A national problem

One of the most fascinating meetings I’ve had in a long time took place yesterday.

I was hosting a leadership mission from the Associated (the Baltimore Jewish federation) here at the Joint’s offices in Jerusalem. 

We had a series of panels on fascinating topics – Haredi (Ultra-Orthodox) Israelis and their integration into “mainstream” economic life; European Jewry’s challenges; legal and illegal migration to Israel, and more. But one topic fascinated me because of the array of talent in the panel discussing the issue: economic development in the Israeli-Arab sector.

The panel included four people who, I think, are at the forefront of what we talk about when we talk about change and talent dealing with this subject:

Avivit Hai, the Program Associate in Israel for the Inter Agency Task Force on Israeli Arab Issues and one of the most articulate speakers on Arab-Israeli issues I’ve met;

Roi Assaf, the Head of the Social Development Department, in the Authority for the Economic and social Development of the Arab, Druze and Circassian Sectors, which sits in the Prime Minister's Office;

Dr Sigal Selach, my terrific colleague and Director of the JDC-TEVET Employment Initiative; and

The inspiring and wonderful Safa Garb,  JDC- TEVET Division Director, Arab Society and Infrastructure.

What I found fascinating about the discussion – and there’s more I’ll write about this at some point – was the depth of knowledge and capacity that all four displayed. 

Roi’s words were particularly poignant: “Arab poverty [in Israel] isn’t an Arab problem – it’s a national problem. Twenty per cent of our population contributes only eight per cent of our GDP.” Imagine what we could achieve if they had the capacity and ability to do more.

The Prime Minister’s Office has some really striking statistics: 78% of Jewish men and 76% of Jewish women (ages 18-66) are employed … but only 69% of Arab men and 27% of Arab women are! Just think about the difference between over three-quarters and one-quarter. That’s a massive statement about the challenges we’re facing.

We have a first-world country with some third-world labor patterns. And it’s not sustainable.

Time

I’m here in Baltimore, escorting my colleague Ofer Glanz, JDC’s Director for the former Soviet Union. 

It’s been a fascinating day, meeting inspiring leadership from the Associated, and sharing our work together in Odessa and across the former Soviet republics.

There was an interesting conversation about how many time-zones we cover in the FSU. In the past we’ve said nine – since the eleven time zones of the Russian federation were reduced to nine in 2010 by then-President Medvedev. But you could still go far East and not everyone “got the memo” about the time-zone change. So even though it was nine, eleven was still a good answer.

But, since the Russian state extends to Kalingrad (the Russian exclave between Poland and Lithuania) eleven is still, formally, the correct answer. 

But - at the same time - so is nine (since they skip two between Kalingrad and the west of Russia). 

With me so far? Airports follow local time … but all train stations, no matter where they are, follow Moscow time.

But then … as Ofer pointed out in a meeting this afternoon … we work in 24 time zones.

Because what we do in Odessa, for example, has a ripple effect – in Ashkelon, in Baltimore … and around the Jewish world. 

How we build community, empower new role-models, pilot new enterprises – these will ripple throughout twenty-four time zones.

Odessa Leadership

One of the most inspiring things about a mission briefing is the encounter with local leadership, and figuring out together new ways of cooperation and partnership.

Anatoly Kesselman, Hesed Odessa Director, evaluates challenges and successes

Ellina Korneva, Director Beit Grand JCC and Pavel Vugelman, Hillel Director,

 Viktor Zonis, Head of Odessa Reform Community; Shlomo Azarov, JAFI Shaliach

  Pavel Kozlenko, Director Odessa Holocuast Museum;

 Kira Verkhovskaya, Director Migdal JCC

We're grateful for all those who have done so much for the Partnership and the Jewish community of Odessa.

The Sounds of Odessa (Part Two)

Young performers practicing at JCC Migdal Odessa .... just terrific

The Sounds of Odessa (Part One)

Watching amazingly talented performers at JCC Migdal Odessa ...

Potemkin Buildings

Yesterday our Baltimore-Odessa Partnership mission visited Yelena, a 16-year old girl in Odessa. 

Yelena lives with a cousin, Rosa, their aunt, Svetlana, and with Svetlana’s mother and baby son.

