Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies

In this article, featured in last week's Detroit Jewish News, you'll read about Mr. Gerry Cook, who continues to be an active player in the Jewish education miracle that is unfolding at Camp Ramah-Ukraine. Friends like Gerry present the Schechter Institute with the privilege of building better and stronger Jews in Israel and throughout the world through our MA and rabbinic programs, the TALI Education Fund and Midreshet Yerushalayim.

Learning To Be Jewish Again
Robert A. Sklar / Editor

Gerald Cook

Until the collapse of the former Soviet Union in 1991, it was common for Ukrainian Jews to grow up without a hint of their Jewish heritage.

However, a summer camp marking its 10th anniversary in Ukraine - a struggling nation of 49 million people, including 500,000 Jews - can proudly point to deepening the Jewish identity of hundreds of campers, thanks to Farmington Hills attorney Gerald Cook, a major financial supporter.

Jews have lived in Ukraine for 1,000 years. Today, the country is nationalistic and continues to be a potential breeding ground for anti-Jewish sentiment. At the same time, it's trying to rebound economically and emotionally from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster of 1986.

In August, 180 youngsters ages 9-16 arrived from 10 cities across Ukraine to learn about Judaism and Israel at Camp Ramah-Yachad (Together). It was held this year in the countryside near the capital city of Kiev, a partner community of the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit.

The Ukraine camp, which moves around each year, is part of Midreshet Yerushalayim, the Eastern European and former Soviet Union outreach arm of the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, Israel's center for Masorti, or Conservative, Judaism.

"This camp is about Jewish renewal and the future of Judaism - and the joy of being Jewish - in a region where it was almost wiped out, first by Hitler and then by communism," says Cook, trustee for the Detroit-based Ben N. Teitel Charitable Trust.

Through the trust, Cook, a member of Adat Shalom Synagogue in Farmington Hills, has given the camp about $50,000 a year, this year almost 60 percent of the $85,000 operating budget. Ben Teitel, who died in 1985, was Cook's uncle and a streetwise native Detroiter with a heart of gold.

Camp director Gila Katz, a Ukrainian native who made aliyah in 1996, looked back on this summer's experience in a conversation with Israeli writer Simon Griver. "In the first camp in 1993, the youngsters barely knew they were Jewish, but after more than a decade of Jewish renewal, these children have a sophisticated sense of Jewish identity," she said.

Most campers attend Midreshet Yerushalyim-sponsored schools or enrichment programs. For some, though, Camp Ramah-Yachad was their first exposure to Judaism. Katz recounted how 11-year-old Igor's "eyes lit up every time he encountered a new Jewish ritual."

Cook's generosity is channeled via Midreshet Yerushalayim to the two-week camp, which charges $10 for all but the poorest children. Griver called that seemingly nominal fee "a significant sum in a country where the average monthly salary is $100." The Jewish Agency for Israel and the World Council of Conservative/Masorti Synagogues also provide funding. Still, there's a waiting list of 100. For information on how to contribute, contact the Schechter Institute through e-mail: pr@schechter.org.il

The camp's 35-person staff serves up drama, music, dancing, sports and swimming as well as Jewish programming.

Marked Changes
Philip Gelpert, then a Ukrainian high school student from Uzgorod in the Carpathian Mountains, was a camper a decade ago. He recalls a campground void of Jewish feeling. He later made aliyah, but returned this year as a counselor. He was impressed that "most of the children were familiar with Hebrew and some could even fluently speak the language."

He added that prayer is no longer something to shun and that Jewish knowledge abounds among the campers.

Food is a camp focal point. Breakup of the Soviet Union forced the standard of living to fall in many Ukrainian homes. "The physical and nutritional sustenance provided by the camp is just as important as the spiritual benefits offered," Gelpert told Griver.

Cook's late bubbe Bessie Teitel, who died in 1981, was from Zhivatov, Ukraine. That link was the original spur to his interest in the camp. Cook embraced the camp because of its commitment to Jewish renewal. He wants Judaism to resonate beyond just Holocaust memories and support for Israel - important as those things are.

His commitment is against a historical backdrop laden with 70 years of communism and a Soviet regime that, as the camp director told Griver, imposed "a cultural and spiritual Holocaust on its Jewish citizens."

The Jewish spirit never died, said Gila Katz, "but the scars remain." Today, she said, "Many Russian-speaking Jews still feel ashamed of their Jewishness."

So Midreshet Yerushalayim's challenge, she said, is "to reconnect these people to their rich Jewish heritage, or to at least get them to agree to give their children a Jewish education."

At least 700 former campers and counselors have made aliyah; most are students or in the army. Another 100 remain in Ukraine; many work in the schools and all are active in the rejuvenated Jewish community.

Ties That Bind
Hagit Sabag, an Israeli-born rabbinical student at the Schechter Institute, spent her third summer at Camp Ramah-Yachad this year. She wanted to visit Ukraine to learn about Jews who speak Russian. "Despite the differences between Russian-speaking Ashkenazi Jewry and Israel's Oriental communities," she told Simon Griver, "I still feel we are one people." Camp Ramah-Yachad alumni no doubt will continue to help influence the renewal of Jewish life in Ukraine. Hurdles remain, though. The federal government has helped fight Jew haters, but they persist locally, where bleak economic, political and social conditions converge to water seeds of hatred. "This renewal," says Katz, whose parents lost their entire families in the Holocaust, "has been the most important achievement of the Jewish people since the establishment of Israel in 1948." I thought Katz's assessment was a bit exaggerated until I realized how remarkable it was that Judaism in Ukraine had survived both World War II and the Cold War. Jerry Cook hasn't yet visited the camp, but he hopes to do so with his wife, Barbara. Their daughter Cheryl was a counselor in 1993, the camp's first year. Crucial to the camp's story, Cook says, is the role it plays in attracting people - professionals, counselors and campers alike - who want to transmit the Torah's gifts inside this ancient land bordering the Black Sea in Eastern Europe. Cook's greatest joy from Camp Ramah-Yachad? As the camp's mitzvah maker told me this week: "Seeing happy children doing Jewish things."

Re-printed with permission from the Detroit Jewish News.