Kupil

Kupil (Ukrainian: Купіль, pronounced [ˈkupilʲ]; Russian: Купель, romanized: Kupel', pronounced [ˈkupʲɪlʲ]) is a village (selo) in Khmelnytskyi Raion (district) of Khmelnytskyi Oblast (province) of western Ukraine. It belongs to Viitivtsi settlement hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine.

History

Settlement in Kupil began in the 18th century. During World War II, the invading German army occupied the town on July 5, 1941, following the commencement of Operation Barbarossa. Jewish people were kept imprisoned in a local ghetto and used to perform forced labor. On September 21, 1942, about 600 Jewish inhabitants from Kupil were taken to Volochisk and executed outside the town. The remaining Jewish inhabitants were ordered shot dead at the town's cemetery. Kupil was liberated from German occupation by the Red Army in March 1944.

The Hebrew scholar William Chomsky was born in Kupil in 1896. He later moved to the United States. William is the father of Noam Chomsky and David.

The Yiddish writer Chaim Bejder was born in Kupil in 1920. He was an editor of the only Jewish magazine in the Soviet Union, Sovetish Heymland. He moved to the United States in 1996 and died in the state of New York in 2003.