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"The Basketball Game" is a graphic novel adaptation of the award-winning National Film Board of Canada animated short of the same name – intended for audiences aged 12 years and up. It's a poignant tale of the power of community as a means to rise above hatred and bigotry. In the end, as is recognized by the kids playing the basketball game, we're all in this together.

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Tag: emigration

מספר הישראלים המעוניינים לעזוב למדינה אחרת אלה הולך וגדל

 כצפוי מספר הישראלים המעוניינים לעזוב למדינה אחרת לאור המשבר הקשה הפוקד את המדינה בימים אלה הולך וגדל. זאת בעיקר לאור הרפורמה במערכת המשפטית אותה מציעה ממשלת הימין בראשות ראש הממשלה, בנימין נתניהו. קנדה משמשת באופן קבוע אחד היעדים הבולטים בעולם להגירה כולל לאלה שרוצים להגיע מישראל. בקנדה יש כיום את הריכוז השלישי-רביעי בעולם של יהודים הגרים מחוץ לישראל וגם נקודה זו חשובה לישראלים

הנה מספר תגובות בנושא שמתפרסמות בימים אלה בפורומים השונים של ישראלים בקנדה של פייסבוק – בנושא המעבר מישראל אל קנדה

אלינור כהן כותבת: יש עלייה של מאה אחוז במספר הבקשות שאני מנהלת ואני מוצפת בשאלות ממשפחות שחושבות לעבור לגור בקנדה מהסיבות הכי עצובות שיש

לגבי נושא המחאה נגד תוכנית הרפורמה במערכת המשפט כותבת דפנה קדם: בטורונטו וונקובר אנו מוחים זה שבוע שלישי למען שמירת הדמוקרטיה בישראל. היא מציעה למעוניינים להצטרף לקבוצות המחאה בטורונטו, ונקובר או גם בערים אחרות בקנדה

אסנת קמחי חושבת לעבור עם המשפחה לקנדה. היא שואלת: אנו חושבים לעבור לקנדה. נשמח לקבל עצות, טיפים והמלצות

דניאלה בואנו גם היא מעוניינת לעבור לקנדה. היא כותבת בפורום: מחפשת לעשות רילוקיישן לקנדה עם בעלי והילד בן השנה. יש לי ניסיון של שלוש שנים בצילומי רנטגן של שיניים. אשמח באם תוכלו לעזור לי בנושא

ליאת מרסו מחפשת עזרה דחופה בנוגע להגירה לקנדה ושואלת איך מתחילים ובמי היא יכולה להיעזר

עידן סטולרוב מחפשת עורך דין מומחה להגירה לקנדה

נטלי קיינן מחפשת להכיר ישראלים שגרים באדמונטון שבמחוז אלברטה כיוון שהיא מעוניינת להגר לשם

ג’ניפר סיל כותבת כי אחיה בן העשרים ושתיים הוא שחקן כדורגל (חופשי) שמעוניין לעבור לקנדה. היא שואלת האם מישהו מכיר סוכן מקומי או מישהו אחר שיכול לעזור לו

אלמוני המציין כי משפחתו מתכננת להגר לקנדה בקיץ הקרוב. הוא שואל האם ניתן לפתוח חשבון בנק בקנדה און-ליין מישראל, כדי להעביר כספים לקראת ההגעה

אלדד בלייש שמעוניין לעבור לקנדה הוא טכנאי רנטגן. הוא שואל האם בקנדה מקבלים תעודות רשמיות מישראל ומה התהליך לאישורן

מאיה טאוב מעוניינת לעבור לקנדה והיא שואלת מה האתגר המרכזי של זוגיות ברילוקיישן

אלמונית כותבת כי היא גרה כיום בישראל. היא מעוניינת לחדש את האזרחות הקנדית שלה ולהשיג אזרחות קנדית לבעלה ולילדים. היא שואלת כיצד עושים זאת בצורה היעילה ביותר ומה התנאים לכך

מעיין עופרי שהיא פרמדיקית בישראל שואלת בפורום על פרמדיקים שעובדים כיום בקנדה. היא רוצה מידע מפורט בתחום התעסוקה הזה

