Category: World

Refugee system doesn’t work

According to David Matas, former president of Canadian Council of Refugees (CCR), changes that have been made to this country’s refugee system within the last few years have made it more difficult to sponsor refugees.

photo - David Matas is a vocal proponent of changing Canada’s immigration system
David Matas is a vocal proponent of changing Canada’s immigration system. (photo from David Matas)

“We set up a sponsorship system in ’78 and it was used in ’79 and ’80 and years around there to bring in the Vietnamese refugees,” said Matas. With the different sponsorship programs developed over the years, mixed with the growing willingness of people to sponsor, visa offices no longer have the capacity to process the amount of sponsorship applications, he said.

“The response of the government, in my view, should have been to increase the resources to match the sponsorship need, but that’s not what happened,” he said. “Instead, what they did is put visa caps on the offices with the biggest numbers, as well as an overall local cap for private sponsorship through sponsorship agreement holders. Then, they divided the global cap amongst the sponsorship agreement holders.”

According to Citizenship and Immigration Canada, “A group of five (G5) is five or more Canadian citizens or permanent residents who have arranged to sponsor a refugee living abroad to come to Canada. All of the group members must be at least 18 years of age and live or have representatives in the area where the refugee will settle.

“The group must agree to give emotional and financial support to the refugee(s) for the full sponsorship period – usually one year.”

They couldn’t cap the G5 applications in the same way as the other, so what they did instead, said Matas, “was insist that anybody who sponsored through group of five had to get prior approval … through the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, which is much more overwhelmed and under-funded than the Canadian government.”

The CIC website explains that, effective Oct. 19, 2012, “a G5 may only sponsor applicants who are recognized as refugees by either the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) or a foreign state, unless you are applying to sponsor a Syrian or Iraqi refugee.”

According to Matas, the caps made the lines longer, forcing people to reapply year after year, making it so that anybody who applied had to wait years before sponsorship came through.

“But, obviously when you’re dealing with refugee people marching across Europe, they can’t wait years,” he said. “And, what’s more, there is a direct connection between people leaving and the failure of the sponsorship. Because, if people know they’re putting in an application and, if they hang around, it will succeed, they’ll stay. But, if it’s going to take five or 10 years, there is no point in waiting.

“So, there’s a direct connection between this exodus that we’re seeing now, the failure of the Canadian sponsorship scheme and the absence of any European sponsorship schemes.”

Matas believes that if we had kept our Canadian sponsorship scheme as it was, then we could have advised Europe to do the same and, if Europe had agreed, all this mass migration could have been avoided.

Recent turmoil has simply shined a spotlight on the issue. “It’s just like water pressing against a dam,” said Matas. “In the beginning, it doesn’t have any impact. It’s only when it breaks, or the water overflows the dam, that you notice the dam isn’t working or that the dam is a problem.”

The current situation does not come as a big surprise to him, with visa offices being “under water” for years. But, instead of giving them more “air” (staff), they were further strained by the capping system, which artificially controlled the number of refugees going through the system, regardless of need.

“With the failure of the Canadian system, there wasn’t a picture to show the Europeans how it is done and ask them to do the same,” said Matas. Instead, “We have a system that collapsed. Well, not completely, but it ceased to be functional.”

According to Matas, the caps need to be removed and the system resources increased “to match the private sponsorship, so we don’t have the generosity of Canadians being frustrated.”

In early September, Matas spoke at a public rally about refugees organized by the Kurdish community of Winnipeg.

“The refugee sponsorship and resettlement community has been against these changes from the first minute they were discussed,” he said. “I am not presenting a new idea here. I’m reiterating a stand that has been taken many times in the past by the refugee support, resettlement, integration [and] advocacy community.”

The topic became an election issue, with candidates talking in terms of numbers – but not in terms of fixing the mechanics of the system. However, said Matas, “Presumably, with the numbers will go the capacity to process them.”

While many of the refugees arriving in Europe are Syrian, many are not, said Matas. “While the situation in Syria is terrible, it’s not the only place in the world that’s terrible,” he said.

About the Canadian government’s decision to not have Canadian visa officers apply the UN refugee definition to 10,000 Syrians, thereby allowing these 10,000 to enter Canada on a first-come, first-served basis, Matas said, “The government, with the recent announcement, did nothing to fix the system,” said Matas. “Rather, it acknowledged, indirectly, its failure, by deciding not to apply it to 10,000 random Syrians who may or may not be refugees. As far as I am concerned, that is not much of a response to the global refugee crisis or even, for that matter, the Syrian one.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Sometimes innocent jailed

Ken Klonsky speaks on “Freeing David McCallum: A Story of Exoneration” at the Outlook fundraiser and social event Sept.27. (photo by Winnifred Tovey)

“Number one, never talk to the police.” The first tip Ken Klonsky gave when asked by the Jewish Independent for the best advice to avoid getting wrongfully convicted by the police. Klonsky – Vancouver author and director of Innocence International, which focuses on righting wrongful convictions produced by false confessions – spoke at Outlook magazine’s annual fundraiser and social event on Sept. 27, which was held at the Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture.

The event began with refreshments. During the initial schmoozing, Faith Jones, a member of the Vancouver Outlook collective, explained that people attending were “from various Jewish activist communities, such as Independent Jewish Voices,” as there is an “overlap with IJV and the Peretz community and the new UBC club, the PJA” (Progressive Jewish Alliance at the University of British Columbia), with topics ranging from food security to Yiddish-language activism.

Jones included that “many other people read Outlook because it offers a voice they don’t hear often” and, within the community, there is a “strong sense that words can change the world.”

Amid stories of the joys of being Jewish and various community and activist involvements, the crowd of about 25 people entered the downstairs room at the Peretz Centre scattered with foldout tables and a slide projecting: “Freeing David McCallum: A Story of Exoneration.”

Klonsky explained “the fraudulent case” of David McCallum, with which he became involved after receiving a letter from McCallum, who had read an interview Klonsky had done for The Sun Magazine with Dr. Rubin Carter, the founder of Innocence International, who passed away April 20, 2014.

