By: David Parsons, ICEJ Media Director

ICEJ caring for the Holocaust Survivors

From humble beginnings just four years ago, the ICEJ’s Home for Holocaust Survivors in Haifa has grown into a thriving assisted-living community which houses and cares for over 70 residents. As we enter 2014, plans are underway to expand the facility into other nearby buildings to provide apartments for another 20 residents and enhance the services for the survivors.

Thus the Haifa Home has to be considered a great success, as it has not only provided urgently needed care for dozens of needy survivors of the Shoah, but also many more Israelis are now aware of the great well-spring of Christian love and support for their nation.

Yet to sustain this unique initiative will take a great commitment from our friends and supporters. The residents of the Haifa Home are now dependent on us to help them live out their lives with dignity.

Expanding the Home

Going forward, we are seeking to expand the Haifa Home to take in more needy Holocaust survivors. Roughly one third of the 190,000 Holocaust survivors in Israel today are impoverished, struggling with illness, or living alone. So an assisted-living facility specifically for poor or ill Holocaust survivors was urgently needed, and that makes the Haifa Home the only retirement home of its kind in Israel.

As the Haifa Home began operating, property owners in the neighbourhood realised the great benefits it was bringing to worthy survivors in need, so they started offering to sell us their apartments on the same block. Currently, a building across the street owned by a fellow Holocaust survivor has been made available over coming years to house survivors. It has seven apartments that will be used to accommodate another 15 residents, and extensive renovations are already underway to turn them into comfortable flats.

Another building at the other end of the street has enough apartments to house 10 more survivors, and it is also being refurbished. Still other apartments nearby are opening up and will be fixed up in the months ahead.

Meantime, people from throughout the Haifa region are coming to volunteer their time to assist with the renovations, saving untold amounts of money. This includes area policemen, soldiers, students and many more.

These added apartments are so needed, as some of the survivors slated to move in have come from living on the streets.

To acquire these additional apartment buildings and complete the renovations, we need to raise $1,000,000 over the coming year. So we need your help!

Maintaining the Home

The Haifa Home provides residents with assisted-living housing, meals, medical care, in-home care-givers, community activities, and a warm family environment. Meeting the ongoing costs involved in caring for the residents is a continual challenge. Some pay what they can afford towards their living expenses, but in most cases this comes to very little.

The operating costs of the Haifa Home for 2014 will be an estimated $85,000 per month. This includes maintenance, utilities, services, salaries and other recurring expenses. The Christian Embassy contributes towards these costs every month and has developed a specific program that provides us with steady income to help run the home.

Through our ‘Adopt a Holocaust Survivor’ program, you can help cover the monthly costs of a resident at the Haifa Home. You will be uniquely connected to a survivor with their own story of tragedy and triumph. We ask that you commit to a Holocaust survivor in any amount for a minimum of six months. You can write for more details on how to adopt a resident of the Haifa Home at: icejaid@icej.org

Feeding survivors

About 100 Holocaust survivors are fed each day at the Haifa Home, including the residents and other survivors in the neighbourhood. In addition, our Israeli partner in running the home, Shimon Sabag of the charity Yad Ezer L’Haver, provides daily meals to another 400 Holocaust survivors in Haifa through a home delivery service. Naomi, a retired kindergarten teacher who now volunteers to deliver meals to survivors, insists many of them would be begging on the streets without this food.

A fleet of seven vans are used to pick up the food donated by nearby bakeries, hotels, banquet halls, IDF bases and company cafeterias, and then distribute it to the homes of area survivors. The ICEJ has helped purchase some of these delivery vans, which are also used to transport disabled survivors to medical appointments and other activities.