They live together in two rooms of a communal apartment, along with five other families. It’s a beautiful building on a main road in Odessa, over a hundred years old. And like so much of Odessa, it’s a Potemkin façade. It looks beautiful and striking on the outside … but on the inside it’s crumbling. The fixtures and steps are falling apart. It probably was a beautiful building before the Revolution. 

But not anymore.

The apartment is on the top floor and it smells awful and needs repairs. Everything’s falling apart. The family can't pay for gas heating, so they use an electric heater to warm up in winter. 

Or they just bundle up with more layers.

Yelena never met her father; her mother left for Kiev to look for a job, and no one has seen her since. 

Rosa is 18. Her mother died and her father is in hospital for long-term psychiatric care. 

Svetlana is 36 but she looks tired, and a lot older. She married for the second time in 2012 and in the summer that same year gave birth to her only son, Igor. A few months later her husband was diagnosed with cancer and died. 

Inna, the girls’ grandmother, is retired. She had a stroke and she's not mobile anymore. She mostly sits on the couch or in bed and cries.

Svetlana is tough. She’s trying to study at University (Law and Finance) with a correspondence course. It’ll take her six years to get her degree but she's sticking with it.  She works several hours a day cleaning offices. She's also a certified bartender and waitress.

The total family income is a little over $450, with Inna’s pension and a small government allowance for baby care and what money Svetlana can bring in.

It’s not enough to feed and clothe a family, especially one with medical bills and little resources.

Yelena starts crying when she talks about Hesed and the help she gets from the Jewish community. Then Inna starts crying too. “Hesed has saved our lives,” she says. “The government won't help people in need. But the Jewish community helps us.” Svetlana is crying now, too, and points to the fridge, which came from Hesed, and says, “I told someone at work about Hesed and they didn’t believe me. They thought I was making it up. How could it be that they just help you, like that? Who could these people be?”

Yelena tries to cheer everyone up, saying that everything is fine, we have a fridge, we have somewhere to live, and we’re not hungry anymore. Meanwhile, Igor is scooting around the dirty apartment, happily playing with us and gripping our hands. He’s got a terrific smile. Yelena is taking care of him today; she’s very responsible.

There are 400 children-at-risk and their families being helped on a daily basis by JDC through Hesed Odessa. Svetlana and her family receive a food card with a monthly allowance for use in the supermarket, vitamin supplements, school supplies and warm clothing for the winter, and diapers, stroller and clothes for Igor.

And they also have Ira, a Hesed case worker, who checks in on them on a regular basis, and helps Svetlana come to activities for youth in the community at minimal or no-cost. She helps them negotiate the city bureaucracy. And most importantly, she shows them that they’re not alone.

As we leave, Svetlana says, “When I become a lawyer I’ll give back as a volunteer. I’ll give free legal advice in Hesed for the clients, for those that need it. Spasiba Bolshoya – thank you so much.”

Difficult steps

Today I met with Lena, a 78-year old client of our Hesed (welfare) system. She never married and has no children.

She is entirely dependent on JDC for everything – for her food, for her medicine, for her home care … even for her entire contact with the outside world. 

And meeting her was one of the most memorable and important encounters I’ve had in a long time.

Lena was born in Nikolaev, about two hours away from Odessa, in 1935.

She remembers the smell of gefilte fish and the taste of apple strudel on Shabbat as a little girl.

She remembers the arguments in her family, as the Nazis invaded, about whether to stay or to flee.

Her parents chose to be evacuated, and spent several years in Central Asia with her uncle, a former Enemy of the People, who was in internal exile. Everyone else in her family – all the other uncles, aunts, cousins, grandparents – decided that the Germans would live up to their civilized tradition, and would almost certainly be no worse than the Soviets.

They stayed and were killed.

Every single member of her family except for Lena, her uncle and her parents, were killed by the Nazis.

Years later, Lena went back to Nikolaev and asked about her Grandfather, with whom she had a close relationship. All the neighbors remembered him, she said.

They remembered him because on that day in September 1941 when the Nazis rounded up all the Jews to the central square, he couldn’t walk.

So they put him in a wagon. And then they marched them all off and no one saw the Jews of Nikolaev again.

Lena settled in Odessa. She couldn’t imagine returning to Nikolaev. She worked as an engineer for a research institute until she retired in 1989.

And since 1999 she's been helped by Hesed. She has heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, a hip fracture. And in an economy like Ukraine’s today, with no Medicaid or Medicare, if you have a broken hip and serious medical ailments – well, you won't be able to afford decent medical care anyway, and your better choice is to stay at home and die slowly with some dignity than go to a terrible, awful, dangerous hospital and die very fast in a corridor with no sheets and no one to look after you.

