Yaakov Bleich

Bleich graduated from Telshe Yeshiva High School in Chicago, Illinois where he began his rabbinical studies. From 1984 to 1986, he studied at the Karlin Stolin Rabbinical Institute in Jerusalem.

According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, in 2008 there were three chief rabbis in Ukraine: Bleich, Rabbi Azriel Chaikin and Rabbi Moshe Reuven Azman. Additionally, Rabbi Alexander Dukhowny is the leader of the Reform movement in Ukraine.[5]

In November 2014, Bleich strongly criticized Minister of the Interior Arsen Avakov for appointing Vadym Troyan, a former Azov Battalion commander, to the post of police chief of the Kyiv Oblast. Speaking to The Jerusalem Post, Bleich stated that “if the interior minister continues to appoint people of questionable repute and ideologies tainted with fascism and right-wing extremism, the interior minister should be replaced”.[6]

In 2018, Kievan weekly magazine Focus named Bleich among the most "powerful foreigners" in the country.[7] In the same year Karlin Stolin tried to take over the community and finally was kicked out leaving them to have to rebuild another synagogue ,[8] and Rabbi Bleich continues to publicly refer to himself as the chief rabbi.[9]

In 2019, Bleich, together with Sviatoslav Shevchuk (Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church) and Epiphanius I of Ukraine (Orthodox Church of Ukraine), held a prayer service for members of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists in the Jewish cemetery of Sambir.[10][11][12]

During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Bleich raised over 2.5 million dollars to help Jews in Ukraine[13] from his home in Monsey, New York.[3]

On February 27, 2022, Bleich told Arutz Sheva: "President Zelensky called me a few hours ago, while waging war, and asked the entire Jewish people to pray for the soldiers of Ukraine: 'The Russians have more soldiers than us, but our soldiers have more determination than the Russians. We need your prayers for us to succeed, the Ukrainian president said."[14]

However, a lengthy March 2, 2022 article in The Forward about the long rivalry between Bleich and Azman for the title of "Chief Rabbi of Ukraine" concluded that by remaining in Ukraine during the war, "it seems that Azman has solidified his standing as the country’s chief rabbi"..[3]