“David McCallum was in prison for 19 years when he saw this. What he saw was a friend was reading it somewhere in the library of the prison. He was able to read it, and saw my name connected to it. He wrote to The Sun, asking for my address and he wrote me a letter asking if I would help him with his case. I had nothing to do with the law at that point in my life. I was just basically an observer…. But the letter was so poignant that I decided I was going to get involved.”

When referring to the McCallum confession, Klonsky noted: “We never see the interrogation. If you have a videotape confession, the purpose of it was to get a conviction because the jury sees a videotape confession.”

Klonsky explained, “The police say, when they are in private, they say, and I’m using their language, the reason people talk to us is because they are stupid and they love to tell their stories and that’s how we get them. Now, I know young people, the reason they talk to the police is they think, ‘Well, I haven’t done anything wrong and I’m going to tell them the truth, the truth is going to protect me’… but your truth might not be the truth of the next person they talk to. McCallum and [the late Willie] Stuckey… they were both told, your friend has told us you shot Nathan Blenner, but we know you didn’t do it, we know it was him.”

Elaborating on the mindset of the interrogated individuals, Klonsky said, “Well, I’m going to go home because all I’m saying is what my friend did … neither David nor Willie confessed to the crime. They said they were witnesses to somebody else doing it. They didn’t realize, being children, that if you’re along for the ride, you are an accomplice and it doesn’t matter. You are going to get charged.”

McCallum was exonerated last year, after nearly 29 years in prison.

Klonsky is currently working towards proving the innocence of Atif Rafay and Sebastian Burns. He called the situation “the greatest tragedy I’ve ever ran in to” because “there is no evidence linking them to the actual crime” and, he alleged, their “false confession … was engineered by the RCMP. Sebastian and Atif were the youngest people that have ever been victimized by this routine.” Klonsky continued, “It is a very dangerous thing to do … they know how to set up a young person.”

In responding to a question of the number of wrongful convictions in the United States, Klonksy said, “A minimum of 35,000, that is 1.5% of the 2.3 million people who are in prison in the United States.… This is the mechanism of an oppressive state. I don’t want to paint an unnecessarily dark picture, but it really is pretty dark.” Klonsky added that he considered this a low estimate, as “The New Yorker says five percent, that is, over 110,000 wrongly convicted people. There are only 70 innocence projects in the United States.”

Throughout the talk, comments and questions were shared by the crowd, ranging from experiences in the 1970s of interrogation regarding the activist work of individuals on the way to an anti-apartheid conference, to questions regarding the motivations of police officers pushing these charges and using such tactics.

Gyda Chud, emcee of the event, spoke after Klonsky and highlighted one of his quotes of the evening: “The opposite of evil is not good, it is truth.” She continued to say that, “for truth to prevail, people like yourselves [Klonsky] and those involved in the innocence project work … we must thank you for righting these wrongs.”

Klonsky told the Independent about “a case in Louisiana, a football player, African-American kid. He was accused of writing false banknotes, forged banknotes, and the handwriting didn’t match and we were able to get him off.” The “kid” is now married with four children, said Klonsky. “Sometimes, you do things that you don’t have any idea of the effect you are going to have.”

A fundraising speech by Marion Pollack concluded the event. “Outlook has a strong and proud history of voicing dissenting opinions…. It shows that there is an amazing and wondrous reality of Jewish voices,” she said.

Outlook editor Carl Rosenberg said, “The presentation was good, people seemed to enjoy it…. I think it went well.”

Outlook publishes six times a year and offers both a socialist and humanist lens of social justice, Yiddishkeit, ethical humanism and other issues. For more information, visit outlookmagazine.ca.

Zach Sagorin is a Vancouver freelance writer.

Ensuring fair, legal elections

Kara Mintzberg (B.C. regional director of CJPAC), Ron Laufer, centre, and Michael Schwartz. (photo from Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia)

With Canada’s 2015 federal election so closely contested, Jewish community organizations continued to the dying days of the long campaign to try to encourage volunteerism and interest in the electoral process. One such point of community engagement was the talk Observing Democracy by Ron Laufer on Oct. 8 at the Jewish Museum and Archives of British Columbia. Presented in conjunction with the Canadian Jewish Political Affairs Committee (CJPAC), the evening was a chance for people to hear about the challenging conditions under which elections run in a variety of countries around the world.

Laufer works as an election observer and administrator. He has administered private elections locally, in the case of court-ordered elections of nonprofit organizations such as the Guru Nanak Sikh Temple, for example. His international experience includes primarily work for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). He has acted as an election analyst, polling station advisor and deputy head of mission for many international elections. Some of these elections were not particularly democratic while others, although complex in their execution, were perhaps surprisingly democratic in their process.

The Afghan election in 2005 was an example of a logistically complicated election. Not only was the concept of democratic elections new, but also a large proportion of the population is both illiterate and isolated in places unreachable by motorized vehicle.

“We used hundreds of donkeys, camels and horses to transport election materials,” said Laufer. The ballots were sometimes seven broadsheet pages on which voters needed to cast seven votes, no more, no less, in order for the ballot to be valid.

Laufer worked on this election on the ground in Afghanistan for six months in order to help educate the population, organize the ballots and the voting, and assess the results afterward. From the slides he showed, another challenge was keeping the election observers safe. “One trip included two international observers, with about 18 others between the interpreters and the security staff.”

Just a sampling of the countries Laufer has visited to help in some fashion with their elections includes Turkmenistan, India, Nigeria, Iceland, Hungary, Kosovo, Uzbekistan, Ukraine, Austria, Tunisia, Malta and Albania. With the exception of Nigeria, these countries are all member states of OSCE. Much of his work as an observer has been for the OSCE, since all member states are required to have observers of their elections. There are 57 states who have signed on to the OSCE, so this keeps Laufer quite busy, considering the length of his missions can range from one week to observe an election day to a long-term mission of up to six months.

Membership in OSCE is, in some cases, a screen for undemocratic states, such as Turkmenistan, and countries like Hungary and Bulgaria, which are becoming increasingly less democratic, said Laufer.

