Russian Billionaire Books 111 Hotel Rooms for Israel Passover Bash

Roman Abramovich Image by Wikimedia Commons

By Anne Cohen April 10, 2014

Roman Abramovich intends to celebrate Passover in style.

For the Jewish Russian billionaire, this involves booking 111 hotel rooms in a Negev desert hotel, to celebrate the holidays with friends and family. Quaint. Understated. Intimate.

Abramovich is a repeat Passover bash offender. In 2009, he rented an entire floor of the Royal Beach Hotel in Eilat.

The Chelsea soccer club-owner will be occupying the Beresheet Hotel from Sunday to Thursday next week, and plans to hold a traditional Seder banquet in a large tent in the desert.

The Times of Israel reports that this latest seder adventure will cost Abramovich roughly $450,000. Apparently, he wanted to get a “feel for the desert in the area where the story of the Jewish Exodus from Egypt took place.”

I’m sure a lavish desert tent party is exactly what Moses had in mind.

Anne Cohen was the Forward’s deputy digital media editor. When she’s not looking for the secret Jewish history of Voodoo in New Orleans, or making lists about Ruth Bader Ginsburg, she writes for The Assimilator. She graduated from the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism with an M.S. magazine concentration in 2012.

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.

In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.

At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.

Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.

Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO