A large throng accompanied Rebbetzin Basya Fuchs o"h
on her last earthly journey. She was 69 years old at the
time of her petirah last week.
Rebbetzin Fuchs was born in 5490 in the Russian city of
Dinowitz to the renowned Levi family. But at an early age,
her family was forced to flee to Kolchoz, as the Communists
took control of their native town. The Communists soon spread
their influence, and the young generation gradually divested
itself of every trace of Yiddishkeit. It was in this
environment that Basya Levi grew up.
Then her father passed away and she, the young girl, took the
responsibility of feeding her family upon herself. Long
periods of want, of hunger and poverty followed her father's
death.
During World War II, she was exiled with her family to the
southern region of Siberia. It was a time of trauma and
suffering. Relatives were forcibly baptized by the
Ukrainians. Somehow she kept the Jewish flame burning under
indescribable conditions.
A refugee from Poland, Menachem Mendel Fuchs, became her
husband after the war. He was a shochet and a
talmid chochom, and just like her in his dedication to
Yiddishkeit. Together they built their home, an island
of Torah in the stormy sea of Stalinist Russia.
It was their zechus to save a sefer Torah from
German hands. Guarding this precious possession, they fled
Russia and returned to Poland. But still they feared the long
arm of the K.G.B. and so they entrusted the sefer
Torah to the members of a small shul. That
sefer Torah, Rebbetzin Fuchs never forgot. To the last
days of her life, she would express anxiety over it,
wondering what had become of it.
In 5716 (1956), Russia and Poland signed an agreement stating
that citizens could return to their native countries. Her
husband's Polish citizenship enabled them to pass through the
Iron Curtain. But it was not Poland that they yearned for,
but Eretz Hakodesh, a place where they could raise their
children al taharas hakodesh. For the sake of this
goal, she and her husband rejected many lucrative positions
and gave up much of their wealth. As they passed through
Vienna, the local Jewish community offered Rav Fuchs a very
well paying position of shochet. But even this
prospect did not deter them from the dream of Eretz
Yisroel.
Arriving at last in Eretz Yisroel, they were assigned a shack
in the primitive refugee camps (maabaros) of Kiryat
Chaim, known as Red Kiryat Chaim because of its political
"color." Torah observant families were a rare phenomenon in
the camp, and they caused genuine kiddush Hashem by
their strength of spirit and by their obvious Jewish pride.
Insisting on the highest standards of kashrus,
Rebbetzin Fuchs would travel long distances to secure
proper food for her family. Her daughters were sent away to
Haifa to receive a Bais Yaakov education.
In her final years, she realized her life's dream of living
in Yerushalayim, in the Shomrei Hachomos neighborhood of
Ramot Daled.
Her entire life was one long saga of chessed and
goodness. She was her husband's help and support,
accompanying him every morning to his kollel. Thus did
this righteous woman gain her share in the Next World. During
her illness, her sole concern was not for herself, but rather
that her husband must continue his devotion to his Torah
studies.
She passed away revered by all, on Shabbos night parshas
Eikev. She had suffered greatly, but she had accepted her
suffering as Hashem's decree; she had never been known to
complain. At the time of her petirah, family and
friends had surrounded her, fervently calling out Shema
Yisroel.
She is survived by two daughters (great women in their own
right, who kept many young women on the path of Torah
education) by grandchildren and great-grandchildren who walk
in the way of the Torah, and by sons-in-law who are
talmidei chachomim.