Lena’s pension is about $150 a month. After paying for utilities and medicines, she has almost nothing left for food, let alone anything else. That’s one of the reasons why life expectancy is so short in a place like Ukraine (high 50s for a man, low 60s for a woman) – you can't afford to live longer, with the medicines and decent food that would keep you alive. So we help with a home care worker, who visits twice a day. We help with a food card, and medical support, and home repairs, and a walker, and more.

But Lena can't use the food card herself. So her case worker takes her shopping list and the JDC Food Card, and does the shopping for her.

Lena hasn’t left her apartment for nine years. The steps are too difficult.

There is a tiny step in her one bedroom apartment … it leads to a small balcony. Lena hasn’t been on that balcony either for nine years. It would be too dangerous.

But she is alive, and she has dignity, and guests come to visit her every day.

“Thank God for Hesed,” she told us. “Thank God it exists for us. Spasiba Bolshoya – thank you so much.”

What's the vision in Odessa?

Notes from our opening JDC briefing for the Associated - Baltimore Jewish Federation mission to Odessa:

JDC will eventually pull out. It may take a long time, but when the community is strong enough, and self-sufficient, we will pack up and come home. We've done this in over 30 countries, and the aim is to work ourselves out of a job everywhere.

In Odessa, we'll realize the vision when we have a sustainable Jewish community here that shows excellence in each of the following four areas:

·           A caring community that lifts and empowers its most vulnerable members and extends a compassionate hand to those in need

·           An engaged community that welcomes Jews of every age, in every neighborhood, wherever they gather, and offers them many ways to connect to their Jewish community

·           A learning community that encourages lifelong study through a wealth of high-quality formal and informal educational opportunities

·           A just community that seeks social justice through commitment to the Jewish ideals of tikkun olam (repair of the world) and gemilut chasadim (acts of loving-kindness)

This is the vision. 

Now we just have to figure out how to get there.

History

We start our mission with The Associated, the Jewish Federation of Baltimore, tomorrow here in Odessa. 

Here’s a brief historic context to what we’re looking at...

In the 1920s after the famine, JDC was helping to feed 600,000 Jews in the Soviet Union. We opened 400 orphanages.

Ukraine was a focal area for our work. The Agro-Joint developed, though many of our staff were later executed for their participation and JDC was finally expelled as a result of the Doctors’ Plot in 1952. During the later communist years, we were able to send in articles for refuseniks and activists, mostly jeans, jackets and sneakers, for them to sell on the market and make a living after they lost their jobs.

In 1988 the Soviet regime turned to JDC and asked us to give support to Jewish elderly.

We demanded a written agreement, mindful of the possibility that we could get kicked out without such a commitment. We received, and have been in these countries since.

The aim at that time was to help Soviet Jews be Jewish.

There were no welfare programs or aims to erect buildings and centers.

The regime took care of peoples’ needs.

The pension was more or less a continuation of the same amount you received as a salary. Anyway, people knew very little and there was very little information.

Some of my colleagues in those first meetings tell a story of how, in one meeting, they opened up a map of the vast territory of the USSR, but didn’t notice that one fold was folded over so for a while they missed the middle section of the territory when they planned the activities in the different cities.

We reached out to Jews where we found them.

We built hundreds of libraries, we brought in over a million books. The library concept didn’t always work – in some places the librarians closed the libraries because they were afraid that people would steal the books, in others they only opened the building for leadership.

But then the economic crisis started in the early 90s.

We were seeing hundreds, then thousands, then tens of thousands, who were selling everything they had on the streets in order to survive.

That’s when we started developing our welfare services...

The light at the end of the tunnel

I'm leaving this weekend to staff the ASSOCIATED Baltimore Jewish Federation Partnership mission to Odessa, Ukraine. Some issues we’re going to look at from a macro perspective …

Ukraine has a population of 45 million, with a labor force of 18 million and an official unemployment rate of 3.5%. Sounds great … but it’s not realistic.

There’s a shadow economy in Ukraine, with huge underemployment. 2 million Ukrainians work abroad (about half each in Russia and in Europe, mostly in Poland and Germany). Even so, there’s been some fairly good economic development notwithstanding the hard punch of the 2008-9 world economic crisis. It’s worth pointing out that Ukrainian banks didn’t collapse, large companies didn’t fail, there weren’t any riots.

