The Woman Behind the Revival of Israel’s Forgotten Cat Breed

From a winter storm in New York to a flower shop in Israel, a rabbi, his boxing-promoter brother, and a remarkable woman discover how a nearly forgotten cat breed can bring people together.

The winter storm was gathering strength, and I was afraid my cat might die. On February 22, 2026, Layla Yom Tov, my first Kanaani, was seriously ill with pyometra, a potentially life-threatening uterine infection. I needed specialized veterinary care, and the journey from Brooklyn to Cornell University Hospital for Animals in Ithaca, New York, was complicated by the weather. I telephoned the hospital and explained the urgency. I also mentioned that Layla belonged to an exceptionally rare cat breed developed in Jerusalem. The receptionist passed my message to a veterinarian, who personally returned my call and agreed to see her. I promised to arrive the following morning.

I made the journey with one thought in my mind: I could not lose Layla. At Cornell, the veterinary team welcomed us with extraordinary warmth. The doctors were genuinely interested in her unusual breed; Layla was treated almost like a little celebrity. But to me, she was not a rare specimen or a curiosity. She was family. She was also the first cat entrusted to me by a woman in Israel whose generosity had changed my life.

Her name was Lyudmila Vlasova. And without her, none of this would have happened.

Nine Months Searching for a Cat

The story began in September 2024, when I was studying for the rabbinate at the Jewish Spiritual Leaders’ Institute under Rabbi Steven Blane. Our classes explored Jewish spirituality, pastoral care, and the responsibilities of religious leadership. I had loved cats since childhood, and my studies were deepening my interest in the relationship between faith and compassion for animals. During one online class, I opened Google and typed three words: Israeli cat breed.

The result introduced me to the Kanaani, a rare domestic breed developed in Jerusalem during the 1990s by Doris Pollatschek. Its appearance recalled the wild felines of the region, yet its existence was almost unknown outside a small circle of enthusiasts. Here was a breed born in Israel, and I could barely find anyone who knew where to obtain one. I decided to search. I did not realize that this seemingly simple decision would occupy the next nine months of my life.

I contacted rabbis, Jewish community leaders, acquaintances with Israeli connections, and people who might know someone who could help. Some made sincere efforts. Others could not understand why I was so determined. A publisher I knew, when approached for assistance, told me, “Keep me out of this.” I will not identify those who dismissed my search. This is not a story about disappointment or resentment. It is about the people who chose to help.

Eventually, I turned to my younger brother, Dmitriy Salita. A former boxing champion and international boxing promoter, Dmitriy inhabits a world of fighters, managers, contracts, and international negotiations. His remarkable life has already attracted the attention of filmmakers. A documentary explored his story, and a proposed dramatic film project associated with producer Jerry Bruckheimer, reportedly titled Knockout, was once discussed. Yet none of that prepared him for his older brother’s repeated requests to locate an almost forgotten Israeli cat.

I kept asking him. Finally, Dmitriy contacted Eugene Ryvkin, a Jewish boxing manager and businessman originally from Belarus. Eugene reached out to his childhood friend Gleb, another Jewish businessman whom I had never met. Gleb made inquiries in Israel. And through this unlikely chain of connections, a name emerged: Lyudmila Vlasova.

It was the sort of sequence a screenwriter might invent: a rabbi asks a boxing promoter for help; the promoter calls a boxing manager; the manager contacts a childhood friend; and the friend finds a woman in Israel who happens to have the very cats the rabbi has been searching for. Each person could have declined. Instead, each opened another door.

In Yiddish, we have a word for a person whose character is revealed through kindness and integrity: mensch. My brother is a mensch, and I am proud of him. His achievements in professional boxing are public, but this particular act of generosity was personal. Today, Dmitriy is also a co-owner and co-custodian of the Kanaani cats and serves with me on the board of the Salita Foundation, helping provide continuity for their care should anything happen to me. His principal work remains boxing, but the story he helped set in motion has become part of our family’s future.

A Flower Shop in Israel

To understand how Lyudmila came to possess these remarkable cats, we must return to Israel in 2023. At the time, she lived in Holon, where she became acquainted with an Israeli woman named Lea. They met through a flower shop and discovered a shared affection for flowers, houseplants, and animals. What began as an ordinary acquaintance gradually became a friendship.

Lea had been involved with Kanaani cats in northern Israel, near the Lebanese border, a region whose residents would experience profound upheaval during the conflict. She had two kittens that she gave to Lyudmila: a male named Arbuz and a female affectionately called Mashinka-Kashindrom. Lyudmila accepted them as gifts from a friend, without fully realizing just how rare their breed was. She was not thinking about pedigrees, international recognition, or the preservation of a nearly forgotten feline lineage. She simply loved cats.

