To Ease the Burden

Uri Lupolianski has always been a prince, a man of regal presence within the often-greasy political arena. He was never part of the askanus scene, didn’t spend evenings at bar mitzvahs and weddings, and maintained a distance from the paparazzi, mostly the result of his bashful nature and genuine desire to get things done.

Still, the last public picture of him — a clearly health-compromised Reb Uri taken at the end of October while he was sitting in the VIP section of the “million-man” rally against the chareidi draft — indicated that he never really left the arena. When he spoke with Mishpacha, he was talking about the religious future of the capital, but the recipe for success in all the Torah world’s endeavors hasn’t changed.

“First of all,” he said, “there needs to be unity within the chareidi public.”

Lupolianski was one of those rare politicians who really knew what unity meant — and not only for the chareidi sector, but for Jews across the spectrum. His personal role as unifier began in the particularly harsh Jerusalem winter of 1976. When his young son was beset with breathing problems, he discovered just how complicated it was to find a small humidifier that would make the baby’s nights easier. When he finally got hold of a machine and his personal problem was solved, it wasn’t the end of the story. Reb Uri was determined that others shouldn’t suffer the same desperate search. That galvanized him to collect medical accessories and open a gemach out of his home, where people around the neighborhood could come in and borrow the equipment at no cost.

Little did he imagine that his small initiative would give rise to a huge empire. Lupolianski began collecting medical equipment such as crutches, walkers, and wheelchairs, and lent them out to people who requested them. By the end of that winter, the small apartment looked like a medical supply warehouse, the homegrown inventory forming the foundation of the mammoth aid organization known today as Yad Sarah.

Reb Uri didn’t foresee the very public persona that was the eventual outgrowth of his little gemach.

“I never saw myself as a public figure,” he admitted years later, “and I certainly never dreamed of a future in the medical world. But since I was a kid, I always seemed to notice what others needed. It’s just this trait Hashem gave me. Most people look left and right, see the reality around them, and move on. I see the problems, and I can’t move on until I do something about them.”

At the end of that first year, Yaakov Lupolianski, Reb Uri’s father, sold his shoe store and retired, leaving his son funds to be able to expand his gemach. At the same time, a site was found for the fledgling organization — it was an old train car once used by Israel Railways, located on Haneviim Street near Bikur Cholim Hospital.

Yad Sarah operated from that iconic converted railway compartment for many years. With time, the organization grew to enormous proportions. In its four decades of operation, Uri Lupolianski managed to galvanize over 6,000 volunteers, young and old, from all sectors of the Israeli population, to staff their 110 branches around the country.

But it’s not just medical equipment the organization makes available. Lupolianski was always on the lookout for anything that would make people’s lives easier.

“Even this cup on my desk,” he pointed out. “We invented it. It looks like a regular cup, but try and knock it off the table and you’ll see that it stays put. How many of us know what it’s like when an elderly parent or grandparent reaches for the coffee cup on the table, struggles to grasp it, and then watches in humiliation as it falls to the floor?”

Rerouting Relationships

While Yad Sarah is a chareidi-run organization, many of its volunteers, and a majority of those who benefit from its services, are not religious. Lupolianski was therefore viewed as a sort of bridge between the country’s various demographics, sitting on the complex axis that connects the religious and secular populations in Israel. In fact, he would say, there’s nothing like working together to bridge that rift.

“It’s a complicated subject,” he said, “but I don’t see a lot of positive results coming out of symposiums and meetings between the different sectors. All that talking doesn’t really change the way the sectors think of one another. Real change can only come through action. And we see it happening here.”

He gave the example of one of their most prominent volunteers — Mrs. Reuma Weizmann a”h, wife of former President Ezer Weizmann a”h. She joined after she herself needed the organization’s help, and at age 92, she was still volunteering, sitting between a famous rebbetzin on her right and an elderly Yemenite woman who once lived in the transit camps on her left.

That said, Lupolianski was always quick to qualify that Yad Sarah isn’t a kiruv organization. “Look,” he explained, “We’re not here to bring Yiddishkeit to people. We’re here to help every person with whatever he needs. But I will say that I personally have purchased many, many pairs of tefillin for people who request them after they’ve received treatment or assistance. People come here and see an empire of chesed, a totally different world than the stereotypes, and they want to hold on to that.

