House calls bring Jewish tradition of Sukkot to the isolated

NEW YORK — Sukkot, the weeklong Jewish fall holiday commemorating God’s miraculous protection of the Jewish people in the desert, looks different this year. To bring the joy and tradition to them, Rabbi Eli Blokh, director of the Chabad of Rego Park Jewish and Russian Community Center in New York’s Queens borough, mounted a sukkah of three walls with a roof of bamboo poles in a bright red pickup truck. Then he, his two young sons, and two rabbinical students drove it through the community, making house calls to those who could not attend small in-person gatherings or construct a sukkah of their own. One of them was Holocaust survivor Leon Sherman, who Blokh said “has an incredibly strong sense of faith and really cherishes the opportunity of being a part of the Jewish observance and tradition.” “He’s been homebound until now,” the rabbi added, “and I thought of him first.” As Sherman stood on the sidewalk outside his home wearing a mask and leather gloves, Blokh’s mobile sukkah pulled up playing niggunim, festive Hassidic tunes, from two loudspeakers affixed to the truck’s roof.