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Jewish organization steps up to aid hurricane victims in Haiti

The humanitarian organization American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) is providing medical assistance, basic provisions and other aid to Hurricane Matthew victims in Haiti.
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October 6, 2016

The humanitarian organization American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) is providing medical assistance, basic provisions and other aid to Hurricane Matthew victims in Haiti.

“Our response to this crisis is especially poignant during the Jewish High Holidays, when we examine carefully our actions in the last year and recommit to our obligation as individuals and a global people to aid those in dire need,” JDC CEO Allan Gill said in an Oct. 5 statement. 

The hurricane made landfall Tuesday in Haiti and resulted in, among other things, the collapse of a critical bridge that connects the capital, Port-au-Prince, with southern Haiti, the hardest-hit area of the storm, which has affected the transport of emergency goods, according to various news reports.

Ariel Dominique, director of community affairs at the Haitian Embassy in Washington, D.C., citing the latest statistics from the Haitian Ministry of Interior, said on Thursday afternoon that 108 people have been confirmed dead, 28,000 houses have been damaged and 21,000 people are living in shelters as a result of the hurricane.

“The devastation in the south had homes and infrastructure collapsing,” Michael Geller, director of media relations at JDC, said in a phone interview from New York. “A very big concern is farmland and livestock supplies that were completely destroyed. There has been quite a bit of reporting of livestock put into shelters and then the shelters collapsed.”

JDC assistance to Haiti dates back to the Holocaust, when the JDC provided relief to Eastern European refugees who were fleeing Nazi persecution and were welcomed in the island nation, according to Geller.

“We’re very proud of the history and the role Haiti played,” he said.

Today, the world Jewish community — Israel, in particular — maintains warm relations with Haiti, which supported Israel’s bid for statehood in the United Nations in 1948. In 2010, the Israel Defense Forces provided extensive relief to Haitians in the aftermath of a devastating earthquake in the Caribbean region.

A partner agency of the Jewish Federations of North America, JDC is providing assistance in more than 70 Jewish communities worldwide. In addition to disaster relief efforts, “our main focus is helping Jews in Jewish communities,” Geller said.

JDC does not not have any representatives currently on the ground in Haiti but is providing aid through several organizations it describes as partners, including Heart to Heart International, which began operations in Haiti following the 2010 earthquake there; Prodev, a Haitian-led nonprofit focused on education; and Partners in Health, known in Haiti as Zanmi Lasante, which operates clinics and hospitals in Haiti.

Hurricane Matthew also has struck Cuba and the Bahamas, and was threatening Florida, South Carolina and the Atlantic Coast of the United States, as of Thursday afternoon. The National Hurricane Center described Matthew on Thursday as a Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale, which says Category 4 storms cause “catastrophic damage.”

For information about how to contribute to the JDC effort in Haiti, visit jdc.org.

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