The Montreal Gazette - 12.16.02

 

The Montreal Gazette

Restoring the faith

 

In a region with a legacy of anti-Semitism, the resurrection of a synagogue and a thriving school has invigorated Kazan's Jews  

 

By Russell Working

 

Kazan, Russia.  It was a time of turmoil in Russia's Tatar Autonomous Republic. In 1994,  local officials were demanding independence for the Muslim-plurality region, and taxpayer dollars were rebuilding mosques that had been turned into warehouses during Soviet times. 

Fifteen Jews decided it was time to reassert their own spiritual heritage. They applied to the government and obtained title to a pre-Revolutionary synagogue that had been converted into a government education centre. And when the teachers refused to heed an eviction order, they blocked the entrance to the building. 

 

"Nobody was against giving us the synagogue, of course, but they were procrastinating," said Mikhail Skoblionok, a 56-year-old businessman who was part of the protest. "So we decided to put pickets at the doors and not let the teachers in. ... Of course it was a scandal, but otherwise we wouldn't have gotten the building back." 

The synagogue now stands at the heart of a remarkable rebirth of Judaism in this part of a country that still struggles with a legacy of anti-Semitism. It is not only a house of worship, but it is home to the Hesed Moshe Jewish Community Welfare Centre of Tatarstan. 

 

And in a nation Jews have fled in droves for Israel and the United States, many of Kazan's 10,000 to 12,000 Jews say they are here to stay in this Volga River industrial city of 1.1 million. 

In provincial Russia, offices can be shabby affairs, with wiring stapled to the walls and a cluster of clunky telephones ringing unanswered on the director's desk. But the newly renovated synagogue is as stylish as a house of worship in Montreal, and the centre's outreach programs rival those of a Western organization. The organization does everything from providing walkers to the elderly to hosting a 350-student strong youth club. 

Across town, a Jewish school has excelled academically to the point that ethnic Russian and Tatar students are signing up for a program that includes Hebrew language studies and Jewish history. The community's vibrancy owes much to a strong Russian Jewish Congress and generous donors, including some in the United States and Israel. 

"This community has wonderful and very professional leadership," said Rob Zwang, head of the Jewish Communities of Western Connecticut, an American group that has formed a partnership with Kazan's synagogue. "Out of all the emerging Jewish communities in the former Soviet Union, this is one of the most successful and the most organized." 

Before the 19th century, Jews were not allowed to settle outside a prescribed pale in Western Russia, and Kazan, built in the 1200s, was off limits. But Jewish traders and discharged soldiers began arriving in the late 19th century, followed by refugees from war zones in World War I. In the 1940s, a flood of refugees fled the Nazi advance across Belarus and Western Russia, and the Soviet government relocated factories here, out of reach of the Germans. 

Even nowadays, Neo-Nazis have vandalized synagogues and attacked Jews and other minorities in many parts of Russia. Some Muslims have demanded the eviction of a 400-student Jewish School from the state-owned School No. 12 building. 

The hostility peaked last year when vandals poured gasoline on the roof and set it alight. All four floors of the school were damaged by water when firemen doused the blaze, said Olga Trupp, principal of School No. 12. "If we're not wanted, we can relocate, as long as they give us another building," she said. 

Many Jews say they feel accepted here. The synagogue's youth club has initiated exchanges with the region's other religions, so that Muslims, Russian Orthodox believers and Jews visit each others' houses of worship and study the other faiths. 

"We're still getting calls from other students saying, 'When are we going to do that again?' " said Ilya Velder, 21. 

The entire community takes pride in the school's accomplishments, Trupp says. Students study Hebrew and Jewish history, has a room full of new computers with Internet access, and most of its graduates go on to higher education. The school is so highly regarded academically, many Russian and Tatar families send their children there. 

And despite last year's arson, Trupp perceives a new spirit among Kazan's Jews. 

"Ten years ago, nobody would say on a streetcar, 'I am a Jew,' or speak Hebrew or anything like that," Trupp said. "Nowadays, when they go in the city, our children are proud of being Jews. I think that's the main thing we achieved. Jewish children are not afraid of being Jews."