“Some time ago,” he continued, “we had a case that really touched my heart. A woman and her husband, both die-hard secularists, tragically lost a baby to SIDS. They both underwent tremendous emotional upheaval as a result, and needed extensive psychological help. B’chasdei Hashem, they were able to have another child. Upon the baby’s release from the hospital, they were told to obtain a certain medical device that monitored the baby’s breathing, so they’d be able to sleep without the constant fear of their previous horrific experience. The woman came here and took the device, end of story… except it wasn’t. She kept coming back with her baby carriage, wandering around the building. One day, I noticed her and I asked her if she needed help. She told me, ‘I already got my help. I have a baby and she’s alive.’ So I asked her why she was here, and she said, ‘I’m just amazed at this chesed machine and I can’t stop coming here to look — how one person leaves with crutches and another with a wheelchair and all for free. I just can’t get over it.’ Eventually, that woman contacted an Arachim seminar and became mitzvah observant.

“So even though we’re not about kiruv, there’s no doubt that we’re a catalyst for creating healthier relations between Israel’s different sectors. Rav Sheinberg ztz”l — my rebbi from my yeshivah days in Torah Ore — once told me that gemilus chasadim is like the tent of Avraham Avinu. People would enter, he would take care of them, and they would find a way to thank the Creator. So we’re part of that chain, that we also open a pathway for them to thank the Creator.”

Finally Fair

Uri Lupolianski was born in 1951 in Haifa, where he attended the Yavne yeshivah high school, and then went on to study at Yeshivat Hanegev in Netivot and Torah Ore in Jerusalem. He also served as a paramedic in the IDF. He and his wife Michal (Schneller) built their home in Jerusalem, where they raised 12 children.

His pathway to politics began in 1989, when he was appointed a member of the Jerusalem City Council as chairman of the Degel HaTorah movement. With his solid reputation as a tireless advocate for the community, he was given the Family and Community Service portfolio and served as chairman of the planning and construction committee. From 1993 to 2003, he served as deputy mayor of Jerusalem.

He had already been a recipient of the Israel Prize, the President’s Volunteer Award, the Knesset Speaker’s Award, and the Kaplan Prize for Efficiency, before becoming Jerusalem’s mayor.

But even though in hindsight, the progression seemed only natural, Lupolianski said that when he entered the public arena on the municipal front, the idea of a chareidi mayor wasn’t even on the distant horizon.

“When I joined the city council, it wasn’t even a pipe dream,” he admitted. “Even the year before I was elected, if someone would have said that he sees Lupolianski as the next mayor, they would have said he was crazy.”

But when Ehud Olmert retired as mayor in favor of a ministerial position in the Sharon government, Lupolianski served as acting mayor, and in the 2003 elections he was selected as the United Torah Judaism candidate for the position. His victory was considered historic, and his term as mayor was one of most productive that Jerusalem ever saw. Lupolianski professionally and sensitively navigated between the needs of the various populations in the city, and for the first time, Jerusalem’s chareidi residents felt that they were finally being fairly represented.

It was a special time for the frum population of the city and for Lupolianski himself, although the political arena was definitely not his natural habitat.

“I wouldn’t say that I miss that time,” he later admitted. “Baruch Hashem, I have a lot to do here in Yad Sarah, so I don’t feel much of a pull for public involvement.”

In truth, said the Haifa-born askan, the political bug never really existed — it was more of a shlichus.

“From the very start, I knew I was going to be in politics for a limited amount of time. Rav Elyashiv instructed me to run for the position and that’s what I did — and it was clear that it would be for only one term. It wasn’t like I was coming from Haifa to be the mayor of Jerusalem. That wasn’t my dream, I didn’t want it, and it certainly was not my plan. But one thing I can say of myself: I never avoided responsibility and when I was asked to take the reins, I reported for duty. I was asked to run by gedolei hador and I did what I was asked.”

