Alexander Levin: “We are making history together”

Jews of Kiev will find a house
25 April - on the eve of Israel’s Independence Day - a solemn ceremony was held to lay the foundation stone and a commemorative capsule in honor of the construction of the Kiev Jewish Community Center (CEEC).
The ceremony was attended by the President of the World Forum of Russian-speaking Jewry, Alexander Aaron Levin, Head of the Jewish Religious Community of Kiev, Chief Rabbi of Ukraine Moshe-Reuven Asman, Co-Chairman of the European Jewish Parliament, President of the All-Ukrainian Jewish Congress Vadim Rabinovich, Head of the Knesset ruling coalition Zeev Elkin, Ukraine's Nikolai Katerinchuk, religious and political figures of Ukraine and Israel, representatives of Jewish organizations and Kiev Jews.
The CEEC building will be located across the street from the Central South Railway Station, on ul. Polzunova, 3, a ten minute walk from the metro station "Vokzalnaya".
Chief Rabbi Moshe-Reuven Asman was pleased to announce that President of Ukraine Viktor Yanukovych and the mayor’s office of the capital support the construction of the Kiev Jewish Community Center. “As written in the Psalms, laying the first stone is a very important step and a big celebration. Our Kiev Jewish Community Center will become a cultural, educational and religious center for Jews in Kiev and Ukraine. There will be the Museum of the History of the Jews of Kiev, a synagogue, a Sunday school and an art school, a library, a center for helping the elderly and needy people, a spiritual rehabilitation center, and much more, ”said Moshe-Reuven Asman.
Especially on the event came from Israel, one of the leaders of the Israeli parliament Zeev Elkin, a native of Kharkov. The guest of honor warmly congratulated those present on this remarkable day: “It is very remarkable that the laying of the stone in the construction of the community center is taking place today, on the Memorial Day of Fallen Soldiers and on the eve of Independence Day of the State of Israel. I see that the connection between the Jewish community of the Diaspora and Israel is strengthening, the Jewish community is independently building its life and is actively developing. "
The leader of the European Platform for Ukraine movement and the European Party of Ukraine Nikolay Katerinchuk read a letter of congratulations from the European Parliament. “This is really a significant event not only for the Jewish community of Ukraine, but also for the entire European Jewish community. Today is a historic day for Ukrainian Jews and all residents of this beautiful city, which marks a new stage in the life of the Jewish community. We express our most sincere congratulations on the occasion of laying the foundation stone for the new community center. ”
Especially important were the words of personal support for the project by the Deputy Prime Minister of Israel, the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Jewish state Avigdor Lieberman. “This long-awaited project will have a unique character. CEEC will unite a spiritual rehabilitation center, will become a place of leisure for children and the elderly, will open the doors of the Museum of the History of Jews in Kiev and Ukraine, ”the Israeli minister said.
“Jews and Kiev are bound by both bitter and beautiful ties of history. So, next year there will be two round dates - 900 years to the first Jewish pogrom in Kiev (1113 year) and 100 years to the “Beilis case” (1913 year), when simple Ukrainian peasants and juries rendered an acquittal verdict and thwarted anti-Semitic plans of the authorities. We must remember all the pages of our past, while looking to the future - in the name of strengthening friendship and good neighborliness between the peoples of Ukraine and Israel, ”said Avigdor Lieberman in a letter to Alexander Levin.
Alexander Aaron Levin told those present at the ceremony: “I am pleased to congratulate all of us on this day! Today we make history together! ”
A stone, specially brought from Israel, and a commemorative capsule with an address to descendants were laid in the foundation of the future community center. Under the solemn sounds of the orchestra, Alexander Aaron Levin laid the capsule in a Jerusalem stone, and then the guests of honor, adults and children, fixed a memorial sign on the first stone. Alexander Levin, Rabbi Moshe-Reuven Asman and members of the Board of Trustees of the Jewish community of Kiev Boris Kahan, Mark Ginzburg and Sergey Samusev laid the foundation stone for the future community center.
To the applause of those gathered in the sky flew hundreds of colorful balloons and white pigeons. The solemn ceremony ended with a wonderful performance of children from the School of Art at the synagogue. Brodsky and the winner of the contest of young talents, a student of the Jewish school "Mitsva-613" in the city of Bila Tserkva, Alice Kirishun.
An amazing atmosphere reigned on the construction site - for an hour and a half the participants in the event forgot that there were stones, clay, a wasteland around. One could see the dancing grandmothers, smiling children with their parents, feel the goodness, light, joy and blessings of Heaven on this wonderful April day.
The stone with the time capsule will be kept in the Brodsky synagogue until the construction of the Kiev Jewish Community Center is completed. After 25 years, our descendants will open the capsule and once again recall the historical moment for the Jewish community of Kiev, which has found its House. And it is very important that this House was built on a stone from Jerusalem.