Most economists in Ukraine point to the need for two major reforms:

(1) Medical – the funding doesn’t enable them to do what they need, so people die early and suffer. Last year they set up four pilot regions – Dnepropetrovsk is one of them – to implement proper medical care, insurance, to expand options and care. Medical care in Ukraine is very corrupt and poor. There’s no emphasis on the patient’s needs. Medicines are expensive and there's a shortage. There are a small number of pharmacy-discount programs like those of JDC, these are very impressive. But they need a lot more.

(2) Pensions – the pension age is going to be lifted from 55 to 60 for women and from 60 to 65 for men. It’s a good move. Many say that Ukrainians have gotten used to suffering. How can you survive on a pension of $100 a month? It’s much harder in the small towns and cities, interestingly. If you have a small garden outside you can manage a little easier if you can grow something.

Political scientists joke that the national sport in Ukraine is elections.

The question will be – on everything – is which way is Ukraine facing. – towards Russia or towards the West? There are no real ideological parties like we’re used to in the West; everything is based more on economic interests and language/identity. But in poll after poll, language identity comes low – usually 10^th or 11^th – on the list of what's important for people’s worries, after inflation, unemployment, cost of living, etc., when they go into the voting booth.

What's clear is that Ukraine could probably go on like this for a lot more time. There’s inertia, there’s an amazing capacity to bear suffering, with very slow progress.

But there’s no light at the end of the tunnel.

The joke is that electricity got so expensive that they decided to turn off the light at the end of the tunnel!

Baltimore, Odessa and Partnerships

I've spent the last couple of days with my amazing colleague, Irina Zborovskaya, Director of JDC Odessa. Born in Odessa, Ira has become a leader in the area of Jewish Community Development in Southern Ukraine. She leads JDC projects and programming that provide Jewish Renewal as well as welfare relief for Jewish elderly, children and families.

One of the most fascinating aspects that we’ve been discussing here in Baltimore with our colleagues and friends from the Associated, the Jewish Federation in Baltimore, is how Odessa is not just a strong and vibrant partnership but also a microcosm of much of what is happening in the Jewish world today, in general, and specifically in the FSU (former Soviet Union).

There are two clashing trends clearly visible in Odessa today, that are playing out in many of the 75+ countries in which we work: hunger and thirst.

There is real hunger – real need, real poverty. 

Thousands of Jewish elderly are given food, medicine, homecare, winter supplies on a daily basis. 

But there is also real thirst – a thirst for Jewish knowledge, identity, community. 

And our task is to continually find the balance between the two in how we prioritize, how we allocate precious resources, how we predict the future trends and demographics of the community.

Ira is at the forefront of this grappling. And we’re fortunate to have partners like the Associated working with us on these, and many other, challenges and horizons.

Havana

I'm in Havana with a leadership group from the ASSOCIATED: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore, a really great group, eager to learn about the Jewish community and what JDC is doing here. We’re escorted by our amazing JDC professional team on the ground Allie and Lulo.

One element came out in a lunch meeting with volunteers from the Jewish community: a theme that was repeated by several younger and older members of the community in their discussions. We are all Cubans, they said. We’re proud, we love our community, we love our country. They can all leave, and all of them have visited Israel, have been to other places. But first and foremost we’re Cubans. And because we’re Jewish we’re uniquely privileged. Not just because of the material support that JDC and our federations bring – although that’s critical. And not just because of the sense of partnership and community – although that’s critical too. But also because we are thirsty for this sense of belonging and identity. Our parents couldn’t have it. It was forbidden. But now we have a chance to enjoy it. And we want it.

Better Together Ashkelon

Better Together improves services for children and youth in disadvantaged communities such as development towns on Israel's periphery and poor inner city neighborhoods, by maximizing local resources and forging partnerships between residents and service providers.  It improves existing services and creates new programs, ac companying children from birth to 18, morning till night, school to home. The program focuses include early childhood development and academic assistance and enrichment activities, while engaging parents, teachers and community leaders in strengthening communities.

