<i>Hachnosos Sefer Torah</i> In Hungary,

An ornate, new Sefer Torah was recently welcomed to the Dejupe Synagogue in Budapest, Hungary. The synagogue, which serves many Arachim alumnae, had long felt the need for a new, Sefer Torah to be composed as a replacement for the old Torah scrolls that had been in use in the synagogue since before the Second World War. Rabbi Shmuel Ya'ari, who has served as Arachim's national coordinator for the organization's Hungarian outreach activity for several years, took responsibility for the Sefer Torah's composition by an expert, sofer stam in Israel. Financial support for the project was provided in part by local Jewish community members under the leadership of Rabbi Sheni Horasti, himself an Arachim alumnus and current Arachim outreach activist in Hungary.

Many local Jewish residents participated in the stirring parade through the streets of Budapest accompanying the Sefer Torah to it's new home. Many were Arachim seminar alumnae for whom this was the first experience of it's kind.

Rabbi Yoseph Wallis, Arachim's CEO, who had arrived in Hungary to participate in the occasion, did not attempt to hide his ebullience as he proudly marched through the streets of Budapest with a Sefer Torah in his arms and Arachim alumnae at his side while local gentile residents rubbed their eyes in amazement at the sight of the Jewish people returning with their Torah scroll 60 years after the demolishment of all Hungarian Jewry in the Holocaust.

Rabbi Wallis addressed participants with the story of his grandfather Rabbi Shraga Feivel Moskowitz, a"h, who had been a rosh yeshiva and distinguished educator in Hungary. Having survived the Holocaust in a labor camp, Rabbi Moskowitz became the very last Jew to be murdered in that camp by the Nazis before all the prisoners and commanders of the facility immediately before the arrival of the Russians who had come to liberate the concentration camp for refusing to eat non-kosher meat. "And now,"concluded Rabbi Wallis triumphantly, "We have conquered them and have returned to dance with the Torah and sanctify G-d's name on the streets of Hungary!"

During the seudas mitzva marking the celebration, participants were addressed by Rabbi Shmuel Ya'ari who offered his blessing to the Arachim alumnae who had merited to receive the Sefer Torah. During his address, Rabbi Ya'ari noted the warm, continuos relationship that Arachim maintains with the some 300 Arachim seminar alumnae living in Budapest today.

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