Reporting From the Ground by D. Hart

The Jewish Home | SEPTEMBER 30, 2022 Reporting from the Ground

Times of Israel Reporter Lazar Berman Recounts His Experience Covering the Russian-Ukrainian War

By D. Hart

On a blustery day in early March, Israeli-American journalist Lazar Berman found himself waiting at the Polish border town of Przemysl, a main artery for people wishing to enter or exit Ukraine. Every few hours, another train would pull up and disgorge masses of refugees fleeing the battlefields and relentless artillery strikes.

But Berman was heading in the opposite direction – into the war zone that so many sought to escape. Over 100,000 thousand Russian troops had invaded Ukraine a week earlier, causing shockwaves around the world and touching off almost seven months of bloodshed.

The Russian offensive was split into four different theaters: two armored divisions snaked from Crimea into southern Ukraine, while three tank brigades pushed into Lukhansk and Donbas in the east. Meanwhile, missile and artillery strikes pounded the capital of Kiev as hundreds of elite paratroopers assaulted Hostomel Airport outside the city.

Now, Berman was heading into the inferno. As the diplomatic correspondent for the Times of Israel, Berman was off to report firsthand on the hostilities for readers back home.

This was his second of three visits to the war-torn country and the first since the beginning of the invasion. In an interview with TJH, Berman recounts his experiences embedding with Ukrainian troops, dodging artillery fire, and reporting from cities under siege such as Kharkov, Izyum, Uman and Lviv.

“The purpose was to give my Times of Israel readers, you know, in Israel, across the world, an accurate view of what is going on there,” Berman told TJH. “Obviously, my focus is going to be more on the Jewish community and anything having to do with Israel.

“There’s plenty of that in terms of what Israel is doing to the country to get refugees out, how the Jewish communities are helping people, Jewish soldiers, IDF veterans that are fighting.”

Getting into Ukraine

Berman had last been in Ukraine only a few weeks prior, sent to cover the happenings as the world waited with bated breath to see if Russian President Vladimir Putin would indeed unleash total war. Like many, Berman had assumed that Putin’s months-long arms military buildup was a bluff.

“I was there in February, really just before the war started. I came out with the impression that there was going to be no war,” Berman said. “I left, and I came back in March to Lviv primarily.”

Then, Berman found himself in a country fighting for its life, with all of the accompanying danger.

“I’d say the most interesting thing about this trip was at the beginning of the war, things are a little bit more hairy because you didn’t know exactly what was happening. There was much more panic in the country as refugees were all over the place,” Berman recalled.

“There was a lot of panic also from Ukrainians who were trying to find Russian collaborators,” Berman added. “There was a concern that someone would have kind of an itchy trigger finger, and you know, that there was one Israeli who was actually killed that way.”

Getting into Ukraine was challenging.

“You can’t fly into Ukraine,” he noted. “I flew into Poland and then I took a train from Przemysl , which is a Polish border

town, and there’s no train schedule,” he said.

“You basically go to the station, refugees get off the train, they’re loaded up with aid and then you hop on,” Berman continued, adding that he himself was pulled off the train at the border by the Ukrainian guards for about a half hour for unknown reasons.

Jews in the Midst of War

The fate of the Jewish community in Ukraine was a major focus of Berman’s. Historically, Ukrainian Jews experienced virulent anti-Semitism, suffering from a series of pogroms such as the Chmielnicki Cossack riots and the Babi Yar massacre during World War II.

But prior to Russia’s invasion, Ukraine boasted 200,000 Jews and numerous kosher restaurants, summer camps, and synagogues. The outbreak of hostilities drew the attention of Jews around the world concerned over the welfare of the brethren in harm’s way.

Numerous Jewish organizations on several continents ran campaigns to assist Ukrainian Jewry, from Jewish Federations in North America, Chabad, Israel’s Foreign Ministry, and the Jewish Agency. The intensive international campaign to help Ukrainian Jews was so comprehensive that community centers were renowned as a place to find vital services such as food, medicine, and shelter.