While he offered many examples of countries in which elections are no more than a show put on by the ruling dynasty, he also gave examples of countries whose systems seem to be improving. His fairly recent trip to Sierra Leone was a bright spot. He said, “They went through hell and back and now it feels like they are moving forward. Their election was fairly smooth.” He acknowledged that elections are only a small part of democracy but said that, without properly run elections, democracy cannot be achieved.

After Laufer answered questions from the floor, Michael Schwartz, JMABC coordinator of programs and development, gave a short presentation that was followed by Kara Mintzberg, B.C. regional director of CJPAC, who spoke briefly on the ways in which Jewish Canadians can “punch above our weight” in an election.

As a community, she said, we represent only 1.1% of the Canadian population and are spread out all over the country; only five percent of all ridings in the federal election were potentially influenced by a concentration of Jewish population in those areas. In general,

CJPAC encourages members of the community to volunteer, and facilitates the introduction of a volunteer who signs up with CJPAC to the volunteer’s choice of campaign, thus alerting the candidate to the participation and interest of a Jewish volunteer. This knowledge, it is hoped, will make the candidates more aware of the Jewish and/or pro-Israel presence and support in his or her riding.

Among CJPAC’s activities leading up to the Oct. 19 federal election was an all-candidates meeting on Oct. 1 at Beth Israel Synagogue with more than 500 in attendance. CJPAC’s mission of fostering Jewish and pro-Israel political leadership is not limited to election time.

For more information on the JMABC, visit jewishmuseum.ca. To become involved in political advocacy through CJPAC, visit cpjac.ca.

Michelle Dodek is a freelance writer living in Vancouver.

Survivors living in squalor

Survivor Mitzvah Project’s Zane Buzby, centre, in 2012 with Abramas and Malka Dikhtyar, the last two Jews in Bazaliya, Ukraine, the birthplace of Buzby’s grandfather. (photo from Survivor Mitzvah Project)

It is officially autumn and British Columbians are nesting, settling in for the cozier, slower season to come. For impoverished Holocaust survivors living in shocking squalor in eastern Europe, the impending winter is a time of danger and scarcity.

Like most people, Zane Buzby initially had no idea that there were thousands of destitute, aged survivors of the Holocaust living in subhuman conditions across the former Soviet Union. After she first encountered some of the poorest of the poor, she returned to her California home and searched for organizations that help them.

“I thought a lot of them must be doing this, even the big organizations that have Holocaust survivor programs,” she recalled recently. “I called every single one of them, [asking] specifically what are you doing? It’s nothing. They’re not helping people financially. No one was doing with this.”

The Claims Conference, which was created by the German government to aid survivors of the Holocaust, has proven useless to most of these individuals.

photo - Survivors Isak and Galina in hospital
Survivors Isak and Galina in hospital. (photo from Survivor Mitzvah Project)

“If you were in a concentration camp – and the Germans kept really good records – if you survived Auschwitz, they have your name … [even so], most people have to hire an attorney,” Buzby said. The survivors she helps don’t have records, partly because the Holocaust in the east was typified by on-the-spot mass murder by Einsatzgruppen killing squads rather than concentration camps. And the few survivors in eastern Europe today do not have the resources to apply.

“They don’t have computers, they don’t have people advocating for them, there’s no lawyers out there,” said Buzby.

photo - Survivors Isak and Galina in their younger days
Survivors Isak and Galina in their younger days. (photo from Survivor Mitzvah Project)

In many cases, they also don’t have the money to pay for heating fuel, let alone medications or doctors. Some may have a pension of $10 a month, others have no income whatsoever. Food can be very scarce and many of the survivors are the last, or among the last, Jews in their villages, making their final years bleak and lonely.

Buzby took it upon herself to help. She formed the Survivor Mitzvah Project in 2001 and has helped thousands of the most desperate, destitute survivors. (See also jewishindependent.ca/oldsite/archives/may08/archives08may02-01.html.)

“This is the last generation of Holocaust survivors and we are the last generation who can say that we helped,” she said. “Everyone turned their back in 1939 but today we can do something to help them and we should.”

The Survivor Mitzvah Project (SMP) doesn’t try to create the infrastructure of social services or initiate major projects. The goal is simple. Get some money into the hands of the most destitute Holocaust survivors as quickly as possible.

“We try to give them between $100 and $150 a month to get food, heat and medication, so it comes out between $1,800 and $2,000 a year per survivor,” she said. “Of course, we don’t have the money, we don’t bring in enough money, we don’t have enough donors to help everyone every month and that’s the sad part. That’s why this is really a call to action. There is no tomorrow for these people. They need money now.”

Buzby, an actor and TV director before she became obsessed with helping destitute survivors, finds recipients through word of mouth, traveling to villages and asking around for Jews or looking for signs of Jewish life. Often, she said, survivors lead her to others. She recalled a particular example.

photo - Some survivors are living in huts – “no running water, no heat, broken windows.”
Some survivors are living in huts – “no running water, no heat, broken windows.” (photo from Survivor Mitzvah Project)

“When I went there, to this little village, it was in such poverty, it was unimaginable, unbelievable poverty. No bathroom, no running water, no heat, broken windows,” she said. “A lot of these people made the huts they live in themselves out of mud and straw bricks after the war. It needs to be refurbished every year but now in their old age they can’t do it, so ceilings fall in. I gave [a woman] $800 and, on the way out, she pulls on my jacket and says to me through a translator, ‘Can I split this was someone?’ And I said, ‘Who are you going to split it with?’ ‘There is a woman down the road who is much worse off than I am.’ And I thought, how could anybody be worse off than you are, so I said come with us and take us to this woman. So we went to see the second woman and she was very bad off, so she was put on the list, and that’s how it goes.”

The Jews in these villages are often surrounded by non-Jews who are also destitute, said Buzby.

“There’s always poor people to help, God knows,” she said. “But for the Jewish people who survived the Holocaust, not only were their families decimated and murdered, their communities were obliterated, especially if they were in the east, they were burned to the ground. There’s no community, there is no rabbi, there’s no Jewish community, there is no shul, there’s no sister, brother and uncle, there is no support system. So, these [non-Jewish] villagers, even though they are also poor, they have large families, they have maybe a church, they have community. These [survivors] have no community. There is absolutely nothing supporting them.”

photo - Basya Kreyn with her prewar photo, Belarus
Basya Kreyn with her prewar photo, Belarus. (photo from Survivor Mitzvah Project)

Holocaust survivors in eastern Europe have one thing in abundance, Buzby clarified. Antisemitism.