מספר הפורומים של ישראלים בקנדה בפייסבוק הולך וגדל עם השנים. הרשימה כוללת כיום בין היתר: חמישה פורומים שונים בעלי אותו שם של ישראלים בקנדה (הכוללים 18 אלף חברים, שמונת אלפים חברים, שבעת אלפים חברים, שש מאות חברים, כחמש מאות חברים, כשלוש מאות חברים), שני פורומים בעלי אותו שם של ישראלים בטורונטו (הכוללים כעשרים ואחד אלף חברים ועשרת אלפים חברים), ישראלים החיים בקנדה (הכולל כארבעת אלפים ושש מאות חברים), ישראלים בהייטק באמריקה – מיועד לאלה שגרים בארה”ב ובקנדה (כולל כארבעת אלים חברים), סטודנטים ישראלים בקנדה (כולל אלף שלוש מאות חברים), שני פורומים בעלי או שם של ישראלים באמריקה – מיועד לאלה שגרים בארה”ב ובקנדה (כוללים עשרים אלף חברים ואלף ארבע מאות חברים) וכן קנדה למטיילים (הכולל כתשעת אלפים חברים)

Posted on March 1, 2023February 28, 2023Author Roni RachmaniCategories UncategorizedTags Canada, emigration, governance, immigration, Israel, Netanyahu, politics, בנימין נתניהו, הגירה, ישראל, משילות, פוליטיקה, קנדה
Ethiopians’ long road home

Ethiopians’ long road home

Israel’s Operation Tzur Israel, bringing olim from Ethiopia to Israel, began Dec. 3. (photo by Kassaw Molla)

It’s been almost 40 years since Israel coordinated the first airlift of Ethiopian Jews to Israel in 1984. The Beta Israel people, a citizenry of more than 100,000 at the time, were facing starvation in the midst of Ethiopia’s civil war. By the end of Operation Moses, some seven weeks and 30 clandestine flights later, more than 8,000 men, women and children had been airlifted to Israel. Since that time, Israel has rescued more than 30,000 Beta Israel from northern and central Ethiopia.

The impetus for saving Ethiopia’s fractured and often-persecuted Jewish populations goes back to 1921. Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, the then-Ashkenazi chief rabbi of British Mandatory Palestine, made an appeal for Jews to rescue the “holy souls of the House of Israel” from “extinction and contamination” in Ethiopia. His urging would be repeated by numerous other rabbis, including a former Sephardi chief rabbi, the late Ovadia Yosef, who, five decades later, declared the population eligible for aliyah to Israel. Nonetheless, there are thousands of Ethiopian families still waiting for their turn to move to the Jewish homeland.

Descendants of Beta Israel

The Jewish enclaves of Gondar City and the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa are home to the descendants of those first refugees of the 1980s and 1990s: grandchildren and great-grandchildren, fathers, mothers and children who were born while their parents waited for Israel to fulfil its stated promise to provide a new home. Their primitive living conditions, say aid workers, are often the product of circumstance. In a 2014 interview, Rabbi Sybil Sheridan (now Romain), a co-founder of the aid organization Meketa, told me that the Beta Israel moved to Gondar City from their ancestral farmlands decades ago due to persecution, with the implicit understanding that their next home would be in Israel.

“They gave up their things, they gave up their jobs, they left thinking they would actually be on the next plane,” Sheridan said. For many, those years of waiting for the next plane have resulted in a week-to-week existence, hinged on the assurances of a future that will reunite them with their now-Israeli families.

In 2003, the Israeli government announced that 20,000 Jews would be allowed to move to Israel, but that plan was later dropped when the Ethiopian government objected to the mass emigration. In 2015, when it became evident that Jewish populations were still at risk from persecution, the Knesset declared it would rescue 9,000 Ethiopian Jews, and would complete the airlifts by 2020. Fewer than 1,000 individuals have been admitted during that time.

In October 2020, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu announced that 2,000 olim would be airlifted to Israel by the end of 2020. The deadline for Operation Tzur Israel (Rock of Israel) has been extended to the end of January 2021, and is gradually being fulfilled. Last month, roughly 700 olim arrived from Gondar and Addis Ababa. Another two airlifts this month have brought the total to roughly 1,500.

photo - Israel’s Operation Tzur Israel has brought approximately 1,500 Ethiopians to Israel so far
Israel’s Operation Tzur Israel has brought approximately 1,500 Ethiopians to Israel so far. (photo by Noga Melsa/Ministry of Absorption and Immigration)

Family members and aid groups in both countries say the 2,000-person limit is not enough. Those waiting in Israel to see their relatives say they are worried for their families’ safety with the risk of civil war and the coronavirus pandemic. Aid organizations argue that the country’s economic shutdown in March is still causing widespread unemployment. While Meketa and Struggle to Save Ethiopian Jewry (SSEJ), two aid groups that work to support the communities, have been shipping in food to the community synagogues, they warn that families are still at risk from famine.