Local rabbis didn’t distinguish between Jews and non-Jews when offering aid. Berman recounted a surreal scene in which he shared a Shabbat meal with dozens of non-Jewish Ukrainians together with Rabbi Liron Ederi, who labored to help refugees from all over the country.

“The shuls have really become, well, they always were more than just the synagogues and community centers. They were welfare centers, schools,” Berman shared. “And that even became more obvious and apparent during the war. And certainly, beyond the Jewish community, people see that, you know, these rabbis, synagogues are places to go to be taken care of.”

He noted, “They’re very well-run. They’re effective. There’s food coming through and they’ll take care of you. So these non-Jewish refugees are eating kosher food, having Shabbat meals, being hosted by the Jewish community… it’s really something.”

Many had feared for the safety and welfare of local Jews, especially in light of the country’s history and groups such as Ukraine’s Lions of Azov Battallion – a paramilitary militia renowned for its neo-Nazi and far-right ideology. But Berman said that he never heard of any instances of Jews being targeted, stressing that he himself never experienced any signs of anti-Semitism during his multiple trips to the country.

He did say, however, that Ukraine repeatedly attempted to spread a narrative in which Russia was attacking Jews in order to engineer international condemnation. A key example was Russia’s purported bombing of the Babi Yar memorial, an incident which earned widespread anger yet was later found to be fabricated.

“I think this war is not about the Jews in any way. I think, yes, there’s been ways in which it was in Ukraine’s interest to make it seem like the Russians are targeting Jews,” he said. “So, you know, they said that the Babi Yar monument had been damaged. I think that turned out to be an exaggeration. There were Holocaust survivors who were killed.

“In Kharkiv, the yeshiva took some shrapnel. I think it’s a couple of Jewish buildings that took some shrapnel,” Berman continued. “But I really think there’s no reason to believe that Jews are being targeted by the Russians and certainly not

by any Ukrainian. So, thank G-d, I think that this is really not about the Jews.”

“There was a concern that someone would have kind of an itchy trigger finger.”

Wave of Refugees

The invasion created Europe’s largest refugee crisis since World War II, as over 5.3 million Ukrainians flooded neighboring countries in a quest to escape the horrors of war. It also sparked a raging debate in Israel, as different political parties in the governing coalition argued to what extent the Jewish State should offer the multitudes shelter until it was safe to return home.

While left-wing factions such as Meretz and Labor demanded that Israel offer a helping hand to civilians fleeing war, rightwing parties warned that the majority of refugees allowed in would settle in Israel permanently and refuse to leave. Additional concerns revolved around keeping Israel’s Jewish majority in order to maintain its Jewish character.

The debate went all the way to Israel’s High Court of Justice, as the Ukrainian embassy sued Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked for capping the number of refugees at 25,000. Berman is a firm supporter of lending a helping hand, regretting that the government prevented more Ukrainians from reaching safe shores.

“I think they should have accepted more. Israel could have accepted more,” he declared. “I think another 10,000 or 20,000 wouldn’t have changed anything in

84 the country if they’re here for six months or two years. It doesn’t look like anything for Israel to worry about in terms of deThe Jewish Home | SEPTEMBER 30, 2022 mographics. It would be the moral thing to do.” On the Frontlines Being on the ground in Ukraine provided Berman a front-row seat to the world’s largest military conflict since the 1991 Gulf War, traveling in places such as Kharkhiv while the city remained nominally under Russian occupation. At one point, Berman was embedded with a front-line Ukrainian combat unit that took part in the effort to dislodge the eastern city of Izium from Russian control. While admitting that “there should have been more moments of that,” Berman says that he never felt that his life was in any imminent danger during his three trips to the battle-scarred country. “I didn’t see any people directly shooting at each other. When I was there, it was before the Ukrainian counteroffensive,” Berman said, referring to the Ukrainian military’s successful offensive earlier this month. “It was, you know, an artillery fight,” he added. “So I saw the HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System). I felt the Russian strikes in Kharkiv. I was definitely in the aftermath of many Russian strikes…but at the time, there was not a lot of traditional force-on-force fighting.”