“Rampant. Terrible,” she said. “There’s more antisemitism now than there’s ever been.”

In places, neo-Nazis march openly on the streets. Fascistic parties are gaining strength across eastern Europe. In Vilnius, Lithuania, kids dress up as “Jews” in masks with exaggerated features that are perceived as Jewish and trick-or-treat, demanding money. War-era Nazi collaborators are being rehabilitated as national heroes, she said.

The relationships between the few surviving Jews and their neighbors is additionally fraught because of the high levels of collaboration between the Nazi invaders and the native populations in the east. The almost complete destruction of the Jewish communities of Lithuania – an estimated 95% of the Jews there were killed – is credited to the assistance of Lithuanians. The Simon Wiesenthal Centre has said that Ukraine, for example, has never initiated any investigation into collaboration or prosecuted a perpetrator.

The Survivor Mitzvah Project gets almost no institutional help. Buzby said she routinely contacts major foundations but they demur, saying they support various organizations that assist survivors. But the survivors Buzby has tracked down have fallen through the cracks of whatever institutionalized assistance might be available.

What they do get is support from some of Buzby’s show biz colleagues. Buzby’s acting career includes turns in some of the classic comedies of the 1970s and ’80s, including Up in Smoke, National Lampoon’s Class Reunion and This is Spinal Tap. As a director, she worked on sitcoms including The Dick Van Dyke Show, Golden Girls, Newhart and Blossom. She has brought entertainment figures together for emotional events in which luminaries including Valerie Harper, Ed Asner, Frances Fisher, Elliott Gould, Lainie Kazan and Chris Noth read letters from survivors SMP has helped, who speak about their hardships and the difference the assistance has made in their lives. A powerful video of one of the events is online at survivormitzvah.org.

SMP has hit the $1 million a year mark, but Buzby estimates she needs $2.5 million to meet demand.

“This is an opportunity for people to change the course of history for the survivors,” she said. “Everybody has monuments and raises money for and builds museums for remembrance of those that perished, which is absolutely as it should be. But what about those that survived?”

The coming of the cold winter adds urgency to Buzby’s work. So does the obvious march of time, she said, as the remaining survivors near the end of their lives.

“It’s a time that’s never going to come again,” she said.

For more information or to donate, visit survivormitzvah.org or canadahelps.org.

CAMERA counters mistruth

Canadian-Israeli Sidney Shapiro addresses the CAMERA conference in Boston last August. (photo from CAMERA)

Sidney Shapiro had finished his Israel Defence Forces service just weeks before he arrived on campus at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ont.

“I walked into the door of the school and there is a huge poster of a kid, a Palestinian kid, in the shadow of a field box and some Israel apartheid whatever,” he said, referring to a familiar cartoon employed by Canada’s anti-Israel movement. “So I wrote an email to the professor who put up the poster, saying I just served in Gaza for two years, I know a lot about it, I’ve seen from my firsthand experience. I’d like to talk to you about it. Not debate or try to convince you, just tell you what my experiences were. And he [replied], ‘I don’t talk to baby killers.’ That basically set the tone for the rest of my university experience.”

Shapiro, whose family made aliya from Canada when he was 10 years old, joined the Jewish Students Association at Laurentian and now, while working on his PhD, is president of the club. Over the years, he told the Independent, his club has had tremendous support from the Boston-based Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA). In August, Shapiro was a guest speaker at the organization’s largest-ever campus advocacy conference.

While primarily an American organization, CAMERA has been a powerful resource whenever the Zionist students at Laurentian have called on them, Shapiro said.

“We started working with them four years ago,” he said. “We went to various U.S.-based organizations, as well as Canadian ones, and the most responsive one was CAMERA.”

CAMERA differs from other advocacy groups in that it focuses attention specifically on promoting more accurate, balanced and complete media coverage of Israel and the Middle East.

“We don’t have a Hillel, we don’t have a Chabad and we’re extremely isolated in terms of responding to Israel advocacy problems on campus,” Shapiro said. “So, while we have some support from the Federation, from CIJA, from other organizations, we don’t have anybody on campus. CAMERA, of all the organizations we ever worked with, is the most responsive, has the most resources and has been a really good partner when we have a frustrating situation on campus, picking up the phone and actually helping us dealing with it.”

The Saudi government sends about 500 students a year to Laurentian, but Shapiro said that is not where most of the trouble comes from. The small band of anti-Israel activists tends to be far removed from the realities of the Middle East. The more common image of a “pro-Palestinian” activist, he said, is “somebody who grew up in the [Canadian] north and has never been exposed to this except that [Israel is] the evil empire and everything that has to do with Israel is merely propaganda. People are incredibly brainwashed,” he said.

Shapiro, who spoke at the conference on the topic of Israeli history, Zionism and Jewish identity, was one of eight Canadian students at the event.

“The most important outcome of the conference is networking,” he said, “meeting many other students. Whether they go to big universities or small universities, we are in exactly the same position.”

A senior CAMERA official countered the idea that the pro-Israel side is losing the battle for minds on campus.

“There’s a misconception that Israel is losing terribly on American campuses,” said Gilad Skolnick, CAMERA’s director of campus programming, in a statement. “In fact, it’s the anti-Israel side that’s losing most of the time.” Of the 44 BDS campaigns [boycott, divestment and sanctions], only 12 have passed BDS resolutions, and over two dozen have failed.… That isn’t to say students don’t face extremely difficult challenges in a lot of places. They do. So, we have to train them as much as possible for whatever comes. Our program provides them with resources and support.”

Responding to emergencies

Israeli field hospital personnel look after those injured in the earthquake in Nepal. (photo by Sam Amiel)

Cardiac surgeon Lt.-Col. (res.) Dr. Ofer Merin is deputy director general of Shaare Zedek Medical Centre and lectures at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He heads the Israel Defence Forces Home Front Command’s field hospital, and was part of the IDF’s relief efforts in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake, in Japan after the 2011 tsunami, in the Philippines after the 2013 typhoon and in Nepal after the earthquake in April this year. With various colleagues, he has written about these experiences, as well as about the provision of trauma care at Shaare Zedek.