Avi Bram, a trustee for Meketa, said conditions in Gondar are worrisome. “The community is in a very bad situation. Many, not all, but many are in a very, very poor and unsettled standard of living, especially now because of the pandemic.”

Bram said the original mandate of Meketa, which was established in 2013, was to reinforce independence for the community through training, conversational Hebrew classes and small business micro-loans. It was never designed to be a supplemental food program. But the aid is critical at this time. “It fills a humanitarian need,” he said.

SSEJ representative Jeremy Feit said the organization does what it can to support impoverished members of the Addis Ababa community. It arranges medical assistance for children under 5 and seniors, and hot meals for malnourished children and pregnant and nursing mothers.

“The end goal of the work is to limit needless suffering and deaths, while urging Israel to evaluate their claims and allow those eligible to make aliyah as soon as possible,” said Feit.

photo - Aid groups Meketa and Struggle to Save Ethiopian Jewry provide emergency food to Ethiopian Jewish communities waiting for aliyah
Aid groups Meketa and Struggle to Save Ethiopian Jewry provide emergency food to Ethiopian Jewish communities waiting for aliyah. (photo from Meketa)

Mengistu (no last name given), who lives in Ethiopia and has relatives in Israel from a previous aliyah, said the communities are facing increasing danger. “On one side, there’s coronavirus,” said Mengistu. On [another] side there’s the war,” coupled with endemic unemployment and famine.

According to Mengistu, the changing criteria for airlifts are only inciting more stress at home.

“[They] said they would bring 2,000 people at the end of this year,” Mengistu said. “We don’t know if they applied their decision [because] every time they decide [on a quota], they change it.

“So, who are they going to bring? Are they going to bring children? Are they going to [separate] brothers and sisters and leave [some] with their parents? Two thousand people, it’s nothing,” Mengistu said, “compared to the [actual number of] the people still in Ethiopia.”

A stalwart proponent

In May of last year, Pnina Tamano-Shata was appointed minister of absorption and immigration by the Likud-Blue and White coalition. The 38-year-old Ethiopian-born Israeli came with life experiences that made her an ideal candidate for the position. She and her family had immigrated during the 1980s rescue Operation Moses, during which an estimated 4,000 refugees died en route. She knows firsthand the conditions that today’s Ethiopian Jewish communities are forced to endure while they wait for aliyah.

She also isn’t bashful in her support for immigrant rights or services. In October, she negotiated an agreement with the Israeli nonprofit Shavei Israel to airlift approximately 700 Bnei Menashe Jews from North India. As part of the agreement, Shavei Israel would cover all transportation costs. The new immigrants will quarantine at a moshav before settling into their new homes and reuniting with their families.

photo - Israel’s Minister of Absorption and Immigration Pnina Tamano-Shata
Israel’s Minister of Absorption and Immigration Pnina Tamano-Shata is the first Ethiopian-born woman to hold a Knesset seat. (photo from Ministry of Absorption and Immigration)

As well, she has put forth a vision and a budget for how to finally resolve the humanitarian crisis in Ethiopia.

In August, Tamano-Shata proposed a plan that would allow, in her words, for Israel to “close the camps” in Gondar and Addis Ababa. Approximately 4,000 of 8,000 olim would be airlifted to Israel by year-end and the rest would follow by 2023. The NIS 1.3 billion ($380 million US at the time) proposal received support from all sides but was never adopted. The Netanyahu government later endorsed a limit of 2,000 by Dec. 31, with assurances of more immigrants at a later date.

Still, Tamano-Shata says she is committed to seeing the aliyah to its end. “[To] my dismay, we were unable to approve the national budget which was supposed to include the outline for the aliyah of those remaining in Ethiopia,” Tamano-Shata told the Jewish Independent in a recent email interview. “However, this does not prevent me from continuing to push for a comprehensive solution for this issue.”

To Mengistu, like many in Ethiopia’s Jewish enclaves, Tamano-Shata’s words are a hopeful sign. “Because now the help for the aliyah is Pnina,” said Mengistu. “She’s one of us. So maybe she will understand the situation and the [reason for] the protests [in Israel.] Maybe things will change.”

