Housing for Holocaust Survivors

1 May 2014

Israel’s government announced recently that it will allocate one billion Shekels to assist Holocaust survivors. But SHATIL insists much more can be done – specifically in terms of providing more public housing to survivors.

To raise public awareness and to persuade the government, SHATIL launched a media blitz in the days surrounding Yom Hashoah about the critical housing problem faced by Israel’s aging — and often needy — Holocaust survivors.

“Too many survivors must spend the vast majority of their money on rent, leaving insufficient funds to for food and medicine,” said SHATIL media expert, Danny Gigi.

SHATIL arranged for Gita Koifman, head of a Holocaust survivor advocacy group and a survivor herself, to appear on a popular Channel Two morning talk show to debate this issue with Minister of Pensioner Affairs Uri Orbach. Lev Eran, a SHATIL community organizer, discussed the issue on Israeli radio. SHATIL consultant Nadia Aizner helped create a news piece on RTVI, an important Israeli Russian news channel, and authored a number of editorials about public housing for Relevant Info, a progressive Russian blog.

“This is a problem that must be solved,” said Gigi. “Raising public awareness is one step toward that goal.”

Photo Credit: “Hall of names in Yad Vashem Jerusalem” by Flickr user Reinhardt König / kingreinhardt.