On September 22, 1942, the small town of Medzhibizh was shaken by unheard-of cruelty. On that day, local police and SS units took the entire Jewish population out of the settlement. These were men, women, children and the elderly, who were no longer destined to return to their homes. And after the anti-Jewish campaign, Medzhibizh, once a powerful Jewish center, joined the list of “Juden Frei” (Free from Jews).
On September 22, 2015, a minibus of the Khmelnytskyi Charitable Foundation "Hesed Besht" arrived at the graves near Medzhybozh with members of the minyan, which meets at the Day Development Center. Conscious elderly people clearly observe the memorial dates and, in accordance with Jewish tradition, arrange joint prayers in memory of the deceased. Medzhybozh burials have a non-standard shape. The grave lids look like giant concrete ships, moored forever in the tracts of Podillia. In addition to them, there is also a fenced area and a massive stele, which contains information about this place. The members of the minyan read the kaddish and prayed for their innocently murdered brothers.
It is simply impossible to be in Medzhibozh and not visit the Baal Shem Tov's grave, and even on the eve of Yom Kippur. So the visitors visited the tzaddik's tomb, where they wrote notes and prayed at the grave. Another prayer was held in the Basha Synagogue - a small reconstructed meeting house where, according to legend, the Baal Shem Tov prayed.
Already at the entrance to Khmelnytskyi, the bus stopped at the Holocaust Memorial at the site of the Proskuriv ghetto shooting. The fate of these Jews also ended in September 1942, so the members of the minyan prayed here too.