With Israel now set to face a fourth election in just two years, Tamano-Shata’s future as the next minister of absorption and immigration is yet to be determined, but her motivation to see the end of what is arguably Israel’s greatest humanitarian crisis remains firm. In 2016, the then-new minister was recognized by humanitarian activist Martin Luther King III for her efforts to establish better protections for Ethiopian immigrants in Israel. Last year, she toured the Addis Ababa enclave and handed out baskets of food to residents. She said she is committed to the rights of Israel’s olim, “despite the policies of lockdowns, shutting of flights and closing of the skies that exists in many countries due to COVID-19.”

At this point, all eyes are on Tamano-Shata. Few doubt that she will meet her stated commitment of 2,000 olim by Jan. 31. But can she, as well, engender better trust between Israel and those waiting for aliyah?

In a recent interview for the podcast One Jewish Family, Ambanesh Biru, former chair of the Gondar Jewish community, summarized the views of a hopeful community that knows its safety may rest in the Israeli government’s understanding of their predicament.

Don’t forget about the Ethiopian Jewish community, said Biru, “especially those [anticipating] aliyah. Because all of the Jews in Gondar and Addis Ababa came from villages expecting they would be going to Israel right away, not to live in Gondar [for the rest of their lives]. So, if anybody comes and talks about aliyah from Israel, please do your best [to follow through].”

Readers can learn more about the Gondar and Addis Ababa communities at meketa.org.uk, ssej.org and jewishagency.org/ethiopian-aliyah-explained.

Jan Lee’s articles and blog posts have been published in B’nai B’rith Magazine, Voices of Conservative and Masorti Judaism, Times of Israel, as well as a number of business, environmental and travel publications. Her blog can be found at multiculturaljew.polestarpassages.com.

Format ImagePosted on January 15, 2021January 18, 2021Author Jan LeeCategories WorldTags aliyah, Ambanesh Biru, Avi Bram, Beta Israel, emigration, Ethiopia, immigration, Israel, Jeremy Feit, Meketa, Pnina Tamano-Shata, SSEJ, Struggle to Save Ethiopian Jewry, Sybil Sheridan
Aliyah despite COVID

Aliyah despite COVID

The breakdown of Nefesh B’Nefesh 2020 aliyah. (image from Nefesh B’Nefesh)

Despite a challenging and tumultuous 2020, 291 individuals from Canada decided to make aliyah and move to Israel with Nefesh B’Nefesh (NBN) over the past year. The Canadians were among the 3,168 individuals who moved to Israel from North America in 2020 – 2,625 since the COVID-19 pandemic hit.

Founded in 2002, Nefesh B’Nefesh, in partnership with Israel’s Ministry of Aliyah and Integration, the Jewish Agency for Israel, Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael and Jewish National Fund-USA, has assisted in easing the aliyah process for more than 65,000 olim since its inception. With the help of its partners, NBN assisted nearly 90% of the total number of olim that arrived in 2019.

Since January of 2020, Nefesh B’Nefesh olim have most often hailed from New York, New Jersey, California, Florida, Ontario, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Texas. Altogether in the past year, 811 families chose to move their lives to Israel, along with 1,032 singles and 332 retirees. There were 61 physicians among a total of 198 medical professionals who arrived in Israel in the last year, most of whom joined the frontlines in Israel’s fight against the coronavirus. And 390 young men and women stepped off the plane with the desire to serve Israel as lone soldiers.

In addition to the olim who arrived throughout 2020, Nefesh B’Nefesh received 6,704 aliyah applications, in contrast to 3,035 in 2019 – marking a 126% increase in interest in aliyah.

image - The breakdown of Nefesh B’Nefesh 2020 aliyah
The breakdown of Nefesh B’Nefesh 2020 aliyah. (image from Nefesh B’Nefesh)

“From the earliest days of the Jewish state, no matter how trying or difficult the circumstances, aliyah has always continued in order to preserve what was once a distant dream for our parents and grandparents,” said Rabbi Yehoshua Fass, NBN co-founder and executive director. “As we look back at the challenges everyone faced in 2020, we are extremely proud of what we have accomplished together. We look forward to watching each oleh grow and build their new lives in Israel, and eagerly look ahead to 2021, a year with the potential to exceed all expectations in aliyah.”

“I welcome the dozens of new olim who chose to leave everything, especially during the time of a global epidemic, and fulfil their dreams of building new homes for themselves in Israel,” said Minister of Aliyah and Integration Pnina Tamano-Shata. “Many will surely remember 2020 as a challenging and complex year, but the olim who arrived [recently] from across the U.S. and are part of the last group of olim this year, are enabling it to be shaded in more encouraging and optimistic colours.