The gedolim knew that the position of mayor of Jerusalem, in particular, is a powerful one even outside the city’s parameters. “Arik Sharon, who was prime minister then, once told me, ‘Don’t you realize that the capital of Israel can’t have a chareidi mayor? You know, the fact that you’re the mayor of Israel’s capital means that we’ve failed.’ He wasn’t the only one who felt that way,” Rabbi Lupolianski said, “because I refused to cooperate with various demands of the government. For example, Sharon wanted to open the Karta parking lot near the Old City on Shabbos. He claimed it was a matter of ‘pikuach nefesh,’ that many accidents resulted from the lack of organized parking at the entrance to the Old City. But I made sure that — at least on my watch — it wouldn’t happen.”

(The end of the Karta saga is well-known: Mayor Nir Barkat inaugurated the parking lot as soon as he took office and it’s open on Shabbos to this day.)

Never Alone

Rabbi Lupolianski had a longstanding relationship with Rav Elyashiv, and as chairman of Degel HaTorah, served as a liaison between the simple home at 10 Chanan Street in Meah Shearim and Rav Steinman’s abode at 5 Chazon Ish Street in Bnei Brak. When he attended Rav Steinman’s levayah in the winter of 2017, he spoke about the acuteness of the loss. He noted that for him, as a public figure, the loss was especially acute.

“I spent a lot of time going between those two homes,” he related. “I had a strong, steady connection with Rav Yitzchak Levenstein ztz”l [Rav Steinman’s closest gabbai], and I would frequently visit the Rosh Yeshivah to speak about certain issues that Rav Elyashiv was involved in — Rav Elyashiv would often send me to Rav Steinman to find out his opinion on certain matters pertaining to the klal.”

Sometimes there were clandestine meetings between the two gedolim, facilitated by Reb Uri and held inside the old railway car on Haneviim Street that served for years as Yad Sarah’s headquarters.

There are so many stories, Reb Uri would recall, but one in particular stood out: “Years back, when I was the mayor, there was an event in the Ahavas Torah shul in Jerusalem’s Kiryat Sanz neighborhood,” he remembered. “Rav Steinman was supposed to attend the event, but a few zealots decided to hold a demonstration against him, claiming he was connected to the Nachal Chareidi [army unit] and that he supported induction into the army. A few days before the event, I was visiting Rav Elyashiv and he told me that he had heard there was a group organizing a demonstration against Rav Steinman, and he asked me to prevent it from happening. I delicately asked, ‘So a few guys are screaming, why is Rebbi getting excited about it?’ And I added that the chareidi public is stronger than a few guys coming to scream.

“And then he said to me: ‘Do you know why the dogs merit to receive neveilos, as the pasuk says, “Throw it to the dog”? Chazal say it’s because when Bnei Yisrael left Egypt, the dogs didn’t bark and therefore they’re deserving of that reward. Does that mean if they had barked, they could have prevented Yetzias Mitzrayim from happening? Of course not. But the answer is that when the dogs bark, it’s not pleasant. L’havdil, when they come to demonstrate against Rav Steinman, it’s not pleasant. Rav Steinman is a refined Yid. It’s not pleasant. Make sure it doesn’t happen.’ ”

Despite his many far-reaching accomplishments, Reb Uri never claimed credit for himself, remaining throughout his life a loyal and faithful emissary to those who had entrusted him with his mission. Yet after the loss of those two towering figures, who did Reb Uri turn to for advice?

“I have whom to ask,” he would say in the past few years. “Baruch Hashem, the Jewish nation hasn’t been abandoned. But I do sometimes feel that our generation had been orphaned. Every public servant needs a spiritual leader to guide him. Without that constant guidance, it’s impossible to remain upright and honest.”

While Lupolianski no longer had those two great beacons of the generation to light his way, there wasn’t a minute when he wasn’t thinking about how to implement more breakthroughs, how to bring about more lifesaving endeavors and how to reinvent each day anew, despite his own severe health challenges.

“My tefillah,” he told Mishpacha when he was looking toward a brighter future, “is that the day will come when no one should need us at all. But until then, we’re here for everyone.”

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1095)