At the entrance to the Marina Rosha synagogue inside the opulent Chabad Center in Moscow, the largest plaque commemorates one of the center’s benefactors: „Reb Aharon Abramovich“ and his family. Visiting there ten years ago, I asked who the generous Reb Aharon was, only to be answered with laughter.

I should have guessed Aharon was the „Jewish name“ of the most famous oligarch in Russia. But despite all I knew about the way Chabad had ruthlessly inserted itself in to the circles of power and money in Putin’s Russia, there was still something incongruous about seeing the name of Roman Abramovich in a house of prayer.