By Tsivya Fox, Breaking Israel News—
Approximately 200,000 Holocaust survivors live in Israel, one third of whom live in abject poverty. With International Holocaust Remembrance Day approaching this Saturday, January 27 and having in mind that an average of 40 Holocaust survivors die each day, now is the time to ensure that those who suffered so much in their youth are able to at the very least, end their lives with love, care and dignity.
“Though the U.N set aside a specific date on the calendar to memorialize victims of the Holocaust, we have a Godly commandment to honor the elderly every day,” stressed Rabbi Mendy Blau, director of Colel Chabad, Israel’s longest running charity organization, to Breaking Israel News.
“How much more do we need to care for Holocaust survivors, who had unimaginable awful experiences in their youth and for the most part, have no family to take care of them?”
Colel Chabad, in conjunction with the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (IFCJ) run many charitable programs, which are specifically geared towards helping Holocaust survivors. They include delivering boxes of food and housewares to the homes of survivors who are still able to take care of themselves, bringing Meals-on-Wheels to survivors who are homebound and can no longer cook, and feeding thousands of mobile survivors through their network of 20 soup kitchens located throughout Israel.