Holocaust survivors
110.000
Holocaust survivors in Israel
Between 10,000 and 15,000 of them die every year.
25 %
living below the poverty line
One in four Holocaust survivors has to choose between medicine and food at the end of the month.
To enable a dignified old age
The traumatic experiences of the Holocaust haunt many survivors well into old age. Often, they face material hardship and profound loneliness – even in the second generation, where the postwar children grew up without grandparents and with much pain. We, as Christians standing alongside Israel, want to use the remaining time to enable the survivors of the Shoah to live out their final years with dignity.
We support Holocaust survivors in Israel and Ukraine . Many survivors found a new home in Israel after the Shoah. Now, in their twilight years, we don't want to leave them alone with their painful memories. With our Israeli partner organizations, such as the Jewish Agency , Keren Hayesod , and the Helping Hand Coalition, we organize personal home visits, concerts, and regular meetings. In so-called Shalom Houses, survivors can enjoy fellowship and share their stories through music, dancing, and delicious food. Practical help comes in the form of food vouchers, financial assistance in case of illness, and help with minor home repairs. Thousands of elderly Jewish people who survived the Holocaust or the difficult postwar years still live in war-torn Ukraine —traumatized, lonely, and living below the poverty line. Here, through our local team , we work closely with Jewish communities and the social welfare organization Chesed . We visit survivors, collect their stories, distribute hot meals and food packages to those in need, and facilitate social gatherings and cultural events. In the long term, survivors can be supported there through a sponsorship – in addition to material aid, this is a strong sign that they are not forgotten.
Sponsorship
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Since the late 1990s, our team on the ground has established close ties with Jewish communities, particularly in Ukraine. While initially the focus was on supporting Aliyah – the return of Jews to Israel – the deteriorating economic situation led to increasing requests for material assistance from the Jewish communities. As a result, tens of thousands of food parcels have been distributed to those in need annually in recent years.
During the distribution drives – before the pandemic usually in conjunction with a tour group – we got into conversation with the recipients. We heard incredible and harrowing stories from people who had once been teachers, doctors, and engineers, and who never expected to one day be queuing for a food parcel. Many of them would have shared their survival stories in schools and at memorial events here in Germany. But during Soviet times, it was forbidden to talk about what had been experienced and suffered, and when capitalism arrived, people had other things on their minds than listening to biographies from the war years.
The fact that people from Germany kept coming and offering them open hearts and ears touched many deeply. This gave rise to the idea of building a bridge between the survivors in need, with their stories that hardly anyone has heard, and people in economically better-off countries like Germany. The sponsors not only provide financial assistance, but also give the survivors and the children of the post-war generation the feeling of being important to someone in their old age, and that means the world to them.