From the New England Journal of Medicine, March 2010: Within two days of the earthquake in Haiti in January 2010, Israel had sent “a military task force consisting of 230 people” who “landed in Port-au-Prince 15 hours after leaving Tel Aviv and began to deploy immediately…. In its 10 days of operation, the field hospital treated more than 1,100 patients.”

From the Journal of the American Medical Association, July 2015: After the earthquake in Nepal in April 2015, the IDF sent a medical team of 126, and the field hospital was “deployed as a stand-alone facility 82 hours after the earthquake.” Over 11 days, “we treated 1,668 patients, performed 85 operations and delivered eight babies.”

From the Lancet, April 2015: “There were 11 terror attacks in Jerusalem, Israel, between October–December 2014 alone. Two of the injured terrorists arrived at our institution and, following standing triage protocol, we prioritized one terrorist to undergo surgery first since his medical condition was more critical than that of the victims.”

photo - Temple Sholom Rabbi Dan Moskovitz with Dr. Ofer Merin when Merin was in Vancouver in August
Temple Sholom Rabbi Dan Moskovitz with Dr. Ofer Merin when Merin was in Vancouver in August. (photo by Karen James)

These are but a few examples of the work Merin and his colleagues do, and the challenges they face. When Merin was in Vancouver recently, he shared some of his experiences and discussed the ethical issues surrounding trauma care. He spoke to the Jewish community on Aug. 20 and to physicians in the trauma unit at Vancouver General Hospital the day prior.

Dr. Rick Schreiber – professor of pediatrics at the University of British Columbia, director of the B.C. Pediatric Liver Transplant Program and president-elect of the Canadian Association for the Study of the Liver – was the catalyst for Merin’s visit. Yet his connection to Merin was not, as it first might appear, through his work as a fellow medical professional, but through Merin’s wife, Ora.

Schreiber was on an adult March of the Living mission earlier this year that was organized by the Montreal Jewish community.

“I’m originally from Montreal. I’ve been out here about 20 years,” said Schreiber, who is very involved with Jewish causes in Israel, overseas and elsewhere, including here with the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver. On this recent mission, he explained in a phone interview with the Independent, all of the tours and activities in Israel were organized by Ora Merin and her company,

Giant Leaps. “I was very impressed with how the program was laid out for the Israel aspects of the mission and the level of the people [we met] and the things that we did. We got to places that most people wouldn’t get to….”

Ofer Merin attended the mission’s closing dinner with his wife. With medicine in common, he and Schreiber started talking, and Merin’s involvement with the Israel Defences Forces disaster response team came up.

The next day, as Schreiber was leaving Israel, he saw Ora Merin again. She told Schreiber that her husband had left for Nepal, which had just experienced an earthquake. “I got to tell you,” said Schreiber, “within six hours, they had up and going a launch – and they bring everything.… It’s amazing what the Israelis do to be first responders, and they are recognized around the world as being the best. They get there very quickly and they set up all the units, like an intensive care and operating tents and all this kind of stuff, and triage, and get rescue things going long before other countries are even getting their finances together.”

“It’s amazing what the Israelis do to be first responders, and they are recognized around the world as being the best. They get there very quickly and they set up all the units, like an intensive care and operating tents … long before other countries are even getting their finances together.”

During that conversation, Ora mentioned that their family (she and Ofer have four adult children) was going to be in the United States – Ofer has a brother in Seattle – in the summer, and Schreiber suggested they think about coming up to Vancouver on that trip. He said that it would be good for her, because of her travel agency, to meet with Federation, which runs missions to Israel, and maybe her husband could give a talk on his work. “So, that’s how that all started, back in Israel, back last May,” he said.

In addition to the community meetings and talk, Schreiber also organized for Ofer Merin to speak at VGH. “There is a big group of trauma people at VGH, and they jumped on this because they had heard of him and they knew of him, and we organized for him to give rounds…. There was very good attendance at that rounds, and he talked about what he does. But he didn’t talk about all the people they deal with and how they set up, he talked about a lot of ethical things, like how do you decide to save this person versus that person – you only have limited space to save people.”

Merin spoke at VGH about treating such large numbers of injured after a natural disaster, and about handling the stress of that, said Schreiber. “The next thing he talked about, the ethics. You’re not able to provide the same level of care as you’re accustomed to, like we supply for trauma people in Vancouver, we can’t give the same level of care … you’ve got to treat people and turn them over quickly, so you can treat the next person.”

Merin also discussed how, at Shaare Zedek Hospital in Jerusalem, they have to treat victims of terror attacks, including, at times, the terrorist. Of the victims and the perpetrator(s), who do you take care of first? At Shaare Zedek, Merin said, such decisions are made on the basis of triage, who is the most badly injured.

The Independent caught up with Merin by email after his Vancouver visit.

JI: What interested you in cardiac medicine/surgery versus other specialties? Did you always want to be in medicine?

OM: My decision to go into medicine was relatively late, in my early 20s, not something I was born with. My decision to go into cardiac surgery, I guess, was based first on my “nature” to choose something surgical – more adrenalin, very quick results. Cardiac surgery in specific is a great combination of both surgery and the need of good clinical and physiology understanding.

JI: The burnout rate for doctors in general is quite high. It must be higher for trauma physicians. How do you (and/or your colleagues) manage the stress?

OM: I would divide [my response]. There are things done on the group level – discussions, sharing, etc. Especially these days in Jerusalem, there is an extra challenge – dealing with treatment of terror victims, and many times treatment of the terrorists themselves…. We have a psychologist who is doing some group work especially with the ER people and the intensive care unit. And, on the personal level, everyone has to find his ways to vent. I jog almost every day. For me, it’s a good way to relax. In missions abroad, I write every day. Also a great way to vent.

JI: The enormity of being part of a disaster-response team is almost beyond comprehension for anyone who has not had the experience. If it’s possible to outline a general order of events, from the time a natural disaster hits to when the Israeli unit is on the ground in another country providing care, could you please share the main points?

