[2] Rabbi Kaufman is the leader of Beit T'shuva, a small Jewish community located in Birobidzhan's old synagogue.
[3] In 2010, The Christian Science Monitor reported that, "Nowhere are the ties between Jews and non-Jews here clearer than in Birobidzhan's tiny second synagogue, located on the outskirts of the city.
A dozen mostly middle-aged parishioners sit on benches, a simple curtain separating men from women.
The rabbi, Dov Kofman, an affable man who walks with a cane, says when the ceremony is over: "I love Israel, my son is now there serving in the army, but this is my fatherland."
"I love coming here, I would do anything to help this synagogue, it's part of my life and want to see it here forever," he says as his friend, the rabbi, looks on with a smile.