Disturbing Report On Killing Of Ukrainian Christians

[Friends, this is from my friend in Jerusalem. He goes to Ukraine frequently and has many contacts there.]

Some background facts from Ukraine: Militants from the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) and Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) terrorist organizations continue to steal, kill, and threaten priests/pastors and Christians in the separatist-controlled areas of eastern Ukraine. Also, pro-Russian militants continue to seize church buildings and rehabilitation centers to serve as their headquarters, ammunition depots, and firing points from which they continually attack Ukrainian anti-terrorism forces.

Dear Gerry shalom!

How are you!

You have surely heard about the events in Ukraine. Many have thought that we have entered the period of hunters that Jeremiah described: Behold, I am sending for many fishers, declares the LORD, and they shall catch them. And afterward I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain and every hill, and out of the clefts of the rocks (Jeremiah 16:16).

There are hundreds of Jewish refugees from East Ukraine arriving to Israel every month. Statistics – aliyah is up 500%. Many – I’ve heard numbers like 20,000 to 30,000 – are waiting in Ukraine for the Jewish agency and Israeli embassy to proceed their documents and yet they must wait months before they can come to Israel.

Sofa Landver, the minister of absorption promised that if Ukrainian Jews would come to Israel as tourists, then their papers would ready in 10 days to become citizen. I wish it was true.

Here is one testimony of one family we could help:

Naomi: story of my mom’s and sister’s Aliyah.

I am 24 year old, made Aliyah 4 years ago from Lugansk, Ukraine, through MASA program. I worked in the Jewish Agency as a youth leader since I was 16. I volunteered in the IDF as a part of Sar-El program.

As the security situation worsened in Lugansk, my mom Yelena and my sister Sophia Kuznetsova (10 years old) made a decision to make the Aliyah. My mom went to the Jewish Agency on June 3 as the city was bombed by the warplanes. Jewish Agency workers told her that they would start organising her aliyah process starting from June the 30th. This was shocking news in the light of the worsening war situation in Lugansk, as it was now under constant Grad fire – Aliyah was possible only in the end of June… I couldn’t take this anymore – I took a loan from the bank and bought plane tickets to my mom and sister. The only way to fly out of Lugansk was through Moscow as flights through Kiev were cancelled already then. My mom packed the most necessary things for herself and for my sister (mostly summer clothes) and left everything – her home, restaurant that she owned and that was destroyed by the bombing – and they fled for the their lives from Lugansk. The restaurant was closed already in May because of the worsened economical situation and my mom was left with debts. After all this my mom arrives to Israel, with heavy heart (her father was left in Lugansk as men are not allowed to leave the city), but still with hopes up. On June 11 we arrived the office for accepting applicants for aliyah. We were first ignored, then treated with contempt and were told to fill the applications. Within a week, they told us, they’ll contact us again. We didn’t get any calls from them.

I went back to these offices on June 17th in order to explain them our situation, but no one was willing to talk to us and then I was kicked out of the room. I burst in tears as I was shocked by this insensitivity. One of the officials told me to ‘shut up’ and after a while one person gave us an envelop in order to send the documents to NATIV. Then I was given a queue to these offices on August the 30th…

Long story short – they are still waiting for their Aliyah as they don’t have apostille (a special authentication stamp) on the birth certificate of the younger sister. They have run out of money and they cannot return to Ukraine to get these apostilles. A good friend provided 1,500₪ to meet their most acute needs…

I guess there are thousands of cases like these coming in the coming days as the war intensifies in eastern Ukraine.

Some facts from June to July, 2014:

On June 8, during the Trinity Sunday holiday, gunmen under the command of Russian Igor Girkin (Strelkov) kidnapped four members of the Transfiguration Evangelical Church in terrorist occupied Sloviansk, Donetsk Oblast.

Among them were deacons Volodymyr Velychko and Viktor Bradarskyi and Ruvym and Albert Pavenko, two adult sons of the church’s senior pastor. According to one of Sloviansk’s deputy prosecutors, who escaped the DNR’s captivity, the church members were tortured and shoot the next day, June 9, and some were burned in their own car to portray their deaths as the result of shelling from the Ukrainian army. “The victims’ bodies were buried by the terrorists in a mass grave at the Children’s Hospital in Sloviansk, alongside the bodies of two dozen dead terrorists,” said Anton Herashchenko, advisor to the Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA).

On June 14 in Mariupol, Donetsk Oblast, Sergiy Skorobahach, pastor of the Restoration Protestant Church and chairman for the City Council was killed as the pastor’s vehicle was shelled by DNR militants.

On June 15, armed militants looted the premises of the New Generation Evangelical Church in Horlivka, Donetsk Oblast. They stole computers and other equipment from the office, as well as legal documents related to the church’s charitable funds.

