Ukrainian Jews High Holidays: Honey Production Amid War

As bombardment intensifies across Ukrainian cities, Jewish communities throughout the country are preparing for the High Holiday season under extraordinary circumstances. While the war continues as a grim routine and explosions have become part of daily life, community rabbis are working around the clock. They are coordinating massive logistical efforts to ensure the holidays are observed with dignity and to strengthen communal bonds despite the dangerous security situation.

Chabad's JRNU network in Ukraine, which oversees aid distribution to Jews across the country, made a strategic decision: to produce most basic food and holiday items within Ukraine itself, using specially supervised local facilities prepared well in advance.

The most striking example is located in a major industrial zone in the Kyiv region. The area is surrounded by logistics centers and massive warehouses that have sustained severe damage and daily bombardment in recent weeks, yet miraculously, the facility chosen for pure honey production remains standing.

Production workers continue their work under constant alert, with the sound of machinery mixing with air raid sirens. Beyond the honey facility, which received kosher certification from Rabbi Yehoshua Vishtzki of the 'Okrkosher' supervision system, the war has also seen the establishment of specialized kosher slaughter operations for meat and poultry under stringent supervision.

As early as next week, the operation's main phase will begin: a fleet of large aid trucks will depart from supply centers toward dozens of Jewish communities scattered throughout the country. Massive pallets of essential food products will be unloaded at Jewish community centers in various cities, from where they will be transported directly to members' homes through an organized and dignified internal distribution system.

The diverse food packages include, alongside poultry, fresh meat and locally produced honey jars, dairy products, special honey cakes airlifted from Israel, festive dobushniotes (honey pastries) produced in the embattled city of Zaporizhzhia, and various canned goods and spreads. To add value to each package, beautifully designed educational materials in the local language about the meaning of the holiday season are included, along with a unique calendar combining Jewish content and photographs from community life.

Jewish communities in Ukraine are expecting record participation in synagogues and holiday activities this year. "We are preparing for an unprecedented number of worshippers who will come to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services," says Rabbi Simcha Levenhertz, a Chabad emissary in Kyiv who coordinates the distribution operation. "After such a long and exhausting period of war and uncertainty, people are seeking togetherness and tradition more than ever. We all look forward and will pray together that the new year coming upon us will finally be a calm, peaceful and sweet year."