The two animals later had a kitten named Layla Yom Tov. By then, a chain of Jewish friendships had helped a rabbi in Brooklyn find Lyudmila’s telephone number. When we finally spoke, I told her about my search, my rabbinical studies, and my growing conviction that these cats deserved a future. She listened carefully. Then she offered to give me Layla.

I was prepared to pay for a rare pedigreed kitten, but Lyudmila refused to take my money. She understood how long I had searched and how much the mission meant to me. In June 2025, approximately two weeks before my rabbinical graduation, Layla arrived in my life. I introduced her to my classmates during an online gathering. They were fascinated by the unusual Israeli kitten appearing on their screens. Rabbi Steven Blane, whom I deeply respect, had watched my interests develop throughout my studies and came to appreciate the sincerity behind them.

Lyudmila’s generosity did not end there. She later entrusted me with Layla’s parents, Arbuz and Mashinka-Kashindrom, whom I officially renamed Haifa. Her family still uses the old affectionate name. I sometimes joke that Haifa has no idea what her official name is, although she certainly knows she is a queen. Lyudmila subsequently helped me obtain two additional Kanaani cats, Sky and Sasha. Five cats came into my care through her generosity and assistance. I had searched for months to find one.

Sometimes history does not begin in palaces, parliaments, or great institutions. Sometimes it begins in a flower shop, with two women who simply care about living things.

The Cost of Keeping a Promise

There is a tendency to romanticize the preservation of rare animals. People see photographs, exhibition awards, certificates, and impressive titles. They rarely see the sleepless nights, veterinary bills, difficult decisions, and fear that accompany the responsibility of keeping those animals alive and healthy.

Layla’s illness brought that reality into sharp focus. At Cornell, I was deeply grateful for the veterinary team’s attention and interest. The doctors were curious about her breed, but what mattered was their commitment to her treatment. She survived the illness and recovered. Months later, she became a mother, bringing a new generation into the family of cats that had begun with Lyudmila’s gift.

During my animal chaplaincy training, around the period of Layla’s illness, I participated in a one-on-one pastoral care exercise. I was emotionally exhausted. As I spoke about Layla and the ordeal of seeking treatment, I began to cry. A fellow participant, Jennifer Kirbas, whom I remember as an exceptionally compassionate and spiritually sensitive woman, asked me a question that has remained with me: “Do you have support in your community?”

I had to admit that I often felt misunderstood. Some people in my Russian-speaking Jewish community could not see why a cat should occupy such an important place in my life, much less why preserving a rare Israeli breed could become a spiritual calling. But others understood: my rabbinical classmates, fellow animal chaplains, American Jewish acquaintances, and journalists who took the time to hear the story. I learned that compassion cannot be neatly assigned to one community or another. It reveals itself in individual human beings.

And Lyudmila understood better than almost anyone.

Five in the Morning in Haifa

Sometimes, late at night in Brooklyn, I would call Lyudmila in Israel. It might already be five or six in the morning there. She was often awake, preparing for another demanding day. She worked hard and shared the responsibilities of daily life with her daughter. Yet she still found time to listen to me.

We talked about the cats: their health, their personalities, their future, and the challenges of caring for such a rare breed. Sometimes I needed practical advice. Sometimes I needed reassurance. Sometimes I simply needed to speak to someone who understood why all of this mattered. Lyudmila never made me feel that my concerns were foolish. She loved these animals too. They had once been part of her home, and their departure for America had not ended her attachment to them.

There is another detail that makes our friendship particularly moving to me. Lyudmila shares the name of my beloved late mother. Her younger daughter, Sasha, shares the familiar form of my late father’s name, Alexander. In Jewish spirituality, we sometimes speak of hashgacha pratit, Divine Providence. I cannot explain these coincidences, but I know how deeply they touched me.

I still speak with Lyudmila. I hope she will one day visit me in America, hold the cats again, and see the family that has grown from the animals she entrusted to me. She has become far more than the woman who helped me obtain five Kanaani cats. She has become a kindred spirit. Through the cats, we have become something like family.

The Golden Cat on Solomon’s Throne

As my work with the Kanaani developed, I found myself returning to the Jewish sources I had studied during my rabbinical education. In Genesis, animals are created before humanity, and Adam is given the task of naming them. In the Talmud, Eruvin 100b, the sages teach that even had the Torah not been given, human beings could have learned modesty from the cat. These teachings suggest that animals are not merely possessions. They belong to the moral and spiritual world in which human beings are called to act responsibly.

King Solomon, son of David, is remembered for his extraordinary wisdom and knowledge of the natural world. A later Jewish tradition preserved in Targum Sheni to the Book of Esther describes his magnificent throne, whose steps were adorned with golden animals. On the fifth step stood a golden cat opposite a golden rooster.

I have spent considerable time contemplating that image. The lion, associated with royal authority, evokes the strength needed to protect a kingdom. The cat, placed higher on the steps, closer to the king, suggests something different to me: the protection of the home, the intimacy of family, and the quiet dignity of a creature that lives beside us. This is my personal interpretation, not an explanation explicitly supplied by the ancient text. But it has become central to my understanding of the Kanaani.

