JERUSALEM — As the war in Ukraine intensifies, the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (The Fellowship) remains in close contact with their staff and volunteers on the ground. The Fellowship’s team continues to work around the clock to ensure Jewish communities across Ukraine have the emergency essentials they need. They are also helping families evacuate their homes, providing them with shelter from missile attacks, and getting them to safety across the border in neighboring countries. 
Valeria Kolchic, who works at the Fellowship office in Kharkiv, the second largest city in Ukraine, has kept The Fellowship up to date on the situation there. “I do not have a shelter in the building,” Valeria said Sunday. “Every time I hear a siren, I run to hide at the nearest subway station.” She added that there have been “air strike attacks and shooting in the streets around us. No electricity, no internet. I am afraid of what’s going to happen next.”
At a Jewish shelter near Kyiv, another Fellowship team member joined a large room packed full of families waiting to be told what to do next. To lift their spirits, they began singing Psalm 133, “How good and pleasant it is when brethren dwell together,” and a post-Shabbat prayer called the ‘Havdalah.’ The Fellowship sponsors this shelter.  Jahana and Alexei, along with their three children, are a family from Zytomyir who are fleeing to the Karpaty region. “We've been living in fear for three days,” Alexei told The Fellowship over the weekend. “Enemy planes circle over the city and we occasionally hear explosions. We turned our home's warehouse into a shelter to protect ourselves from the bombings. Today we heard about the possibility of evacuating from the city and we went straight to the synagogue. We want to get to a safe place where our children will not be in danger. The Fellowship and the Jewish community are the only ones who have helped us all these days. We received moral support that strengthened us greatly and helped overcome fear. The possibility of evacuation is a miracle that could save our lives.”
“We’re going to continue to do everything we can, with every dollar we can, for every family we can,” said Fellowship president and CEO Yael Eckstein. “As the people of Ukraine battle for their freedom and pray for peace, we at The Fellowship promise to do everything possible to keep them safe as they face an uncertain future.” The International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (The Fellowship) was founded in 1983 to promote better understanding and cooperation between Christians and Jews and build broad support for Israel. Today it is one of the leading forces helping Israel and Jews in need worldwide — and is the largest channel of Christian support for Israel. Founded by Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, The Fellowship raised more than $200 million in 2021, mostly from Christians, to assist Israel and the Jewish people. Since its founding, The Fellowship has raised more than $2.6 billion for this work. The organization has offices in Jerusalem, Chicago, Toronto, and Seoul. For more information, visit www.ifcj.org. Yael Ecksteinis the president and CEO of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (The Fellowship). In this role, Eckstein oversees all ministry programs and serves as the organization's international spokesperson. She can be heard on The Fellowship's daily radio program airing on 1,300 stations worldwide, on on her podcasts, Nourish Your Biblical Roots and Conversations with Yael. Before her present duties, Yael served as global executive vice president, senior vice president, and director of program development and ministry outreach. Based in Jerusalem, Yael is a published writer, leading international advocate for persecuted religious minorities, and a respected social services professional. As president and CEO of The Fellowship, she also holds the rare distinction of being a woman leading one of America's largest religious nonprofit organizations. |
Yevgeniy Maloletka
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