Paul
Goble
Staunton, August 7 – The Federation
of Jewish Organizations of Russia (FEOR) which unites Hassidic Jewry in Russia
and the Russian Jewish Congress which unites Reform Judaism there have been
competing for influence over the estimated 15,000 Jews in Crimea since the
Russian occupation of that Ukrainian territory.
In the new issue of “NG-Religii,”
Andrey Melnikov, its editor, says that after the annexation, the reform Jews of
Crimea preferred to deal with the Russian Jewish Congress, but that FEOR
dispatched its own representatives to the peninsula in the hopes of gaining the
upper hand (ng.ru/ng_religii/2014-08-06/4_jews.html).
To that
end, FEOR representatives have announced plans to build what Melnikov calls “a
large spiritual center” in Simferopol “similar to those which the organization
has already erected in various cities, including Moscow” and thus serve to
inspire and promote the revival of Judaism in Crimea.
The
interaction of the two has not been without problems, the “NG-Religii” editor
continues, all the more so that at least one of the Lubavicher communities lost
its permanent rabbi who returned to the United States shortly before the
Moscow-orchestrated referendum on March 16. FEOR is ready to help that one and
another has refused to take Russian citizenship.
Reformist
Jewish communities who are the more numerous in recent years, however, prefer
to get assistance from others. One
ongoing project, the reconstruction of a synagogue built in 1893, is going
forward with the help of the Russian Jewish Congress, the World Union of
Progressive Judaism, Israel’s Sokhnut agency, the American Joint Organization,
and the Federal Jewish National-Cultural Autonomy of the Russian Federation.
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