Location: Matnas Shapira, Neve Alonim, Ashkelon

BT is in s even locations in the South today. Sivan is the brand-new (this week) BT Ashkelon coordinator. We do a tour of the neighborhood. Shapira is a large neighborhood in the ‘middle’ from a socioeconomic standpoint. 16,000 residents, including many FSU olim, Eth-Isrs, veteran elderly. The stronger younger families move up to Barnea. Elderly and weak stay in Neve Alonim. The streets are fairly clean (the municipality emphasizes street cleaning) but empty and neglected. This is the southernmost area of Ashkelon, which developed north. Vaknin was born here.

Outside the kindergarten it’s nearly all fathers, recognizably Ethiopian or FSU.

David is Matnas Director, he has a good reputation. January 2010 BT came to Ashkelon, there's been less vandalism, more pride in the neighborhood. You can see more energy here, more activity. The school next to the Matnas also improved its infrastructure. (BT doesn’t invest in physical infrastructure but it’s important to encourage and strengthen the local authority to do so; BT focuses on the programmatic and social ele ments).

In the photos: Room 6 is the early ch ildhood room

The moadon room was redesigned by an architect from Hatzeva. It was officially opened last week, though programs have been running since the summer. It’s very comfortable, well-designed chairs, original art, two brand-new computers, good lighting, clean walls.

CHELI is a social work student doing her training here  (black shirt and pink)

RAVIT is the mother in brown

LOREN is her daughter, here for English classes

BELLE is the educational coordinator

MARGALIT is the youth activities coordinator

SIVAN is the BT coordinator

Margalit: the youth activities coordinator has to pull everything together, cooperate, create new opportunities and an informational structure that allows us to know what's happening with each youth, so that no one falls between the chairs. We have Noar B’Aliyah youth movement garin and we integrate the parents into the activities. It was difficult to bring the parents and children together. There are groups for cinema, communications, meeting professionals, sports instructor group, and more.

There are several older madrichim. Margalit is from Jerusalem, decided to live here with her Garin. They finished the army a year ago and settled right here in the neighborhood. We’re creating a continuum of educational service, focused right now on the 9th grade, and will be expanded.

JENNY is an 11th grader, born in Ukraine. Started volunteering in 9th grade. She says that this week there were 100 youth taking part in activities; we’ve undergone a massive change this last year. I’d rather be here than wandering the street. The 11th grade is responsible for activities like the forum, chanuka party, summer camp. Jenny is also an artist – she drew the main mural on the wall of the early childhood room. Wants to go for officer training in the army, has learned about leadership and personal example from the program here. My volunteering here has helped me in life.

BELLE is in charge of the educational center for math and English. 51 kids come to the center, they have 6 teachers (4 from the commune/garin). Loren is here to study English and math, she's very serious, highly motivated.  Belle notes that the center allows us to identify needs and behavioral difficulties not just in the subjects being taught. Loren’s mother takes part.

Loren’s mother loves it because at school there are 40 kids in the English class. Here there are two. Loren is progressing well, she loves it too. It’s my future success, it strengthens me, my grades are improving. Loren’s mom loves that she comes here now from her own free will, she enjoys being here.

DAVID what we have here is boosting the weakest sectors, narrowing the gaps, empowering, improving people’s self-confidence. There are solutions here that you can't get at the schools and people can feel at home here.

CHELI we have 60 families of kids aged 4-6 taking part in enrichment classes, improving parent-child communication; identifying development problems, referring to the right solutions, developing child skills. There are lots of parents especially here who don’t know how to play with their kids, we need to teach the parents, show them how to be caring, patient, understanding, give guidance, but retaining appropriate parental authority. It changes people’s homes and families for the better.

There's a process, but we see change and progress. We’ve often seen parents come with the expectation that they'd drop off the kids in front of the TV. That’s not going to happen here.

There's a program twice a week for kids under age 2. The mothers’ forum meets around problems, challenges, need to work through concepts, to speak, to discuss. Empower them with skills. How to move from diapers, how to talk to kids, how to play. What's interesting is that they have the ‘formal’ discussion but we see them continuing the discussion outside. There’s an added extra.

David: we’re sending out from here better citizens like Jenny and Victoria. There are quality people here, we can find them and help them. There were those who didn’t speak, we didn’t see or hear them. David tells the story of a 9th grade boy who didn’t speak, wouldn’t look you in the eyes, stammered. Now in 10th grade, takes part here actively, volunteers, smiles, looks you in the eyes, has confidence. It’s because of the learning center and the special attention.