Mariupol family risks all just to tell teen daughter in Israel: ‘We are alive’

Sue Surkes is The Times of Israel's environment reporter

Vika and Ksiusha Korotkova in Mariupol, Ukraine in September 2021, on the day Ksiusha left for Israel. (Courtesy: Alina Gryadchenko)
Vika and Ksiusha Korotkova in Mariupol, Ukraine in September 2021, on the day Ksiusha left for Israel. (Courtesy: Alina Gryadchenko)

A Ukrainian family in Mariupol, a city that has suffered massive bombing and has had little contact with the outside world for days, risked everything to drive to a location where there is still phone reception to get a message to their 14-year-old daughter in Israel: “We are alive.”

On Tuesday, Vika Korotkova, who has been sheltering with her husband and younger daughter Sofia, phoned Christians for Israel, a Netherlands-based organization devoted to bringing Jews to Israel that also operates in Ukraine.

It was Christians for Israel that sponsored a flight to Israel in September for Vika’s daughter Ksiusha, within the framework of the Jewish Agency’s Na’ale program for high school students from the former Soviet Union and elsewhere.

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