Vignettes from the Ukraine border, bomb threats at Jewish institutions across U.S., new season of Israel Mossad series on AppleTV+, and remembering the last Yiddish speaker in Lviv.

WAR IN UKRAINE

Refugees arriving at Poland's Medyka crossing (left) and Tanya Arbit comforts Sofia Sarkada, 15. (Jodi Rudoren)

It’s the one-month anniversary of Russia’s invasion, and the U.N. reports that more than half of Ukraine’s children have now been displaced from their homes. Our editor-in-chief, Jodi Rudoren, met some of them during a three-day visit to Poland’s border region this week with the Jewish Federations of North America…

‘At 15, you can grow up’: Refugee stories of aguish and hope at the Ukrainian border: With bombs terrifyingly close to their fifth-floor apartment in Kyiv, Irena Sakada, her teenaged daughter and their Yorkshire Terrier joined the throngs searching for underground shelter. They found several addresses promised by the municipality were inexplicably locked, but “eventually we just broke the lock and invaded,” Irena said. Some 120 people squeezed into six rooms, sleeping on the floor, with no electricity or bathrooms.

Those first days were harrowing. But when she really started to worry was when her daughter, Sofia, an artist, stopped picking up her brushes. They are now staying in a hotel that used to be a yeshiva in Lublin, where the Joint Distribution Committee is helping Ukrainian Jews make their way to their next chapters. A few days ago, Sofia painted a new character.

The Sakadas were one of a handful of refugees whose stories Jodi and the group heard in Lublin, Warsaw, and at Poland’s largest border crossing, Medyka. There, refugee families pushed shopping carts with their belongings, more than a few of them including pets, through a line of tents filled with people offering help: hot soup, free SIM cards, stuffed animals for the kids, a bus to shelter, a Ukrainian flag to drape around their shoulders.

Read excerpts from Jodi’s notebook ➤

More on Ukraine…

MacKenzie Scott, the ex-wife of Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, donated $10 million to the Jewish group HIAS for its work aiding refugees fleeing the war.
Ukraine tried to bolster its surveillance capabilities by asking Israel for access to its potent Pegasus spyware. Israeli officials balked, for fear of upsetting Russia.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy asked President Joe Biden not to sanction Roman Abramovich, the Russian-Jewish oligarch, who Zelenskyy sees as a potential mediator.
Meet the Orthodox, 42-year-old, former IDF soldier on the front lines in Ukraine: “Many Ukrainians think, or wish, that I am from Mossad,” he said.
The Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center is starting an investigation into Russian war crimes in Ukraine.

FROM OUR OPINION SECTION

AIPAC risks irreparably damaging the U.S.-Israel relationship: America’s preeminent pro-Israel lobby recently launched political action committees, enabling it to donate directly to candidates for the first time. But the endorsements have been confusing if not downright dangerous, writes our opinion editor, Laura E. Adkins, especially as the group has stopped holding its annual policy conference, for years the largest and most important Jewish political gathering in the U.S.

Confusing: the group is backing 27 politicians who supported the 2015 Iran Deal, which AIPAC spent millions trying to defeat, claiming it would jeopardize Israel’s security. Dangerous: The group’s “choice to endorse 37 members of Congress who voted to overturn the results of the 2020 election,” Adkins writes, “and whose anti-democratic positions the vast majority of American Jews reject, harms the stability of our country and could jeopardize the future of the U.S.-Israel relationship.” It’s all made worse by the fact that AIPAC is no longer holding the conference, where members could hear all kinds of pro-Israel politicians and make their own decisions who to support. Read her essay ➤

I lost my Jewish community after my interfaith marriage, so I built a new one: When Aileen Weintraub and her non-Jewish fiancé were trying to find a rabbi to marry them, they were told that their children would be damned to hell. Weintraub was shaken, as she was determined to raise her children Jewish, while still honoring her husband’s family traditions. “I knew I would need to rebuild my community in our small rural Hudson Valley town,” Weintraub writes, “I also knew it wouldn’t be easy.” Read her essay ➤

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

Chris Hemsworth as Thor in 'Thor: The Dark World.' (Marvel Studios)

