Svetlana Khachevskaya lived in Minsk with her parents Anna and Venyamin Khachevski. When their neighbor Esfir Galperina and her four children Maya, Vladimir, Nelli, and Klara had to move into the Minsk ghetto in 1941, the Khachevskis decided to help them. Anna Khachevskaya found a hiding place in the countryside for Maya and Vladimir, and the Khachevskis took in Klara and Nelli themselves. The two girls received forged identity papers and the family took loving care of them.
14-year-old Svetlana Khachevskaya was active in a resistance group. She ran errands and relayed secret information. At the beginning of 1943 she was arrested by the German security police and murdered shortly later. Her parents were also arrested in retaliation, and the hidden children along with them. Klara Galperina and Venyamin Khachevski were publicly hanged.
Svetlana Khachevskaya and her parents were honored as Righteous Among the Nations by the Israeli Holocaust memorial center Yad Vashem in 2001.