Chabad emissaries deliver holiday packages to Ukrainian Jews despite growing drone threat

Ukraine’s Jews are preparing to spend their fifth High Holiday season under the shadow of war. As in previous years, tens of thousands of Jews across the 169 communities that remain under Ukrainian control have received boxes of holiday essentials. Getting those packages to recipients, however, proved particularly challenging this year.

“The most significant challenge this year has been the increased range of Russian FPV drones. The Russian military has stepped up production to tens of thousands of drones every month, and their destructive impact is clearly being felt,” says Alina Teplitskaya, CEO of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Ukraine (FJCU).

“Russian drones are not only attacking the front lines, but also civilian targets deep inside Ukrainian territory. They are now striking targets as far as 70 kilometers from the front, including virtually any truck traveling within that range, on the grounds that the trucks may be transporting military equipment to the front. This meant that in the Kherson, Chernihiv, Dnipro, Sumy and Zaporizhzhia regions, delivering the packages to Jewish communities by truck—as we do every year—had become a real danger.”

Organizers turned to smaller vehicles to distribute the boxes, but securing them brought further complications.

According to Teplitskaya, “There is a severe shortage of drivers and vehicles throughout the country. Many of the drivers we worked with in the past were drafted into the military over the past year, while those who remain are afraid to knowingly enter dangerous areas, even for high fees. We began searching for drivers immediately after Tisha B’Av, and it took two weeks of negotiations to secure the number of drivers we needed. This is why this year’s distribution took place over a longer period—even longer than during the first year of the war, when we were still learning the new rules of the game.”

The federation says drivers carrying packages to Nikopol and Marhanets in the southern Dnipro region, and to Pavlohrad in the region’s east, had to turn back after seeing Russian drones strike vehicles ahead of them.

“Ultimately, we delivered the packages to these cities through Jews who live there. They traveled to the major city of Dnipro, where our offices and aid warehouses are located, and collected the packages themselves—for their own families and for the Jews of their cities.”

The distribution extended beyond eastern Ukraine to Jewish communities across the country, with trucks carrying thousands of boxes each. In all, the federation says more than 50,000 Jewish households received holiday packages through its cooperation with Chabad emissaries based in communities throughout Ukraine.

More than 1,000 additional kits were distributed over the past month to Jewish soldiers serving at military bases and camps along the front lines. As in previous years, Yaakov Sinyakov, who works with the soldiers year-round on the federation’s behalf, delivered the kits and spoke with them about the approaching holidays.

The boxes contained the customary Ukrainian-language Hebrew-Gregorian calendar, a booklet explaining the Tishrei holidays, pure honey, grape juice, a special-edition liqueur, a kippah, a refrigerator magnet listing Shabbat and holiday candle-lighting times, a desk calendar, and Shabbat and holiday candles.

This year, children also received a toy whistle-shaped shofar for the first time, intended to help them participate in holiday preparations and learn about the traditions. A personal sports water bottle was also added to each box at the last minute in response to increased Russian attacks on water infrastructure.

Alongside the packages, the federation is providing communities across Ukraine with food and supplies for holiday meals. Tens of thousands of Jews are expected to attend synagogues over the holiday season. The effort supplements the federation’s humanitarian assistance throughout the year.

Rabbi Mayet Stambler, chairman of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Ukraine, highlighted the shofars given to children when reflecting on this year’s distribution.

“We are confident that the sound of the shofar rising from the Jewish children of Ukraine will ascend before the Heavenly Throne, pierce the heavens, and bring with it a good and sweet year—a year of peace and hope. When the war began, we never imagined that it would last for so long and exact such a devastating human and material toll. We pray that in the coming year we will finally merit the true and complete redemption and hear the sound of the shofar of Mashiach.”