At a reception held on Sunday (Sept. 6) by the Jewish community in Uzhhorod that came after a memorial ceremony for a mass grave discovered in the city, Rabbi Berel Lazar, Chief Rabbi of Russia and member of the Rabbinical Center of Europe (RCE), abjectly refused to be honored by the Mayor of Uzhhorod (Ungvar).

The drama took place during the  reception event that was organized for rabbi Lazar and the deputy ceo of the RCE after uncovering of a special memorial monument commemorating the Jews murdered in Uzhhorod (previously called Ungvar) during the Holocaust. The Jewish victims were dumped in a mass grave, which was recently discovered.

Towards the end of the event, a representative of the Mayor of Uzhhorod attempted to award Rabbi Lazar with a medal of honor. However, in the presence of those in attendance, Rabbi Lazar refused to accept the medal due to anti-Semitic remarks the mayor was known to have made in public. Rabbi Lazar told the messenger of the mayor that he does not intend to take the medal with him and it should remain in the city until the mayor apologizes for his anti-Semitic remarks. Rabbi Lazar pointed out that since the mayor had not offended him personally but his remarks offended the entire Jewish nation, he ought to apologize to the local Jewish community.

Rabbi Lazar’s remark astounded the mayor’s representative, yet elicited enthusiastic cheers and applause from those present.

Mayor Serhiy Ratushnyak is known to have made anti-Semitic remarks on several occasions. In a recent election campaign Ratushnyak called an opponent “an impudent little Jew.” He later told the Associated Press news agency in an interview “I don’t like Jews.” Prosecutors have charged Ratushnyak with hooliganism, abuse of office and xenophobia, said Viktoriya Popovych, a spokeswoman for the regional prosecutor’s office.

Ratushnyak’s remarks drew angry responses from Jews and non-Jews all across Ukraine. It is thought that with the upcoming mayoral elections, Ratushnyak wanted to give Rabbi Lazar the medal, even though he was purposely not invited to the event.

The ceremony yesterday that was followed with a reception to the Rabbis came five months after Rabbi Menachem Mendel Taichman, Rabbi of Uzhhorod and the Carpathians; found that an unmarked plot in the local cemetery was actually a mass grave of over 200 Jews who were murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust. The monument, funded by the RCE’s Cemetery Division and by the Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS, was inaugurated in the presence of a large crowd including several prominent rabbis from all across Ukraine.

In his speech, Rabbi Lazar made mention of the significance of the date so soon after the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War Two which culminated in the horrors of the Holocaust. Rabbi Lazar called on leaders around the world to internalize the impact of their public statements because they can do so much damage. The rabbi also called for tolerance and mutual respect amongst nations.

Uzhhorod, which once had a thriving Jewish community before the Holocaust, is undergoing a process of Jewish revival in the past few years under the leadership of the chief rabbi of the city, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Taichman. Uzhhorod is known for its magnificent Jewish history, which had a Jewish population of 15,000 Jews prior to the Holocaust. The city was known for its active Jewish community life and served as a Jewish center for the entire district of the Carpathians.

Today, under Rabbi Taichman’s guidance, the city once again has regular prayer services and activities for youths and seniors; it boasts a state-of-the-art mikve, a soup kitchen for the needy and other necessary services for its Jewish community.

Ungwar is located within the territory of Ukraine and is called Uzhhorod in Ukrainian. It is the capital of the Carpathians district which contains a group of small towns, of which one of the larger ones is Munkach.

(Sirgei Kubik, RCE)