On June 16, armed members of the self-proclaimed DNR occupied the Word of Life Church’s building in Horlivka. “Yesterday, after the work day, there was a prayer meeting at the church. Men with guns came and demanded we open all the rooms. The kept us there for about 1.5 hours and then ordered us to leave. They told us that it would now serve as their headquarters and the building itself was nationalized,” one of parishioners said.

On June 17, militants in Donetsk seized the Evening Light Christian Rehabilitation Center. Initially terrorists captured 27 patients, then the head of the center and his assistant, all of whom were held in the basement. Fortunately, they were released the next day.

On June 19 they captured the Word of Life Evangelical Church in Torez (Donetsk Oblast), which is a member of the Protestant Church of Ukraine. “Armed people with Cossack Guard insignia stormed the church building. They ordered us to take the furniture and get out, insisting that these churches are sects and they will be destroyed. The people in the building were threatened with a firing squad if they made a fuss about the inccident,” said Donetsk pastor, Sergiy Kosiak.

On June 21, armed militants seized the Word of Life Protestant Church in Shakhtarsk, Donetsk Oblast. They also captured Pastor Nikolai Kalinichenko, who was later released, and stole his car. “The terrorists declared that, if the pastor continued to engage in religious activities, he would be shot,” a statement indicated. Later, media reported that the Word of Life Church building was used by terrorists of the DNR to hold men aged 20-40 years in order to forcefully recruit them into the militia’s ranks.

On June 26, militants broke into the building of the Evangelical Church of Winners in Druzhkivka, Donetsk Oblast, and took Pastor Pavlo Lisko and his wife to their headquarters. “Armed militants stole money, documents from the safe, and the office computer and took them along with the pastor and his wife to the militants’ headquarters, a building near the Druzhkivka City Council,” said a clergyman. The pastor and his wife were held captive in separate cells and accused of cooperating with Americans and giving assistance to people leaving Donbas. After almost a week of captivity, the church ministers were released.

On July 3, DNR terrorists in Donetsk took captive Greek Catholic priest Tykhon (Sergiy) Kulbaka. Prior to that, he repeatedly received threats, including his car being vandalized with graffiti of Nazi symbols. Finally, on July 14, the priest was released from captivity by the militants, but with compromised health.

On July 3, Patriarch Filaret (Denisenko) of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church under the Kyiv Patriarchate (UOC-KP) stated that in the Luhansk region “worship services are not actually being held in our temples because the separatists-terrorists prohibit it.”

He also said that armed men threatened to execute UOC-KP Bishop of Luhansk and Starobelsk, Afanasiy (Yavrovskiy). Later, militants forcibly expelled the Bishop of Luhansk and also tampered with the brakes of his car, obviously hoping to cause an accident leading to his death.

On July 8, Donetsk terrorists kidnapped UOC-KP Archpriest Juriy Ivanov. “Earlier, separatists came to the priest’s home and demanded that he request an urgent visit from the Archbishop of the Kyivan Patriarchate in Donetsk, Sergiy (Gorobtsov), apparently with the intent of additional abductions,” said UOC-KP Archbishop,Yevstratiy (Zorya). On July 30, after three weeks of captivity, the priest was released and transported to a safe place.

On July 9, armed militants seized the Donetsk Christian University and read this order: due to the military situation in the city, the Donetsk Christian University will be made available to military units of the DNR, including all property, equipment, and other supplies and those who do not obey will face court-martial.

This was reported by former Rector, Mykhailo Cherenkov. He added that dorm residents and the University’s employees were kicked out, but on the next day they were allowed to take computers, documents, and personal belongings. “At this moment, armed militants are living in the dorms of the Donetsk Christian University. The gates are blocked, there are checkpoints, people are being held prisoner on the property, and much of the militants’ weapons and equipment is being kept there,” said Oleg Shtein, University Vice-Rector of Administration, in comments to the IRF.

On July 15, Catholic priest Victor Vonsovych, of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ Parish in Horlivka and Donetsk Dean of the Roman Catholic Church, was arrested. He was held in the occupied SBU (Ukrainian Secret Service) building and was released from captivity on July 25. Militants warned the priest that he would be shot if he returned to Horlivka. “Now they prey on Catholic priests,” said Bishop Stanislav Shyrokoradiuk from the Ordinary Kharkiv-Zaporizhia Diocese of the Roman Catholic Church. According to him, there are many provocations against peaceful civilians and the clergy are doing everything possible to rescue people.

On July 27, the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Debaltseve, Donetsk Oblast, was destroyed by artillery fire. The Church website said: “Directly opposite the church building was a deployment of the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic’s militia. They hid in the bushes with weapons, alongside Grad, and began firing mortars. Gunmen used volley tactics, firing from one location and then quickly moving to another part of the city to continue firing.”

On July 27, near Ilovaisk, Pastor Oleksandr Kobzev of Christ Church was kidnapped. This was reported by Donetsk Mufti Said Ismagilov. The pastor’s location remains unknown.

Disturbing report on killing of Ukrainian Christians