OM: One of the important things is to work in parallel. We bring in the team way before there is a full understanding of the scale of the disaster, so we are prepared before there is a governmental decision to send a team. Once a decision is taken, we are prepared to leave. We send immediately a small forward team, which can report back, and prepare whatever is needed for deployment. We drill every year, so we maintain a high level of preparedness.

JI: In a couple of articles, you mention collaboration/integration with local facilities in a disaster-response situation. What types of factors enter the decision of where the Israeli unit fits into the overall aid effort?

OM: To be honest, in the last natural disasters around the globe, Israel is almost always the largest and first to be on ground. Therefore, we communicate with the local health providers and make a mutual decision where it is best to deploy.

The decision if to deploy as a self-sufficient unit or to operate (like in the Philippines) as an integrated unit is based mainly on the question if the local services are still functional. If they are, it is many times better to assist them and not “compete” with them, as we are arriving for a short term.

Climbing for the kids

This coming October, some 30 Jews from around the world will be climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro to raise money for SHALVA, the Association for Mentally and Physically Challenged Children in Jerusalem. (photo from SHALVA)

Scaling the largest free-standing mountain in the world is a remarkable accomplishment. A test to human endurance and tenacity. Raising a special needs child can require the same tenacity.

This October, some 30 Jews from around the world will climb Mt. Kilimanjaro to raise money for SHALVA, the Association for Mentally and Physically Challenged Children in Jerusalem – helping the parents and kids of SHALVA scale their own personal “mountains.”

With participants from Canada and as far away as the United Kingdom, the United States and Israel, the climb has attracted an eclectic group of trekkers all bound together with a common goal. The group spans the spectrum of the Jewish community from secular to ultra-Orthodox. Each one has their own reasons for choosing to reach beyond their limits to do something incredible.

“Everyone at SHALVA is touched that so many SHALVA supporters have come together to climb for one cause,” said trip coordinator Gaby Hirsch. “What started as a U.K. initiative became a global effort as the unique opportunity captured imaginations around the world.”

To make the trip as inclusive as possible, organizers decided to make it adhere to the highest possible standards of Jewish law. The trek is serving vegetarian food and the organizers have purchased new cooking and eating utensils. On the seventh day of the trek, the group will rest for Shabbat on Mt. Kilimanjaro, allowing them to join millions of Jews around the world in keeping Shabbat as part of the Shabbos Project. While no participant is required to keep Shabbat, by making the trip adhere to the most stringent feasible level of Jewish observance, all climbers are able to maintain their own comfort level.

Photographer Sarah Raanan was looking for a challenge, a chance to push herself, but it was learning about SHALVA that made her sign up. “As soon as I found out about SHALVA, I knew I had to do this,” she explained. “The first video I watched just blew me away.”

photo - Providing services for more than 500 infants, children and young adults, SHALVA accompanies each child from birth to adulthood
Providing services for more than 500 infants, children and young adults, SHALVA accompanies each child from birth to adulthood. (photo from SHALVA)

Raanan is not the first one to be impressed by the scope of the SHALVA Centre. For 25 years, SHALVA has been helping children with special needs move beyond their limitations. SHALVA programs and services are designed to provide individual treatment for the child while also strengthening the fabric of the family. Providing services for more than 500 infants, children and young adults, SHALVA accompanies each child from birth to adulthood. Individually tailored programs are designed to help participants reach their full potential and integrate into the community.

Claire Freeman from London saw for herself the life-changing work SHALVA does when she lived in Israel. “There’s not a place in the world that does what they do. But they can’t do it alone,” she said. As a mother of three, Freeman is grateful that her children can run and play. She wanted to show them that even when you are born with the gift of being able-bodied, life is about pushing yourself to go beyond your own limitations.

Having positive impacts on their children is a common theme for participants, as is slight apprehension at leaving a brood at home.

Shoshana Baker, originally from Teaneck, N.J., but now living in Ra’anana, Israel, was unsure whether she would do the climb despite being attracted by the challenge. “At first, I thought no way, it’s too hard to leave my children. Then I realized that it was an incredible lesson for them.” Baker decided to teach by example the importance of dedicating oneself to a worthy cause.

Toronto native Helen Silverstein wanted to do something meaningful for her 60th birthday. “I wanted to do it because the kids at SHALVA can’t.” Looking to avoid a flurry of birthday cards and gifts she didn’t need, she was happy to have her friends and family sponsor her to climb.

Every climber has pledged to raise $10,000. Each one has found his or her own unique methods of raising money, from running an “Auction of Promises” to sponsored paragliding. The money raised is helping to fund SHALVA’s National Centre, due to open in Jerusalem next year. This state-of-the-art facility will enable SHALVA to expand its services to offer treatment to four times as many children.

The would-be trekkers are not without their apprehensions, and for good reason – in the course of nine days they will hike approximately 100 kilometres. Trekking through five different ecosystems, participants will be pushing their personal endurance to the limit. One of the biggest risks is altitude sickness. This condition occurs when the body responds badly to the reduced level of oxygen present at higher altitudes. Climbers are warned to watch out for headaches, dizziness and nausea.

John Corre, a grandfather of nine, is participating to celebrate his 70th birthday. Despite the extreme physical exertion, he is not fazed by the length of the climb. His biggest fear is the possibility of altitude sickness because there is no way of knowing before the climb how the altitude will affect an individual.

One climber not daunted by overcoming extreme odds is Jerusalem resident Rachel Illouz, a breast cancer survivor. As she was going through the surgery and chemotherapy, she kept telling herself that one day she would climb a mountain. In her own words, “As soon as I found out about the SHALVA climb, I said to myself ‘That is my mountain.’”

Just as SHALVA has brought together people from across Israeli society, united by the desire to give all kids the best start in life, so now SHALVA is bringing together Jews from every possible walk of life to continue that vital work. This unique trip shows us how we are all climbing mountains of one variety or another in our lives, and reminds us that it is incumbent upon us to reach out our hands and help the other up.

To help the climbers reach their fundraising targets, you can make a tax deductible donation at climb4SHALVA.org/view_profile.php?id=1401.