🔨 A Colorado man who pleaded guilty to plotting to bomb a synagogue contends his plea agreement denies him religious freedom by forbidding him from having a replica of Thor’s hammer. The man practices a neo-Norse faith for which the hammer is an important symbol, but the judge previously placed it on a list of banned items since the object has been co-opted by some white supremacist groups. (Forward)

💻 Israeli soldiers in the occupied West Bank are not allowed to leave their shifts until they enter at least 50 names of Palestinians into a database, according a report from our colleagues at Haaretz. The tracking system, known as “Blue Wolf,” has been in operation for more than two years. One soldier interviewed said it can seem like the growth of the database comes at the expense of protecting the public. (Haaretz)

😡 Two Jewish institutions, one in Missouri and one in Pennsylvania, were targeted Wednesday with identical bomb threats that invoked “Ukrainian Jew filth,” according to the Anti-Defamation League. Jewish community centers in Oklahoma, Arizona and New Jersey, and a synagogue in Michigan, have also been threatened in recent weeks with similar language. (Forward)

🚓 Racist and antisemitic graffiti was found near a Florida high school. In addition to swastikas and a reference to the KKK, there was a statement about a school shooting. (Orlando Sentinel)

🎭 A Yiddish theater in Australia is staging a modern adaptation of Isaac Bashevis Singer’s “Yentl,” about a woman who cross-dresses as a male yeshiva student. “Singer may not have been consciously reaching for an overarching theory of trans rights at the time of writing,” one reviewer says, “but it is impossible to miss the play’s extraordinary plea not just for tolerance but understanding and compassion.” (TimeOut)

Shiva call ➤ Boris Dorfman, the last of Lviv’s prewar Jewish residents still living in the city, died at 98. He had an irrepressible spirit and a link to Ukraine’s Jewish past, writing more than 1,000 articles for “Shofar,” a local Yiddish newspaper he co-founded. A 2014 documentary, “Boris Dorfman: A Mentsh,” told his story. Learn more about the movie ➤

What else we’re reading ➤ Conservatives confuse Black ‘Israelite’ groups in labeling Ketanji Brown Jackson as soft on antisemitism … Thousands of Middle East scholars sign resolution endorsing boycott of Israel … Holyland Market, New York’s Israeli mini-mart, is closing its doors after 18 years.

ON THE CALENDAR

Harry Houdini before jumping off the the Harvard Bridge in Boston in 1908. (Wikimedia)

On this day in history: Ehrich Weisz, an escape artist and illusionist, was born on March 24, 1874. You may know him better by his eventual stage name: Harry Houdini. The son of a Hungarian rabbi, he was raised in Appleton, Wisconsin, where, according to legend, he wore tefillin and spoke Yiddish. “Some Houdini historians trace young Ehrich’s interest in magic to his father’s sermons,” Michael Kaminer wrote in 2018. “After seeing the rabbi hold a congregation rapt, the power of performance became clear.” Houdini led the Rabbis’ Sons Theatrical Benevolent Association, which raised money for charity during World War I; Irving Berlin and Al Jolson were also members. Here are some Houdini stories you may not have heard ➤

Last year on this day, we eulogized George Segal who died at 87. Benjamin Ivry wrote how the actor always brought his Jewishness to the screen — even when he was playing non-Jews.

VIDEO OF THE DAY

What we're watching ➤ The trailer for Season 2 of “Tehran,” an action series that follows an Israeli Mossad agent undercover in Iran, portrayed by Niv Sultan, a Sephardic actress born in Jerusalem. “The danger is way bigger, the stakes are higher and the action is on the edge” compared to the first season, Sultan said. As if that wasn’t enough, Glenn Close has joined the cast for the new season. And if this is the first you’re hearing about the series, catch up on the first season now on Apple TV+ so you’re ready for the new episodes when they arrive on May 5.

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Play today’s Vertl puzzle (aka the Yiddish Wordle)

Thanks to Laura E. Adkins, Nora Berman, PJ Grisar and Adam Langer for contributing to today’s newsletter. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at editorial@forward.com.

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