Eli Sufrin was admitted to University College hospital with Covid-19 just before Passover. He was rushed there by the Jewish volunteer ambulance service, Hatzola, after they had called at his house to check up on him. While he was in hospital, another volunteer organisation took care of Eli’s family’s shopping for Passover as they were self-isolating. Twice, a local restaurant cooked and delivered supper for the family, and when Eli’s wife wanted to send him kosher food to eat and books to read, Lecheiris, a local volunteer group, took the package to the hospital for her.
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Eli Sufrin stands for a portrait in Stamford Hill, north London. He contracted the coronavirus before Passover and was in hospital for nine days.
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Hershy Tunk, the founder of Lecheiris UK, sits at his desk answering calls and monitoring WhatsApp groups.
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Left, Ari Feferkorn prepares kosher meals at home. Six months ago he started Bedside Kosher, a free home-cooked meal service for Jewish patients in hospital, which is supported by volunteers in the community. Right, his daughter peers over the fence at the neighbour’s children playing in the garden.
Across the UK, communities have hastily pulled together in the pandemic, with leaflets posted through doors, WhatsApp groups set up and crowdfunders launched. Many people are meeting neighbours for the first time. In Stamford Hill, north London, the networks of support are well established. “Not on my fingers and toes could I count the times I’ve been helped by community organisations recently,” Sufrin said as we chatted on the street during the Jewish holiday of Lag B’Omer.
Many strictly Orthodox Jewish families in the Stamford Hill community do not have access to social media and mainstream news outlets, so some were slow to grasp the severity of the situation. “Close-knit means we’re all there for each other and we keep in daily contact. But it also means we tend to congregate more, and the virus has spread much quicker,” said Mrs Davidovits, a part-time teacher and volunteer at the Interlink Foundation.
Haredi men pray at least three times daily in the synagogue, and some spend six or seven hours there. So when Britain’s chief rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis, ordered the closure of all United Synagogues, the largest network of Orthodox synagogues in the country, in the same week that schools across the UK were told to close indefinitely, the community was shaken.
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Lecheiris volunteers check an Instagram story encouraging prayer for Rabbi Pinter, who was critically ill with coronavirus. He died that day, 13 April.
Sam Friedman, a local graphic designer saw what was going on and started a physical distancing awareness campaign putting notices in local magazines and on social media. He said: “For some people essential things means going to the supermarket, but for some essential means what’s ideally required by the Jewish law, and that is prayer in groups. Many people have never prayed by themselves in the house setting, with kids around. It’s very tough. These people needed an extra dose of awareness to adhere to the law.”
First established in the 1920s, the Haredi community of Stamford Hill has been growing rapidly since the second world war, when many arrived fleeing the Holocaust. It is the largest strictly Orthodox Jewish community in Europe, and makes up 7% of the population of the borough of Hackney. Families tend to be large: Mrs Davidovits has six children, and said she had friends who had eight or nine. We met one afternoon in April to discuss family life under lockdown. “I think that overcrowding is probably something more unique in its severity to our community. With two or three kids it’s still difficult, but it’s not the same as eight kids. I feel lucky to have a little outdoor space.”
Only 0.4% of the UK population is Jewish, but 1% of UK deaths from coronavirus have been among Jews, according to the Board of Deputies of British Jews. Moses Gluck has been an undertaker in Stamford Hill for 30 years. He told me he had done three to four months’ work in one month alone, often working until 1am. As most of his staff are older and at risk, he has relied on younger volunteers to help out with ritual acts such as the tahara, washing the bodies. “The day I would say I’m used to it, I would have to leave this business … Here in Stamford Hill we are a close-knit community. We say we’re all family. So to come to a family where they have just lost somebody, you feel with them. It’s our loss.”
Haredi Jews are expected to donate at least 10% of their earnings to charity, so perhaps it’s no surprise that there is a volunteer organisation for almost everything. Hatzola, the 24/7 emergency medical response team, is perhaps the best known. Started in New York in the 1960s, it is the largest voluntary ambulance organisation in the world. The Stamford Hill branch has almost 50 volunteers and on a normal day might field 20 calls. At the peak of the crisis it was receiving 80 calls a day and had to rent extra ambulances to meet the demand. “Some members here took more calls during this period than others did in a year. It was just constant. Most calls were serious,” said Benjamin Stern, a Hatzola volunteer of 20 years. A community-funded campaign raised more than £200,000 in a few weeks to buy a new ambulance and two response cars.
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Dovy Sternlicht, a Hatzola technician, sits in an ambulance at the end of a day. “Covid-19 didn’t read the textbook,” he said.
Yoni Koppel works in property maintenance, and for the last three years he has volunteered with Chaveirim in his spare time. Chaveirim offers a free 24/7 service to help with breakdowns, gas leaks and other odd jobs around the area, but when I met him in April we drove to Homerton and Royal London hospital to drop off food and drink packages to the NHS staff there. Covid-19 has forced many organisations in Stamford Hill to adapt to the needs of the community. “At first my wife was worried,” Yoni said. “But we have been brought up in the same area, and here if people need help you have to put yourself in the frontline. So she does understand.”
It’s not only men volunteering to criss-cross town dropping off packages and offering support. But when I reached out to some of the women, they politely declined to talk about it. Mrs Davidovits told me some Haredi women were leading organisations in Stamford Hill, but they did not want to attract attention due to tzniyut, a Hebrew word that best translates as modesty. “It’s not only about the way we dress, but it’s behaviour as well and about putting ourselves out there. It’s very central to our way of life, for men and women.”
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Left, Chayelle Davidovits sits in the garden with her baby sister Gitty while waiting for the barbecue to light. Right, Motty Davidovits sits listening to his classmates between lessons, which are now conducted over the phone.
The virus has shone a light on cracks in every community, but it has also unearthed resilience. The close-knit way of life in Stamford Hill meant lockdown presented previously unimaginable challenges and many were at risk. Everybody knows people who have died. Equally, those like Eli who needed support in a moment of need have undoubtedly received it. Moses Gluck, the undertaker, echoed so many I spoke to when he told me his work was not just business; “there has to be heart to it”. Hatzola hasn’t been called to a patient showing Covid-19 symptoms in two weeks.
