Belgrade Jewish Youth Surprise a Seasoned American Writer

Steve Lipman, a writer for the Jewish Week newspaper spent Passover 2003 in Serbia with the Jewish community. This is his personal account of what it was like for him, as an American, to spend such a meaningful holiday with a community that has seen so much pain. Upon request, JDC facilitated the logistics of his trip.

"On the first evening of Pesach this year, two long, table-cloth-covered tables filled the social hall on the third floor of the Jewish Community building in Belgrade. Places were set for 50 people -- young adults, high school, and college-aged, who were to attend a seder that I was to lead.

Following erev yom services in the Belgrade synagogue, the young members of Serbia's small Jewish community found their way into the seder room. Soon, all the seats were occupied and young Belgrade Jews, dressed for the holiday in skirts and suits, showed up. More seats had to be brought in.

The seder began on time, the kids listened respectfully, staying through the meal and birkat hamazon and the rest of the seder, until the final songs. I have seen the rebirth of Jewish communities through the former Iron Bloc of Europe. But the overflow crowd, I told them, reinforced an old feeling. Miracles didn't happen to the Jewish people only three millennia ago at the Red Sea. A room full of young people, who grew up under Communism, who hear stories about Nazism, who had heard how dangerous it had been to assert their Jewishness ... these young people who chose to come to a seder on a weeknight, when movies and homework beckoned, who wanted to know how to live as Jews, is a miracle in our days."