Gennady Kernes with Rabbi Moshe Moskowitz.

Kharkov Mayor Airlifted to Israel for Treatment

Gennady Kernes, the mayor of Kharkov, Ukraine, who was critically wounded in an assassination attempt Monday, has been flown by emergency medical airlift to Israel for ongoing treatment.

Kharkov city council spokesperson Irina Kutsenko said Israeli physicians arrived late at night on April 28, and strongly recommended that Kernes be transferred to Israel for continued treatment, according to local reports. “The plane departed from the Kharkov airport at 3:20 a.m. Kharkov time,” the spokesperson said.

Valery Boiko, director of surgery at the Kharkov Institute for General and Emergency Surgery noted that Kernes suffered severe damage to his thoracic organs and abdominal cavity. “The condition of the patient is critical, close to very severe,” Boiko said.

Gennady Kernes is among the leading Jewish officials in Ukraine.

Rabbi Moshe Moskovitz, chief rabbi and Chabad-Lubavitch emissary in Kharkov, said “a team of Israeli doctors flew here in a special hospital plane, and after they assessed his condition and saw that things were stable, they took him to Israel for further treatment. The Israelis said that he was treated very well here in Kharkov, but some treatments are more advanced in Israel, which has more experience with bullet wounds, especially.”

He added that “here, there is such a thing as medical tourism, and because of the high quality care of Israeli doctors and hospitals, people often travel to Israel to get treated, and at the same time, Israeli doctors are also traveling here. People are very impressed with how the Jewish community takes care of each other.”

In the meantime, “all we can do right now is pray,” said the rabbi, noting Kernes’ Hebrew name, Moshe ben Chana. “He’ a good friend of the Jewish community and has helped us in many ways.”

“He’s very proud of his Jewish heritage: He received a Jewish name six years ago when he had a bris (circumcision) through us. He puts on tefillin regularly, shakes the lulav and esrog. We are all davening (praying) for him.”

It remains unclear who was behind the assassination attempt. Kernes was initially an outspoken opponent of the pro-West Maidan movement that toppled President Viktor Yanukovych in February.

But he has since softened his stance toward the new Kiev government and recently insisted in public that he does not support the armed pro-Russia insurgents or any annexation of Ukrainian territory, and as mayor ordered actions to be taken in opposition to violence by local pro-Russian activists.

Kharkov is in eastern Ukraine where pro-Russian gunmen have seized government buildings, set up roadblocks and staged protests to demand autonomy or elections that would lead to outright annexation by Russia.