March 8, 2022
IsraAID, the international Israeli humanitarian aid organization, is the first recipient of an American Jewish Committee (AJC) #StandWithUkraine Fund grant. The AJC emergency fund, launched March 1, has raised to date more than $700,000 to assist Ukrainian refugees and to provide humanitarian assistance to Ukraine following Russia’s unprovoked, violent invasion. An estimated two million refugees have fled Ukraine to neighboring countries.
IsraAID, a longtime partner of AJC, has responded to humanitarian crises worldwide for more than 20 years, and often is among the first relief organizations to be on site, as it is now doing in Moldova. The IsraAID team arrived in Moldova two days after the war began and has set up operations in Palanca, on the border with Ukraine, and in the capital city of Chișinău to assist many of the 100,000 refugees who have entered from Ukraine.
The AJC grant will support IsraAID in establishing safe spaces for children, providing medical supplies, and offering trauma counseling. IsraAID CEO Yotam Polizer says the Ukrainian refugee crisis is of “biblical proportions,” and his organization is dedicated to helping people, primarily women and children, build resilience and rebuild their families and lives.
Moldova has special significance for AJC, the leading global advocacy organization founded in 1906 after vicious pogroms in Tsarist-ruled Kishinev. An AJC leadership delegation visited Moldova in 2016 to mark the organization’s 110th anniversary. AJC maintains close relations with Moldova’s democratic government and with the Jewish Community of Moldova, an AJC international partner since 2014.