“Despite COVID-19, the Jewish nation is thriving and aliyah is continuing,” Tamano-Shata continued. “In the past year, more than 20,000 olim from 80 countries around the world made aliyah.”

“The thousands of new olim from North America and around the world, during a year of a global pandemic, lockdowns and almost complete paralysis of international air travel, emphasizes how much the longing for Zion is deeply ingrained in the hearts of the Jewish people around the world,” said Isaac Herzog, chair of the Jewish Agency.

The top 10 cities in Israel that new olim chose as their homes this year were Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Beit Shemesh, Ra’anana, Haifa, Herzliya, Netanya, Modiin and Be’er Sheva. The olim most commonly worked as educators, physicians, nurses, social workers and lawyers, as well as in the fields of marketing, sales and business. The average age of an oleh this year is 30, with the oldest being a 97-year-old and the youngest being only 35 days old.

When the pandemic began in earnest in March 2020, Nefesh B’Nefesh adapted its various programming and transitioned into holding virtual meetings, webinars and informational sessions. The online seminars have allowed the organization to reach a much wider audience and have included a wide range of subjects, from choosing communities and special webinars for medical professionals, to how to pack and ship for aliyah.

The ongoing support after aliyah provided by NBN has meant that 90% of its olim have remained in Israel, leading to tens of thousands of new Israelis who go on to make significant contributions to the country.

Format ImagePosted on January 15, 2021January 13, 2021Author Nefesh b’NefeshCategories IsraelTags aliyah, Canada, coronavirus, COVID-19, emigration, immigration, Israel, olim
Jews leave Venezuela

Jews leave Venezuela

Moises Brunstein now lives in Toronto, but he still has family in Venezuela. (photo from Moises Brunstein)

Political upheaval, economic disintegration, rising crime rates and the implosion of social services have brought Venezuela to its knees. The lucky ones see Soviet-style, hours-long supermarket lineups; the unlucky see bare shelves in a country said now to have the worst inflation rate on the planet, in some sectors upwards of 700%. The chaos, combined with rising antisemitism, has spurred a massive flight of Jews.

Caracas’ once-thriving Jewish community of nearly 30,000 has dwindled in just a decade and a half to a quarter its former size. The exodus continues in conditions exacerbated by the sudden departure of foreign investment and international corporations.

Interestingly, Venezuela was among the first countries to recognize Israel and, in 1991, supported revoking the 1975 United Nations resolution comparing Zionism to racism. Jews have lived in relative peace there for hundreds of years, until the last decade.

In May 2004, Tiféret Israel – the oldest synagogue in Caracas – was vandalized after demonstrators at a government-sanctioned protest graffitied on city walls slurs such as “Sharon is a murderer of the Palestinian people,” “Viva the armed Palestinian people” and “Free Palestine.”

In November of that year, armed and hooded state policemen broke into the Colegio Hebraica, a Jewish grade school in the city. During the three-hour sweep of the premises, under the pretext of a weapons search, the doors were locked and bolted with the children inside. Agents found nothing of interest.

Venezuela’s chief rabbi condemned the raid as community “intimidation.” The Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism and Racism – based at Tel Aviv University in Israel – reported that the intrusion was “perhaps the most serious incident ever to have taken place in the history of the Jewish community.”

In December 2007, Venezuela’s secret police raided the Hebraic Social, Cultural and Sports Centre, again under the pretext of searching for weapons and drugs, of which they found none.

Coincident with the Gaza War (Operation Cast Lead, December 2008-January 2009), a number of incidents occurred, beginning with then-president Hugo Chávez expelling the Israeli ambassador.

Later, in a public broadcast, Chávez said, “From the bottom of my soul, I damn you Israel. You are a criminal and terrorist state that is openly exterminating the Palestinians,” and he accused Israel of “Nazi-like atrocities.”

At the same time, the Venezuelan foreign ministry dubbed Israel’s actions “state terrorism” and government officials were seen wearing keffiyahs and waving Palestinian flags in the streets at an anti-Israel march said to have been organized by Chávez himself.

On a Friday night in January 2009, armed men broke into Tiféret Israel and gagged and bound security guards. The thugs ransacked offices and left antisemitic slogans on the walls, including a call for the expulsion of Jews from Venezuela. Religious objects in the sanctuary were ruined, and a list of the country’s Jews was stolen.

