The city of Chernobyl, located 80 miles north of Kyiv, is best known for the nuclear reactor disaster of 1986. On February 14, a drone struck the protective shell covering the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, causing a fire and significant damage to the shelter.
Jews have a long and storied history in the city, first settling in Chernobyl in the 16th century. In the 18th century, a prominent Hasidic movement was founded in the city by Rebbe Menachem Nahum Twersky, a disciple of the founder of Hasidism, the Baal Shem Tov. In 1898, Chernobyl had a population of 10,800 people, of which 7,200 were Jews. Thousands of people used to come from around the region to hear the teachings and receive blessings from Mordechai Twersky, son of Menachem Nahum who continued as Grand Rabbe of Chernobyl. All of his eight sons became rabbis around Ukraine, as did their children.
The members of the Twersky dynasty escaped Chernobyl before the war of 1917. The Jews who did not leave were subject to programs in 1919, and a massive fire that destroyed over 100 of their homes. As a result, the Jewish population declined drastically prior to World War II.
Chernobyl was occupied by the German Army from August 1941 to November 1943. When the Germans arrived, the 400 Jews who remained in the city were gathered near the synagogue, marched to a ditch by the Jewish cemetery, undressed, and shot on November 19, 1941.
In 1977 Chernobyl became home to the country's first nuclear power plant. On April 26, 1986, a nuclear reactor exploded, releasing radioactive materials into the atmosphere, which spread across Europe. It was the largest nuclear disaster in history. Along with the residents of the nearby city of Pripyat, the 14,000 residents of Chernobyl were evacuated to the newly built city of Slavutych; most have never returned. Chernobyl is largely a ghost town today, but a small number of people still live there, and the city has two general stores and a hotel.
The final resting place of Menachem Nahum Twersky, sits within the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (the one-thousand-square-mile swath of contaminated land ringing the malfunctioned reactor), along with an old synagogue and other Jewish heritage sites. Many Jews visit the home of former prominent rabbis, and an estimated 60,000 tourists travel to Chernobyl annually to explore the empty swimming pool, abandoned school, and memorials in the evacuated area.
New Square, an Hasidic town in Rochester County, New York, was modeled after Chernobyl by a succession of rabbinical leaders from the Twersky family.
Thousands of descendants of Rabbi Twersky live in Poland, the United States, and Israel.
.jpg)
Photo Credits:
Chernobyl Power Plant in 2013:
By Paweł 'pbm' Szubert (talk) - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=27270396
Pripyat Montage:
By Wikiwind (montage); (WT-en) RealLeo at English Wikivoyage (Pripyat CentralSquare.jpg); Jorge Franganillo from Barcelona, Spain (Pripyat (38307778522).jpg, Pripyat welcome sign (38071252145).jpg, Pripyat (38338630751).jpg); Alexander Blecher, blecher.info (Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (2015) 68.JPG); Shanomag (The Abandoned Sport Hall in Pripyat - Chernobyl.jpg).Wikiwind - Own work(Original text :), CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=73959953
Slavutych:
By IAEA Imagebank - https://www.flickr.com/photos/iaea_imagebank/8389775194/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=56377349
