Family Rescue – The Altman Family

Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. Isaiah 41:1

HELENA’S STORY

“My husband and I worked very hard to create a stable and loving space to raise our beautiful children. Maxim and Natasha are our lives and were always so happy living in our small village. We had the most wonderful neighbors and there was just this sense of community, where we all would look out for each other and take care of each other’s children. Then really, everything totally changed in an instant on that horrible morning, when our village came under the control of the occupiers.

The first weeks were absolutely terrifying, because we had no idea what to expect and how we were going to be treated. My elderly parents who lived just a few blocks away came to live with us, because my father was very ill and needed his chemotherapy treatments. We tried to stay strong and calm for the children, but we knew in our hearts that the only way to survive this, was to escape this living nightmare. 

 Our living conditions began to deteriorate very quickly when all of the electricity and running water was shut off. My father was unable to get his Chemotherapy treatments and sadly died a short time later. My sweet little boy Maxim, began to stutter every time he spoke, and Sasha my daughter, began to suffer from night terrors. We were living trapped like caged animals… Our world was crumbling…

Finally, there was a glimmer of hope when a humanitarian corridor opened up. We loaded everything we could into our car and put a sign on the window that there were children in the vehicle. We began to drive, but then suddenly troops appeared in the road with large guns and blocked our path. At that moment, my husband and I made the decision that we would wait for nightfall and then try again. Thank God, we finally made it out alive.”  

The Altman family is now in our refugee program where they are safely under our care. Everyone in the family is working with our therapeutic teams to overcome the immense trauma that they all have suffered from. Sasha is enrolled in our Mitzvah schooling program and is making wonderful progress while working with our psychologists and social workers. And little Maxim is attending our Kalaniot day program where he is receiving psychological services and the loving care that he needs to heal. 

May God bless you for helping us to bless and save suffering Jewish families in Ukraine.  

BECAUSE OF YOUR LOVE

Even to your old age and gray hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you. Isaiah 46:4

I am so very blessed that we are working together, praying together and moving into action together to bless and save Holocaust Survivors and elderly Jewish brothers and sisters who are in immediate danger of losing their precious lives. Because Of Your Love and commitment to our God-given mission, we are together breathing new life into the fractured souls of these precious people by providing them with the life-saving services and tender loving care that they so very much need right now.   

OUR SISTER ANNA

81 year old Anna was born in Kiev and has lived there her entire life. She has overcome so many challenges while being forced to live in extreme poverty and deprivation. Throughout all of her years of suffering, Anna has always been the first one there for those in her community who need assistance. Now this dear sister really needs our help to treat her many medical conditions and partial blindness. 

Because Of Your Love, our Senior Care Team is now coming to Anna’s home to provide her with her daily medications, medical care, meals, and the loving companionship that she so very much needs right now in her life. 

OUR SENIOR CARE HOME

Because Of Your Love, our Senior Care Assisted Living Facility is saving the lives of Holocaust Survivors and elderly Jewish brothers and sisters who are no longer able to live on their own and are in need of 24 hour care. Our highly trained staff of caretakers, doctors, exercise therapists and psychologists are ensuring that all who live in this safe and wonderful home, receive the love and care that they so very much deserve in their golden years.

My family, I am praying that you will continue to support our loving Senior Care Services Program, so that we can together rescue and save our elderly Jewish brothers and sisters who are suffering so terribly right now in Ukraine. 

May God bless you abundantly for Your Loving commitment to this mission that is so near and dear to His heart.

HISTORY IS NOT DESTINY 

By Don Horwitz
CEO, Christians Care International  

The Jewish Pale of Settlement was that part of the Russian Empire where Russia’s Jewish population was required to live and work between the late 18th and early 20th century. The Pale, which included most of Ukraine, was made up of over 5 million Jews, accounting for 40% of the world’s Jewish population. Our Jewish brothers and sisters did their best to live in the Pale, but so many of them were violently killed in many of the same cities which are now being attacked and bombed.

My family, my own grandparents Ben and Minnie, ran for their lives to escape being killed from the Pale Of Settlement. For my entire life, I had always questioned why my grandparents who helped to raise me, never, ever once spoke about my heritage or their lives before coming to America. Of course, when I was older, I understood that there had to be an immense amount of trauma that they suffered from in not only witnessing loved ones and friends being viscously taken away, but also in the close calls that they surely encountered when finally escaping. Even with this understanding, I still somehow selfishly felt cheated that I never knew enough, or really anything at all about the foundation of my family.

It was a few months after this war in Ukraine started, that I realized that history was again repeating itself for the Jewish people of this region. It is of course, not for the same reasons as it was when my grandparents fled. But the images that we are now seeing of inhumane destruction, of people in indescribable pain and the brutal scenes of torture and death… are very much the same.

A few weeks ago, after completing a conference call with our team in Ukraine, I started to think about the history of repression in Russia and the continued affects that it had and is currently having on it’s people. The thoughts of using force, fear and terror to control, brought me right back to what my grandparents must have surely experienced while living there. Tears began to flow down my face uncontrollably and I softly said to myself… I now understand how “constant overwhelming fear” dictated how my grandparents would live and act for the rest of their lives.    

Through research, I found out that my grandparents were not the adults that I imagined them to be when they ran. They were only teenagers…17 year old teenagers who were recently married. They must have been terrified about the unknown and also about the possibility of being caught and killed at the hands of their aggressors. I am now sure that extreme fear was the reason they had never spoke about their past, because for their entire lives they probably felt that some how, some way, they would still be found, and then they and their entire family, who they risked their lives to create… would be executed.

Ben & Minnie's 50th Wedding Anniversary

The horrific history of the Jewish people in this region is not their destiny. We are being called upon and challenged right now by God to “Up Our Efforts” in working together to assist in His plan for the Jewish people and Israel. Our work in this God-given mission is not only blessing and saving our brothers and sister’s lives, but it also is a part of God’s plan to provide HOPE for the entire world.

The Lord said to me, “I have a greater task for you, my servant. Not only will you restore to greatness the people of Israel who have survived, but I will also make you a light to the nations—so that all the world may be saved.” Isaiah 49:6