A Military Background

Berman’s background made him well-suited to understand and report back the military aspects of the Russo-Ukrainian War. Emigrating to Israel as a young adult, the ___ year-old native of Rhode Island served as an officer in the IDF’s Givati Brigade and Bedouin Reconnaissance Battalion and is today a captain in the reserves.

After finishing his military service, Berman worked for years at The Dado Center for Interdisciplinary Military Studies, the IDF’s office think tank that is tasked with developing new methods of fighting for the General Staff. He is currently a PhD candidate in war studies at King’s College London, a highly regarded university in the United Kingdom.

“This could not be more up my alley in terms of a topic to write about,” said Berman. “And as a reserve officer in the IDF, I’m quite comfortable with this type of situation.”

Berman noted that his extensive military and defense experience assisted him in covering the war in Ukraine, providing him with the necessary tactical understanding, situational awareness, and an ability to operate under difficult physical conditions.

“Just being calm, realizing when you’re in danger, when you’re not – being physically robust and being able to endure,” Berman stated. “You know, the first time I was there, it was below freezing. I’d be standing there at night, not knowing when a train would come. Being able to carry stuff and to do whatever it is.”

Berman recalled the multiple “sleepless nights” he underwent during the early days of the war, noting that “being physically used to the physical hardship is also important, kind of being comfortable around soldiers” was key.

In addition, Berman’s IDF experience resulted in him being “comfortable around guns. I kind of have a sense of when you look at a unit, how well-trained they are, how serious they look, how well equipped they are… all those things are pretty much advantages that most other reporters don’t have.”

While covering the war, Berman chanced upon a unit in the Ukrainian armed forces staffed entirely by IDF

veterans. The volunteers hoped that the combat experience from their mandatory military service in Israel could be put to good use defending Ukraine from its eastern neighbor.

“It was a unit that was kind of pieced together; friends and people who know each other. A small unit,” Berman recalled. “I interviewed them. I tried to go on a mission with them, but I was not given permission. I’m still in touch with them.” A Never-Ending War?

Few had given Ukraine a chance in the weeks leading up to Russia’s invasion. The Russian military was widely viewed as one of the world’s premier fighting forces, boasting advanced cyber capabilities, air defense systems, a modern navy fleet, Su34 fighter jets and Iskander missiles.

With Russia outnumbering Ukraine by a significant margin, almost all Western intelligence agencies predicted that the war would be over within a matter of weeks. So pessimistic was the Biden administration of Ukraine’s survival that it offered to evacuate President Volodymyr Zelensky to the United States soon after hostilities commenced.

“I don’t see Russia just raising their hands and giving up.”

But the vaunted Russian military soon fell apart, its invasion force getting cut to pieces by Ukrainian defenders while plagued by issues such as logistics, ammunition, and manpower. What was expected to be a lighting war soon turned into a prolonged slog that many say can end up lasting years.

Yet Ukrv aine may have turned the corner with its recent counteroffensive. Launched on September 6 after weeks of planning, Ukrainian forces broke through Russian lines to retake over 2,500 square kilometers and free major cities such as Izyum and Kharkhiv.

While acknowledging that the counteroffensive changes everything, Berman remains doubtful that Ukraine will succeed in dealing Russia a decisive victory on the battlefield that would bring the seven months of fighting decisively and swiftly to an end. His sentiments come as Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a general mobilization, a major escalation unseen since World War II that could call up as many as 300,000 reservists.

“If you would’ve asked me two weeks ago, I would have said yes, it will drag on for years. The success of the Ukrainian counter-offensive opens up new possibilities for them to actually push them out militarily,” Berman predicted. “But I think that still the most likely scenario is some kind of low level on-again, off-again conflict for years,

“I don’t see Russia just raising their hands and giving up.”