Solomon was the son of King David, from whose royal line Jewish tradition anticipates the Messiah. Through the symbolic image of Solomon’s golden cat, I see the Kanaani as a living reminder of Jerusalem’s ancient cultural and spiritual heritage. I make no claim of biological descent from the animals of Solomon’s court. The connection is symbolic, not genealogical. Yet symbols can preserve memory across generations, and living creatures can inspire people to rediscover traditions they might otherwise overlook.

That understanding led me to establish the Royal House of Kanaani and to describe these cats as the Heirs to King Solomon’s Feline Throne. For me, the title represents a cultural responsibility: to preserve a rare breed developed in Jerusalem while using its story to encourage compassion, historical awareness, and a deeper relationship with Jewish tradition.

I hope that this work will eventually attract broader support in Israel and beyond. I envision a future in which responsible preservation, international cooperation, and perhaps even a form of Kanaani Diplomacy can help secure the breed’s survival. But whatever institutions may eventually become involved, the human origins of this effort must never be forgotten.

What the Cats Gave Back

I began this journey believing that I was searching for an animal. What I discovered was a remarkable network of human kindness.

Doris Pollatschek had developed the breed in Jerusalem. Lea helped pass it on through her friendship with Lyudmila. My brother Dmitriy opened a door that others could not. Eugene Ryvkin and Gleb extended a chain of goodwill without asking what they might receive in return. Lyudmila’s daughter Sasha became part of a family story that now stretches across two continents. And Lyudmila herself entrusted me with animals she loved, simply because she believed I would love and protect them too.

Not everyone I encountered understood the mission. Some relationships grew distant. Others deepened. New friendships appeared where I least expected them. The cats brought people into my life whose goodness I might otherwise never have discovered. They brought me closer to my brother, closer to Jewish teachings about the natural world, and, symbolically, closer to the wisdom of King Solomon and the spiritual legacy of his father, King David.

Most of all, they brought me Lyudmila.

I hope that one day Israel will recognize the contribution of women like her, whose private acts of care have helped preserve a rare Jerusalem-born breed. I hope that she will receive the appreciation she deserves, not because she sought recognition, but precisely because she did not. Her generosity was never a publicity campaign or a business arrangement. It was an act of trust.

When I think back to that frightening journey to Cornell, I remember holding Layla and worrying whether she would survive. I remember the doctors’ curiosity about her rare breed. And I remember that somewhere across the ocean was the woman who had placed that little creature into my life.

Layla survived. She became a mother. The family grew. And the friendship that began with her crossed an ocean and became something enduring.

We often speak about our duty to protect animals, and rightly so. But we seldom speak about what animals give us in return. They can reveal the kindness of strangers, deepen the bonds between brothers, connect people across continents, and open unexpected paths into our own spiritual traditions.

I went searching for a rare Israeli cat. I found a brother’s kindness, a chain of extraordinary friendships, a deeper connection to my faith, and a woman whose generosity changed my life.

I thought I was helping to save the Kanaani. I never imagined how much the Kanaani would give back to me.

Dedicated with love and gratitude to Lyudmila Vlasova, whose kindness helped give the Kanaani a future and gave me a friendship that feels like family.

⸻

P.S. A Story Waiting to Become a Film

As a New York Film Academy documentary filmmaking alumnus, I cannot help seeing this story as a film: a boxing champion and his rabbi brother, lives unsettled by war and displacement, a perilous journey through a New York winter storm, and a woman whose generosity opens a path toward rescue for an almost forgotten breed of cat.

The story begins in rupture—in the places where war scatters families, uproots traditions, and leaves even the most fragile forms of life vulnerable to disappearance. Yet from that darkness, unexpected bonds emerge. Across borders and through danger, friendship becomes a lifeline; compassion becomes a form of courage; and one act of generosity begins to gather the broken threads of a heritage nearly lost.

At the center is the Kanaani—desert-born, unadorned, and quietly regal. Its story reaches back symbolically to King Solomon, yet its future depends on a modern choice: whether we allow living heritage to fade into silence or help restore it to memory, protection, and dignity. The journey from war and displacement to rescue is therefore also a journey from erasure toward renewal.

This is not only a story about cats. It is about faith tested by hardship, friendship crossing borders, and chesed overcoming indifference. It is about the possibility that even after loss, something precious can still be carried forward. Preserving the Kanaani becomes a form of cultural restitutio in integrum—an attempt to restore what history nearly erased and to return a living symbol of heritage to its rightful place.

Perhaps true royalty is not the crown placed upon a creature, but the dignity with which we treat it. And perhaps every act of compassion—especially when it reaches across fear, distance, and suffering—helps turn survival into renewal and brings the world one step closer to redemption.

Amen.