Ukraine marks 85th anniversary of Babyn Yar massacre

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was among international dignitaries at a special ceremony held on Wednesday 7 October at the Babyn Yar memorial site, marking the 85th anniversary of the massacre of Kyiv’s Jews.

Among the diplomats and representatives from nearly 50 countries taking part at the 2026 memorial were Israeli Minister Ze’ev Elkin, Israeli Ambassador to Ukraine Roey Rosenblit, Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan, senior ministers and members of parliament from Ukraine and Germany, and Rabbanim and Chabad shluchim (representatives) from Kyiv, elsewhere in Ukraine and abroad.

During the ceremony, a tree was planted in memory of the victims.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy said: “It is important that, despite Russia’s brutal war, our partners are able to come to Kyiv on the 85th anniversary of this tragedy to pay tribute to all the innocent victims of this terrible crime. And it is our shared duty to stand united against evil so that such tragedies never happen again.”

Harav Yonatan Markovitch, Chief Rabbi of Kyiv and Chabad shliach in the city, then recited chapters of Tehillim in memory of the Jews murdered.

In a statement on social media, Yad Vashem wrote: “Today at Babyn Yar in Kyiv, where 85 years ago more than 33,000 Jewish men, women and children were murdered in just two days, Yad Vashem Chairman @AmbDaniDayan reminded us that the victims were not a number. Each had a name. An age. A hometown. A family. A future.

“They were murdered because they were Jews. Their lives must never be reduced to statistics, and their memory must never be erased, distorted or manipulated for political ends. “Historical truth is not a weapon to be bent to the needs of the present. It is a responsibility entrusted to us.”

In his remarks, Rabbi Markovitch stressed the importance of perpetuating the memory of those murdered at Babi Yar, while highlighting the continued existence and flourishing of Jewish life in Ukraine — precisely in the place where the Nazis sought to destroy Kyiv’s Jewish community.

Writing on social media, he said: “For the Jewish people, Babyn Yar is a wound that has remained unhealed for generations. Remembrance is the responsibility of the living. For hatred never begins with a gunshot. First come the words, the humiliation, the indifference to others’ pain—and only then does evil arrive, which is already difficult to stop It is especially important to me to see Ukraine’s leadership and diplomats from many countries here today. This means that the memory of Babyn Yar remains part not only of Jewish history, but also of the memory of Ukraine and the entire civilized world.”

Over the course of two days in September 1941, 33,771 Jewish men, women and children were marched to the edge of a ravine in Kyiv where they were forced to strip before being shot and murdered.

Between 1941 and 1943, an estimated 100,000 civilians and prisoners of war, including Jews, Roma and Ukrainians were murdered at the site.

Around 1.5 million Ukrainian Jews were murdered during the Holocaust.