Helping the World’s Neediest JewsJDC PROGRAM DASHBOARD

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Helping the World’s Neediest Jews

Tens of thousands of elderly Jews go to bed hungry every night, homebound in dilapidated apartments. And Jewish families trapped in a cycle of poverty struggle to make ends meet and secure a future. We bring life-saving relief to the world’s most vulnerable Jews living in places where nearly no other social services exist.

TENS OF THOUSANDS of children and elderly live

under the poverty line

OVER 167,000 vulnerable elderly receiving vital

humanitarian services

NEARLY 29,000 at-risk children and families

supported by JDC

NEARLY 54,000 vulnerable elderly receive free or

subsidized medication from JDC

MEDICAL CARE

When the daily shelling began to be too much to bear, Masha packed up her belongings and left her hometown of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine for the safety of Kharkov.

A graduate of its Jewish school and youth clubs, the 24-year-old was a proud daughter of Donetsk—and she could scarcely believe the streets she knew so well had become a dangerous war zone.

Since then, she’s become one of some 2,800 internally displaced Jews helped by JDC: receiving extra food, medicine, and medical care; crisis-related home repairs; emergency housing; post-trauma care; and extra winter items such as warm bedding, clothing, and space heaters.

Though directly impacted by the crisis herself, Masha—a graduate of JDC’s Metsuda young leadership program in Ukraine—is one of dozens of young Ukrainians volunteering to deliver needed supplies to the country’s most vulnerable Jews.

They’re part of a new network of about 200 volunteers in 15 Ukrainian cities designing innovative programs to help vulnerable elderly, at-risk children and families, and others

aff ected by their country’s violence and volatility.

“Thank God, I’m not in as bad condition as others,” she says. “I can work and support myself. For me it’s important and is an honor to be an ambassador for all the Jews in need in Ukraine, to volunteer through JDC.”

Masha and her friends are part of a new generation of Jews growing up after the fall of the Soviet Union, a cohort with a fi erce drive to improve the communities they live in.

It’s a story that resonates with Nikolai Railean, director of the volunteer center in Moldova’s capital city. Nikolai coordinates about 300 volunteers who work with children with special needs, plan community celebrations, visit the elderly, and more—work that’s more important

now than ever in light of Moldova’s recent economic turmoil.

“In the Soviet Union, volunteering was treated as an obligation. Only now is the culture starting to change,” he says. “Now, step by step, we’re showing young people that volunteering is about the wish of each person to be involved in improving the world.”

PROGRAM SPOTLIGHT

As the Greek fi nancial crisis deepened, JDC provided emergency funding to help the Jewish community address critical needs, including food, medicine, utility stipends, scholarships to keep children in Jewish schools, employment and leadership training, and network opportunities for young people.

IN THE FORMER SOVIET UNION AND CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE:

“ Step by step, we’re showing young people that volunteering is about the wish of each person to be involved in improving the world.”

// CHALLENGE The most vulnerable Jews are often forced to choose between putting food on their

families’ table and paying for the medical care they require. It’s an impossible choice, and healthcare needs

often suff er.

// INNOVATION JDC provides free medical consultations, subsidized medication, and loans of needed

medical equipment to the poorest children and elderly across Europe and the former Soviet Union. In

communities like Morocco and India, JDC funds old-age homes designed to provide compassionate,

dignifi ed, high-quality care for isolated and impoverished elderly who might otherwise be completely alone.

THOUSANDS have recieved

professional training

EMPLOYMENT

// CHALLENGE Throughout Europe, the global recession has transformed previously middle class

individuals into the “new poor.” In countries like Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, and the nations of the Baltics,

thousands struggle to provide for their families.

// INNOVATION JDC’s employment programs combat economic crisis-related unemployment by off ering

professional skills and training to re-establish self-suffi ciency.

12,300,000+ hours of home care provided to

vulnerable elderly in the Soviet Union

HESED SOCIAL WELFARE CENTERS

// CHALLENGE Tens of thousands of vulnerable elderly languish alone throughout the former Soviet

Union. Many, often homebound, require extensive care and material assistance to purchase food, utilities,

and other necessities.

// INNOVATION JDC’s network of Hesed social welfare centers provides critical assistance to the

most vulnerable and connects seniors for important social interaction and activities.

Ukraine & Moldova

in Crisis:

Volunteers

Step Up

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The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) is the world’s leading Jewish humanitarian assistance organization. JDC works in more than 70 countries and in Israel to alleviate hunger and hardship, rescue Jews in danger, create lasting connections to Jewish life, and provide immediate relief and long-term development support for victims of natural and man-made disasters.

JDC is primarily funded through the Jewish Federations of North America. Key JDC funders also include: The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, the Maurice and Vivienne Wohl Charitable Foundation, World Jewish Relief (UK), UIA Federations Canada, and tens of thousands of individual donors.