An Eyewitness to Ukraine’s Tragedy
May 12, 2014 by
As mayhem in the Ukraine continues, and the death toll mounts, threatening a possible civil war, a heartwarming story emerges from this Ukrainian tragedy. The story involves Israeli humanitarian aid to injured protestors in Kiev. Ten Ukrainians wounded in clashes were airlifted, and brought to Israel’s Kaplan Medical Center in Rehovot. Valeriya Babchuk, a Kaplan Medical Center doctor, on vacation in her native Kiev, volunteered to provide emergency treatment to Ukrainian activists being shot at the “Maidan,” or Independence Square, in Kiev, Ukraine’s capital.
Jeremy Borovitz, 26, a Jewish Service Corps Fellow with the American-Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) in Kiev was on hand in Philadelphia to relate the story surrounding the “Maidan.” He was hosted by Louis Balcher, the regional representative of Kaplan Medical Center. Borovitz, a prospective rabbinic student at the Pardes Institute in Jerusalem, stopped in the Delaware Valley on his way to Israel from Kiev, where he spent a full year. In Kiev, he was involved in many projects including the “Our Shtetl” project, taking him to small villages and, with local Ukrainian non-Jewish students, made short documentary films about the Jewish history of the area.
The situation in the Ukraine has left an indelible impression on the
young Borovitz, who worked closely with Ukrainian students seeking a
freer, more Western-oriented state for their people. In the meantime,
Russian President Putin reduced tension by suggesting that the
referendum being staged by pro-Russia separatists in parts of Eastern
Ukraine should be postponed. The separatists are seeking to rush the
referendum, which they hope will result in an approval for the region to
join Russia, much like what happened in Crimea earlier in March of this
year.
It was apparent to Putin that open and unmitigated Russian support
for the referendum could trigger additional and harsher EU and US
sanctions. Moscow is, however, still opposed to holding presidential
elections in Ukraine on May 25, 2014. USA Today reported (May 7, 2014)
that “A Ukrainian candidate for president from the country’s restive
Donetsk region said that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s pledge to pull his forces back from the Ukrainian border is ‘very good news,’ and a sign that diplomacy may have a chance.”Putin would like to see a change in the Ukrainian constitution that will allow for federalism in Ukraine. This would give the regions greater powers, and provide Russia with increased influence over eastern Ukraine, and ultimately over the whole of Ukraine.
Ukrainians in the rest of the country and in particular in the western part of Ukraine have rejected the Russian over-lordship and seek closer ties with the West. To confirm this assertion, this reporter asked Jeremy Borovitz whether the demonstrators at the “Maidan” were genuine democrats who want to see a democratic, Western-oriented Ukraine, or were they simply demonstrating for jobs and better living conditions? READ HERE
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