Bible Museum in the works

An artist’s impression of the interior of the new Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C. (all photos from Ashernet)

image - An artist’s impression of the exterior of the new Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C.
An artist’s impression of the exterior of the new Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C.

The Museum of the Bible, which will open in Washington, D.C., in November 2017, will display a large collection on loan from the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). The museum will cover an area of 48,000 square metres and use advanced techniques to illustrate Bible stories. Following an agreement with IAA, the new $400 million privately funded museum will devote a whole floor to a revolving selection of items from the two million held by IAA in Israel.

The museum also will house the Green Collection, the world’s largest private collection of rare biblical texts and artifacts. Steve Green is the founder and president of the 600-branch U.S.-based Hobby Lobby craft store chain. The museum building, which was formerly the home of the Washington Design Centre, was purchased by Green for $50 million in 2012.

 

Fighter returns to Israel

Former British Columbian Gill Rosenberg spent nine months fighting the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. (photo from Gill Rosenberg)

Gill Rosenberg returned to Israel a month ago, after spending nine months fighting the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

Born in Surrey, Rosenberg, 31, grew up in White Rock and graduated from King David High School before continuing her studies at B.C. Institute of Technology, finishing a program in airport operations management. She moved to Israel in 2006 to serve in the Israel Defence Forces, volunteering through a program called Mahal (the overseas volunteer IDF program). During the course of her service, she made aliya. She now lives in Jerusalem.

“I served as a search and rescue NCO (non-commissioned officer) and as an instructor at the Search, Rescue and Civil Defence School,” Rosenberg told the Independent. “It was a great experience.”

She also spent time training the Kenyan Armed Forces and helped them establish a disaster response unit in their country.

Growing up in British Columbia taught Rosenberg “to respect the diversity of culture, beliefs and religion,” she said. “As well, being raised Jewish, I had a strong education on the Shoah and participated in the March of the Living, visiting the concentration camps in Poland.”

After that experience, Rosenberg was invited to speak at the B.C. Legislature on behalf of Jewish youth when the government voted to enact Holocaust Memorial Day legislation, when Ujjal Dosanjh was premier.

Intolerance and totalitarianism are two things that she has vowed to never tolerate. “I fully believe that when we say ‘Never again,’ we don’t mean just for us Jews,” she said. “We can’t stand by and stay silent to any genocide taking place – and that’s what I saw happening to the Yazidi population on Sinjar Mountain. The Christians and Yazidis in Iraq have lost the most in this war.”

Rosenberg fought in Syria with the YPG/YPJ (Kurdish militia groups) for three months and then headed to Iraq for six months, fighting with the Assyrian Christian militia, Dwekh Nawsha.

“In Syria, I was in Serekaniye and it was a pretty static front over the winter months,” she said. “It was bitterly cold, always raining, muddy, and darkness like I’ve never experienced anywhere else.

“There’d be a firefight at least once a day, but it was mostly from a distance of over one kilometre. My first day on the frontline, a suicide bomber blew himself up about 50 feet from our checkpoint. He intended to get closer, but because of the deep mud, his vehicle got stuck and, thank God, he was the only casualty that day.

“In Iraq,” she continued, “I was at a frontline 25 kilometres from the city centre of Mosul. They were in Baqofa and Telskuf, and the next town over, called Batnay, was already Daesh-occupied.

“The Daesh [ISIS] are hitting that position with mortars, Katyusha rockets and heavy machine gun fire daily and especially at night. They attempt to ambush, but both Dwekh Nawsha and the Peshmerga at that frontline have prevented any advancement of ISIS forces.”

Rosenberg said she was treated with the utmost respect and not any differently than other fighters. “They feel like the world has forgotten them, so for an Israeli Jewish woman to pick up a weapon and stand with them on the frontlines meant a lot to them,” she said. “I still keep in touch with the leader there and he tells me I’ll be a part of them forever, that we’re family.”

As she was fighting, Rosenberg wore the Canadian flag on her uniform proudly. “I feel that Canada is one of few countries that still stands tall and supports democracy and freedom, and it isn’t afraid to condemn those committing evil in this world. And that’s something to be very proud of.”

Earlier in the interview, she noted, “Stephen Harper is the only world leader condemning the nuclear deal with Iran and speaking out against the evils of this world and standing with our best allies.”

Since returning to Israel, Rosenberg has met with several members of the Knesset and shared with them some of her experiences. She also has been approached by several nongovernmental organizations working in Syria and Iraq for her help with their efforts.

“I want to continue helping women and children in Syria and Iraq,” she said, “so I have to determine where my experience and abilities can be best put to use. As far as returning to the frontline, I have no plans to return at this stage.”

Rosenberg was very clear that she does not see herself as a recruiter. “I very adamantly would advise against anyone traveling to the region to fight,” she said. “There are many ways to help, including a Montreal Jewish foundation called CYCI (the Liberation of Christian and Yazidi Children of Iraq), which are buying and liberating the children that are sold like sheep in the market in ISIS-controlled areas.

“Pikuach nefesh [to save a life] is an obligation we have as Jews, and the Talmud even requires us to spend money to save a life if we have that ability,” she said. “This organization [CYCI] gives us that ability.”

Another Canadian organization, also coming from the Jewish community, is Rape Is No Joke (RINJ). This group provides medical care to women and children who have been victims of rape and other brutality in Syria and Iraq.

From what Rosenberg has been hearing, the dynamics on the battlefield have changed in recent weeks, with the Iranians making gains in Iraq against ISIS. However, she was quick to add, “They might be fighting ISIS just as I was, but, ultimately, they’re not a friend and I believe they’re a much greater threat than is ISIS.”

Reiterating her discouragement of anyone traveling to the region to fight, Rosenberg said, “I believe that if we don’t stop ISIS now, they’ll be at our doorstep before we know it. ISIS are geniuses at social media and media and know how to look strong and strike fear in the hearts of the West.

