight of lonely seniors like her parents, pensioners struggling on just $3-4 a day, and knew she had a role to play.

Her decision to keep going, even when her actions seem like just a drop in the ocean, recasts our expectations about heroism. It doesn’t always mean vanquishing your foes, and courage isn’t always about being fearless. It’s the bravery of acknowledging the reality of a broken world and repairing it anyway.

Stella Britchenko, 28, never stopped showing up. An Odesa-based psychologist who works as an elementary-school English teacher, she is among hundreds of JDC-trained Jewish community volunteers who’ve mobilized during the conflict.

She told me that each Shabbat, something miraculous happens — the air raid sirens never sound when she lights the candles ushering in the Jewish day of rest. For Stella, who’s been deeply connected to the Jewish community since childhood, it was hard not to view it as a sign.

“You really feel like you’re under protection from above,” said Stella, whose days are filled with packing food and organizing online trauma relief. “If I wasn’t volunteering, I’d go crazy. When I light the candles, I thank G-d that we are alive and that everything is all right — we’re really proud of what we’ve done, and we’re not going to stop.”

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Anna and Stella, and hundreds just like them, have helped us deliver 800 tons of humanitarian aid, care for more than 43,000 Jews in Ukraine, assist more than 40,000 refugees, and evacuate 13,000-plus Ukrainian Jews. Beyond the Jewish community, we’ve provided emergency medical care and telemedicine services in Ukraine, Poland and Bulgaria.

An unforgiving winter looms amidst widespread destruction. So we’re distributing lamps, candles, charging stations and power banks, portable stoves and extreme-weather sleeping bags. We’re also transforming our Jewish community and social service centers into generator-equipped warming shelters.

Though most of us are not on the front lines, there’s a role for us, too. We must lift up the stories of these modern-day miracle workers. And we must recognize we’re part of a rising tide.

In our case, it’s led by a multifaith coalition — including the Jewish Federations of North America, local Jewish Federations like UJA-Federation of New York, the Claims Conference, International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, families, foundations, corporations, and individuals — that’s given more than $90 million for Ukraine relief efforts. Their funds are empowering ordinary people doing extraordinary work.

For the next eight nights, Ukraine’s Jews will carry on lighting menorahs, leading scores of holiday programs giving new meaning to an ancient observance. Until the conflict ends, and beyond, they’ll continue sustaining each other, keeping untold numbers alive.

In turn, they’ll inspire us to do even more to help. They prove that miracles can happen today — lighting the darkness takes just one spark we each can kindle.

Weisler, a former journalist, is the senior video and digital content producer at JDC, the global Jewish humanitarian organization.