Argentinian community in crisis

JACK HUBERMAN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN

Picture men in business suits, standing in line at a soup kitchen. Picture a Jewish community closing schools and laying off teachers. Picture young people in their 20s struggling to obtain visas to take them somewhere they could have a better future. Picture synagogues that are full but can no longer afford to pay their rabbis and staff. Picture families who don't get their prescriptions filled because they need the money to buy food. Picture this happening in a community that, for decades, had raised millions of dollars for Israel and the less fortunate in their own community. Picture this happening in a place where teenagers were fluent in Hebrew and where Jewish community institutions once rivalled those in North America. This is Argentina today. (These words are adapted from the sermon of a rabbi who visited Buenos Aires.)

Argentina continues to be in the midst of a devastating economic and social crisis that began in December 2001 – the worst in the last 100 years. The country's economy collapsed and, after more than two years, is just now barely beginning to recover. Fifty-five per cent of Argentina's population of 37 million – about 20 million people – now live below the poverty line. Poverty has increased by 40 per cent in the past year. Three quarters of a million more Argentinians became unemployed last year.

Argentina is home to the largest Jewish community in Latin America. There are approximately 250,000 Jews in Argentina and about 80 per cent of them were middle class before the recent economic collapse. They are the doctors, dentists and lawyers who had good practices but many of whom, if they still have work, are forced to work at many part-time jobs just to get by. They are the owners of businesses, whose suppliers will not extend them credit and whose customers cannot afford the goods they have in inventory. These are the people who make up a new social class called the "new poor." About 60,000 Jews now find themselves living below the poverty line. Many of them are no longer able to afford the basic necessities of life – food, clothing, shelter and medicine.

Many people lost almost everything they had. They found themselves unemployed, with little or no prospect of finding another job. Some have had to accept jobs at very low salaries. The savings people had were effectively lost because of the combined effect of a 300 per cent devaluation of the peso and because the banks closed for a period of time, freezing what little was left of their savings. Can you imagine if you lost two-thirds of your savings overnight and couldn't get at the rest? At the height of the crisis, many families faced eviction, if they hadn't already lost their homes. Many faced bankruptcy. Jewish institutions suffered because of the failure of the large Jewish banks that had provided them with financial backing. The overall effect has been absolutely devastating on what was previously a vibrant, proud and self-sufficient Jewish community.

Can you imagine how difficult it would be to feed a family of four, for a month, on $100 worth of food vouchers? Can you imagine what it would feel like if the total income for your family of four was only $250 a month? That's what tens of thousands of Jews in Argentina have to live on. This is why Jews in Argentina and the Jewish community in Argentina need our help.

CJA campaigns throughout North America provide the majority of the funds required for both helping Jews in Argentina make aliyah and for social and humanitarian purposes in Argentina. Our own Greater Vancouver Combined Jewish Appeal has designated almost $100,000 of the $5.5 million raised in our campaign to go to Argentina. A significant portion of the funds from all CJA campaigns has been, and continues to be, used to assist Jews in Argentina to make aliyah. The balance of it is used to help meet the local needs of the community but additional assistance is urgently needed and I suggest that it can most easily be developed by local initiatives that come in the form of direct people-to-people and organization-to-organization aid.

The Jewish tradition of tikkun olam (repair of the world) teaches us that we are all responsible for one another and that we are obliged to respond to cries for help from those in need. As Jews, we also know the importance of the mitzvah of tzedakah (charity). According to the Mishnah, "whoever saves one life, it is as if he saves the entire world." Think of these concepts in terms of the current crisis in the Jewish community in Argentina.

It is my hope that every synagogue, Jewish organization and Jewish school program in the Greater Vancouver area will respond to this crisis. Several have already made a commitment to do so. Temple Sholom has established an Argentina Fund and will direct funds raised by it to assist the largest Reform congregation in Buenos Aires feed their hungry members. Congregation Beth Israel has taken steps to help also. Their plans are still in the development stage.

Help is needed to address both the basic human needs and the Jewish needs of Argentinian Jews and their Jewish institutions. Some North America communities are already providing assistance through twinning arrangements with synagogues and Jewish schools in Argentina. They have been raising money and sending it to their twinned congregations and schools to help them provide assistance to their members through their food banks, medical clinics, pharmacies, clothing depots and meal programs. They have also contributed funds to enable children to continue their Jewish education and to prepare for and to have bar and bat mitzvahs.

Addressing the needs of Jews in Argentina doesn't necessarily mean raising large sums of money because even a few hundred dollars goes a long way in Argentina. It could buy food for a Shabbat meal for the poor who come to synagogue to attend services. It could enable a child to have a bar or bat mitzvah or a Jewish couple to be married in a synagogue, both of which might not now happen because of cost. It could cover the tuition for a child at a Jewish day school – for a child who might otherwise go without a Jewish education. It could pay part of the salary of a rabbi or of a teacher at one of the remaining Jewish day schools, both of whom might not otherwise get paid. It could send a child to a Jewish summer camp or a youth program. A few hundred dollars a month would go a long way towards helping to keep a Jewish family in their home, pay their utilities and provide them with food.

There are other ways in which we could help. Here are a few examples.

Students in our Jewish schools could adopt e-mail pen pals in Jewish schools in Argentina and let them know that we care about them. Jewish university students on our campuses could follow the lead of Hillel students at the University of Washington. They, like Jewish students in a number of other American cities, are going to Argentina to learn about the crisis in the Jewish community and do community service there rather than spending their spring break lying on a beach in Fort Lauderdale or Cancun.

We could reach out to Argentinians who have come to Vancouver to make a new life for themselves. Some of them are young people who have left their families behind because there was no future for them in Argentina. Some of them left with very little and arrived here with very little other than hope for a better life. We could help them find a place to live and help them find jobs. We could invite them to attend services and welcome them into our congregations. We could invite them to our homes for a Shabbat or holiday meal.

Another important thing we can do, is to educate our own Jewish community about the crisis in Argentina. Few people either know about it or appreciate how serious the situation really is. As caring Jews, we should know about it. It should be the subject of sermons by our rabbis and discussions by our bar and bat mitzvah kids and other groups at our synagogues. It should be discussed in our schools. However we do it, we need to make our community aware of the urgent need and then follow up with action.

Rabbi Daniel Goldman of Congregation Bet El, one of Argentina's largest synagogues recently said: "Now we are in need. And it is an emergency for us."

Rabbi Marc Schneier, president of the North American Board of Rabbis and a spokesperson for Jewry worldwide, describes the situation in Argentina in the following way: "Whether it is the Joint Distribution Committee, United Jewish Communities or the North American Board of Rabbis, we're probably contributing only a fraction of what is needed in terms of monetary and material sustenance in Argentina – this is the No. 1 crisis facing the Jewish people outside of Israel today."

Vancouver's Jewish community needs to step up to the plate and do its part. Many other communities throughout North America have already done so. Every synagogue, Jewish school program and Jewish organization needs to do its part. Urge any of them with which you are affiliated to learn about and do something to aid the situation of the Jewish community in Argentina. We can make a difference with your help, even if it's one person at a time.

Jack Huberman, QC, is a Vancouver lawyer. His and his wife Evelyn's interest in the crisis in the Jewish community in Argentina come from their personal knowledge of the situation and their desire to inspire a response to it in the Vancouver Jewish community.

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