Leskiv Mikhail & Yekaterina ; Son: Nikolai

Leskiv, Mykhailo Leskiv, Katerina Leskiv, Mykola Mykhailo and Katerina Leskiv lived with their four children in the small town of Jezierna, Tarnopol District (today Ozerna, Ternopil’ District). Among their neighbors was the Jewish Blaustein family, consisting of parents, Ben-Zion and Rosa, and two children, Munio (Moshe) and Dozia. On July 2, 1941, the Germans occupied Jezierna, and during the following two days, carried out the first Aktion, which the Blausteins luckily survived. For the following months they remained in their own house, going daily to forced labor and being subject to humiliation from the Germans and many locals. When a labor camp was formed in Jezierna, Munio Blaustein was interned there; he perished in July 1943, with the liquidation of the camp. The rest of the family was marched, together with other Jezierna Jews, to the ghetto in Zborow (Zboriv). The living conditions in the ghetto worsened from day to day: hunger increased, and sanitary conditions deteriorated until there was an outbreak of typhus. In Zborow, they received a small supply of food, smuggled into the ghetto by 20-year-old Mykola Leskiv, the eldest son of their former neighbors. In March 1943, Ben-Zion Blaustein was taken to a labor camp in Zborow, and soon after, rumors spread that the days of the ghetto were numbered. It was then that Rosa Blaustein asked Mykola to hide her and her daughter, and, without hesitation, Mykola agreed. His family kept the promise: after their successful escape and return to Jezierna, Rosa and Dozia were accepted by the Leskivs and sheltered in their attic. Throughout the following year, the rescuers shared their meager fare with their two Jewish guests. Mykola was the one who brought them, with great sorrow, the news about the liquidation of the camps in Jezierna and in Zborow, and the deaths of Rosa’s son and husband. In March 1944, as the front drew close to Jezierna, the Leskivs’ house was burned down by the Germans because it obstructedthe view of the battlefield. The Leskivs were taken in by their relatives, while Rosa and Dozia, having no other choice, hid in the forests and, miraculously, survived to witness the liberation, in July 1944. Shortly after the end of the war, Rosa and Dozia left for Poland, hoping to reach the USA where they had relatives. Unfortunately, Rosa’s health declined and she died in Paris, in 1946. Dosia Blaustein reached the United States a year later. She and her rescuers never met again. On February 15, 1999, Yad Vashem recognized Mykhailo and Katerina Leskiv and their son, Mykola, as Righteous Among the Nations.