“I can tell you, from my personal experience on the ground, that they fight in a very cowardly manner and often run away when challenged. This is especially true when it’s the women of the YPJ. Their beliefs are such that they think if they’re killed by a woman, they will go to hell. So, my only question is this, What happens to them when that woman is also Jewish and Israeli?”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

Making lasting connections

Salome Henry, second from the right, in Jerusalem on her Ambassadors to Poland trip with, left to right, Deborah Stein, Ashley Solomon and Zahava Rothschild. (photo from Salome Henry)

The Anne Samson Jerusalem Journey (TJJ) is trying to increase Jewish engagement among Conservative, Reform and non-denominational youth. A four-week summer program for public high school teens, TJJ takes participants on a Jewish heritage trip to historical and modern sites in Israel.

Participant Salome Henry, 16, was born in France and later made her way to Vancouver with her family, before recently moving again with her family to Boston. She went on TJJ – which is run by NCSY (National Conference of Synagogue Youth, the international youth movement of the Orthodox Union) – two years ago. She stayed involved with NCSY after the trip, which she took while she was still living in Vancouver.

“I’m hoping to stay connected to the organization,” Henry told the Independent. “I ended up going on a second summer program after TJJ. I went on the Ambassadors to Poland trip, which was spending one week in Poland learning about Jewish history, followed by three weeks in Israel, which was really intensive.”

While Henry goes to public school, her school has a Jewish students union, which she helped get started this past year. “This is one way that I stay connected to the Jewish community, because it’s rather hard if you go to public school.”

Henry said, “Most of the friends I have at school who are Jewish don’t really associate with Judaism, or they don’t consider themselves Jewish, or they celebrate things in different degrees…. I thought to myself that it would be great to have something like this. I know I definitely wanted to be able to talk about Jewish issues that I usually discuss at NCSY, but I feel like a lot of other kids can benefit from it, too.’”

Henry’s school has a large Jewish population from Israeli, Russian and American backgrounds. “It’s a very diverse community,” said Henry. “I remember when I came to the school, I realized there were so many people who are Jewish.”

The Jewish student group is looking at planning a trip next year to Israel or a one-week trip to Poland. At board meetings, they talk about upcoming holidays and there is a rabbi on hand if people have any religious or spiritual questions.

“We just received a lot of funding for next year, so what we are going to be doing is getting speakers to come and speak on important subjects and people will be able to come after school and listen to them,” said Henry.

In addition to putting together the speakers program for next year, Henry is finding places where students can volunteer in conjunction with the local synagogues. “I think it would be nice to add that aspect to our club,” she said.

“I’m going to delegate some work to some younger kids, because I want the club to be able to grow afterwards,” she added. “If all the seniors in the club graduate and no one can take over, that would be unfortunate.”

Another thing weighing on Henry is to find ways to support Israel in the larger community. “When I was in Israel last summer, we talked a lot about what it means to be a Jew on a college campus and how to speak up for Israel, especially in terms of media,” she said. “It’s hard to really talk to people who are so against it.

“A lot of kids have these ideas – they see it [Israel] in the media, which is captured very differently from what the reality is, so they immediately assume that what Israel is doing is wrong. If they took the time to analyze, they’d see what Israel is doing is logical and is what any other country would do.

“If they knew more about the IDF [Israel Defence Forces], they’d know it’s one of the most moral armies out there. So, I think that’s really something that we … today, as American Jewish youth, if we have the resources to learn about it … we really have the duty to tell others around us who don’t know about it, because it’s for the good of the Jewish community. It’s also our reputation that is at stake. Hopefully, we can focus on that next year.”

Being from France, Henry is keeping a close watch on what is unfolding there, as well – and more so as of late, as she will be there this summer. “I’m so concerned, because I know that things in Europe are so much worse for Jews,” said Henry. “With current events, people are starting to realize the intensity of the situation.”

From conversations with her family, Henry has become more aware that this current situation is not a new one for French Jews – something she feels people need to be educated about. “It’s horrifying to think the Holocaust has already happened, but people are still saying the same things that they were in the in 1940s. There’s still so much hate out there.”

Henry’s parents are very proud and happy with her involvement. “Both my parents love my NCSY friends and they are happy that I have that community near me,” she said. “They are thankful, because they know how much they mean to me.”

Seeing her go to Israel last summer with TJJ while Israel was in the midst of a conflict did not overly concern her parents, as they knew she was in good hands with a great group of kids, said Henry. And, indeed, everyone returned home safe.

Positive TJJ stats

According to a recent study commissioned by NCSY, 92% of the Jerusalem Journey “alumni feel emotionally attached or very attached to Israel.”

“The results suggest that TJJ – the trip, the subsequent educational activities and other consequences of participation – played a major role in generating increased Jewish engagement in these areas, and undoubtedly many others as well,” said the report, called The Jewish Impact of the Anne Samson Jerusalem Journey (TJJ): Increasing Jewish Engagement among Conservative, Reform and Non-Denominational Youth.

Conducted by Prof. Steven M. Cohen of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion and Ezra Kopelowitz, chief executive officer of Research Success Technologies in Israel, the internet survey portion of the study took place last spring. Non-Orthodox alumni who had participated in summer programs since 2007 were contacted. Of the 1,784 alumni surveyed, more than 20% provided responses that could be used in the analysis.

Questions focused “on behaviors and attitudes considered to be important to Jewish leaders across the denominational spectrum” in an attempt to answer the question, “Does the Jerusalem Journey help make non-Orthodox-raised Jewish youngsters ‘more Jewish’?” Responses from the TJJ survey were compared with the Pew Research Centre survey of Jewish Americans (2013), the Jewish Community Study of New York 2011 and the Birthright survey of applicants for 2001-05 but who never participated (2010).

According to the report summary, “86% of TJJ alumni said it was very important to raise children as Jewish, compared with 69% of Birthright applicants; 80% of TJJ alumni fasted for the whole of Yom Kippur, compared with only 48% of the 18-to-29-year-olds in the statistically adjusted Pew survey; 75% said it was ‘very important to marry a Jew,’ compared with 55% of Birthright applicants; and 73% of TJJ alumni usually attended a Shabbat meal, compared with only 34% of Birthright applicants.”

As well, “94% of TJJ alumni said they attended a Passover seder last year, 61% said they participate in Jewish learning on a weekly or more frequent basis and 41% said they returned to Israel after attending TJJ…. In general, the survey found that TJJ attracts significant Jewish engagement and identity among young people who were not raised in Orthodox homes.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.