In February 2009, Beit Shmuel Synagogue was the target of a bomb that shattered windows and damaged a nearby car.

According to the 2009 World Conference against Antisemitism, the average of 45 anti-Israel articles published a month in 2008 jumped to five a day during January 2009, and there were newspapers that accused Israel of genocide.

And the situation didn’t improve much after the Gaza War. For example, the country’s main Jewish organization, La Confederación de Asociaciones Israelitas de Venezuela (CAIV), reported more than 4,000 antisemitic incidents in 2013. And, as recently as this year, the Venezuelan United Nations ambassador, Rafael Ramirez, asked in a speech at UN headquarters in New York whether Israel was “trying to impose a ‘final solution’ on the Palestinians in the West Bank.”

Little of this is shocking to Moises Brunstein, an expat now living in Toronto.

A first-generation Venezuelan, Brunstein’s Romanian parents arrived in Venezuela by Red Cross boat in 1941, after having been prisoners in Nazi-occupied France. With no command of the language and no money, Brunstein’s father worked his way up to become president of the local hydro authority.

“We lived a very nice life,” Brunstein told the Independent. That is, until Chávez came to power. Twelve years ago, at age 29, it was time to go, Brunstein said. With only four suitcases, he came to Canada, leaving behind all of his books, furniture and currency. Some cousins remain in Venezuela, but his father’s side has left for Florida, Australia and Spain; his mother’s side for Canada.

It is his belief that the state is trying to squeeze the Jewish community out of Venezuela. “In 2010 and 2011, the main building where Jews had stores was extricated by the government,” he said. “My mother, a lawyer, saw her offices taken over.

“Everything changed when the government aligned themselves to Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran. The Palestinian flag flew in the Venezuelan congress.”

Brunstein last visited Caracas in 2009 for a cousin’s wedding, and found security to be unusually high. “You don’t wear yarmulkes in public,” he warned.

There are various reasons why many Jews remain in the country, he said. The elderly aren’t necessarily mobile and have no command of a second language; those with businesses find it hard to leave.

Brunstein mails his mother basic foods, medicine and personal hygiene products, as well as a Passover care package.

Meanwhile, an expat living in New York, Freddy Steiner, runs his apparel and clothing stores in Caracas – Componix Clothing – from the United States, but his visits back home have steadily declined.

In 2000, about a year after the Chávez revolution, Steiner moved his family from Caracas to Miami.

“Pure safety, the number one issue,” he explained. “The kidnappings start[ed] to rise, the security was deteriorating. More and more people leave each year, knowing how much this is affecting the next generation.”

Caracas, he noted, consistently is ranked among the 10 most dangerous cities in the world, with medical services next to non-existent, except for the wealthy.

“The entire economy is in a coma, shut down,” he said. “Since early spring, malls and restaurants shut down at 7 p.m., there’s no electricity and no water.”

According to Rabbi Ariel Yeshurun of Sky Lake Synagogue in North Miami Beach, which has a sizeable Venezuelan membership, many of his congregants express concern about family who remain in Venezuela.

Abraham Levy Benshimol, former president of CAIV and of the Ascociación Israelita de Venezuela, said that, in addition to the difficulties experienced by all Venezuelans, those Jews who remain are facing increased challenges because of the exodus. “You still have the same number of schools, but you don’t have the same number of contributors,” he said. “So that’s a big problem.”

Chaya Perman, the wife of Rabbi Moshe Perman, director of Venezuela’s Chabad Centre, said, “The recent anti-Zionism is part of what is going on internationally.”

According to Perman, “nearly every Jewish family is affiliated in some way,” with some 90% of Jewish children attending Jewish day school; kosher meat, pizza, and bread products are still available. Given the overall circumstances, however, houses of worship are using up financial reserves to keep afloat, though they are “not yet at the point where they think they need help from wealthy Jewish communities,” she said.

For the Permans, two married children with their husbands and 15 grandchildren remain in Venezuela. They, much like the rest of the community, don’t know whether tomorrow will be better or worse. But there’s always hope.

“It’s a wait-and-see attitude,” said Perman.

Dave Gordon is a Toronto-based freelance writer whose work has appeared in more than a hundred publications around the world.

Format ImagePosted on September 16, 2016September 15, 2016Author Dave GordonCategories WorldTags antisemitism, Chávez, economic crisis, emigration, Venezuela
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