More than 30 thousand pilgrims are expected to arrive in Uman to celebrate Rosh Hashanah, which corresponds to the average rate of visitation in the period before the coronavirus pandemic and in peacetime, said the first deputy mayor of Uman Oleg Ganich.
“Travel agencies have already sold more than 30 thousand tickets for flights and to places of pilgrimage to Uman. Therefore, we expect more than 30 thousand pilgrims. This is the number of pilgrims who came to us before the coronavirus and in times of peace, when there was no war,” he said on the air of the national telethon on Wednesday.
At the same time, Ganich noted that the pilgrims are not stopped by warnings of danger from either the Israeli authorities or the Ukrainian authorities. “They believe that meeting the new year at the tomb of Tzadik Nachman guarantees them a happy, kind, cheerful and bountiful year,” he said
Last year, according to official figures, 23,000 pilgrims were registered, Ganich recalled. He noted that the official figures did not differ significantly from the actual figures – “200-300-500 people at most.”
In 2023, Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year) will be celebrated from September 15 to 17.
About 5,000 Hasidic pilgrims have already arrived in Uman, Cherkasy region to celebrate the New Year according to the Jewish calendar (Rosh Hashanah), which this year will take place from 6 to 8 September, according to the Wikka Cherkasy publication.
“This year, pilgrims travel to Ukraine in advance, because last year, due to enhanced anti-epidemic measures to prevent the spread of coronavirus, not everyone was able to attend the celebration of Rosh Hashanah in Uman,” the message says.
According to the newspaper, head of the State Migration Service in Cherkasy region Ivan Shapran paid a working visit to Uman and coordinated with the staff of the Uman department of the institution further steps to prevent and identify violators of migration legislation.
Israeli citizens can use a visa-free travel regime while on the territory of Ukraine for up to 90 days within 180 days.
As of Friday morning, the number of Hasidic pilgrims in front of Novi Yarylovychi checkpoint on the border with Belarus has slightly decreased, and now there are about 700 people, said the speaker of the State Border Service of Ukraine Andriy Demchenko.
“As of 10:00, we have information that the number of foreign pilgrims has slightly decreased. If yesterday morning and evening there were about a thousand of them, then at the moment there may be about 700 of them,” said Demchenko to the Interfax-Ukraine agency on Friday.
He also said that he hopes that the pilgrims heeded to the calls of the State Border Service.
‘It’s radical to say that they left largely – we do not observe such a situation yet, and we do not have such information. But we hope that those foreigners nevertheless heeded to the explanations that our employees gave them, emphasizing that the decision to ban entry for foreigners will not be revised until September 28 and they will not be able to enter the territory of our state, taking into account the fact that the purpose of their trip was a pilgrimage, which does not fall under the category of exceptions for foreigners who can enter the territory of our country,” Demchenko said.
The speaker also reported that pilgrims are trying to get to Ukraine through other checkpoints, but these are isolated cases, and after arriving at the passport control line, they are denied entry and return back.
“This situation happens every day, through other checkpoints along the state border in general. But these are single citizens or very small groups of foreigners. When they arrive at the passport control line, they are denied entry and return back,” Demchenko said.
In turn, the official representative of the State Border Committee of Belarus Anton Bychkovsky said that about 600 Hasidic pilgrims out of about 1,200 who were blocked at the Belarusian-Ukrainian border have left it and are returning deep into Belarus.
“Now 570 Hassid pilgrims are leaving the border,” Bychkovsky said.
According to him, after passing through passport control, the pilgrims get on buses and leave the border deep into Belarus.
Earlier, hundreds of Hasidic pilgrims gathered near Novi Yarylovychi – Nova Huta checkpoint, wishing to get to the Ukrainian city of Uman to celebrate Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.
Belarusian border guards allowed the pilgrims to pass, but Ukrainian border guards did not allow them to enter the territory of Ukraine due to restrictions on the entry of foreign citizens and stateless persons into the country, introduced in order to combat the spread of coronavirus.
Nearly 25,000 Hasidim arrived to Ukraine to celebrate Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year) 5780, which is celebrated from September 29 through the evening of October 1 this year, according the Jewish calendar.
As a press service of the State Border Guard Service reported on Saturday, for the last 24 hours border guards registered arrival of 5,687 Hasidic pilgrims, who were seeking for entry to Ukraine.
Overall, border guards at the checkpoints in Kyiv, Odesa, Vinnytsia and on the borders with Poland, Slovakia and Romania have already documented the arrival of 24,782 pilgrims in the prescribed manner.
Since the beginning of the arrival of Hasidim from September 6, State Border Service officials refused entry to eight Israeli citizens due to the lack of necessary documents and a ban on entry to Ukraine during a previous visit.
