The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee Inc

Saving Jewish Lives: Relief and social welfare programs provide human services and support to Jews in need in countries around the world. Services are provided to those individuals that meet criteria relevant to the local environment, such as poverty and income levels, the existence or lack of available social services within a country, and consideration for physical mobility, disabilities, and unique circumstances. Programs include: 1)food and nutritional support; 2)development of social services; 3)homecare; 4)medical services, equipment, and medicines; 5)emergency grants.In 2023, JDC continued its historic and wide-ranging response to the conflict in Ukraine, which required increased emergency humanitarian support work in the country, in numerous European (cont. on Sched. O) border countries hosting refugees, and other post-Soviet nations impacted by the crisis and global inflation. JDC leveraged its preexisting infrastructure in Ukraine (including its social service center network, JCCs, thousands of JDC staff, social service center professionals, homecare workers, and JDC-trained Jewish community volunteers) and partnerships with local Jewish communities in Europe and continued to use them for emergency response, in which they worked on multiple fronts: In Ukraine, JDC provided ongoing care to more than 41,000 Jews the elderly, poor, displaced, and newly impoverished people including basic and emergency essentials like food, medicine, water, homecare for the homebound and sick. JDC aided 29,000 people with winter survival needs, including: wood, coal, canned and dehydrated foods, support for covering utilities' costs, heaters, warm clothes, blankets, subzero sleeping bags, and electric bedding. JDC-supported Hesed social service centers and Jewish community centers continued to be utilized as emergency warming centers with generators. JDC delivered more than 800 tons of humanitarian aid including food, medicine, and other crucial supplies to Jews in Ukraine and Moldova. Together with local European Jewish communities, JDC provided support to 13,000+ Jewish refugees, including long term integration support from housing to education, employment and trauma care, and Jewish community participation. JDC expanded its network of Trauma Support Centers across Ukraine to provide counseling and assistance. With eight centers now operating around the country, hundreds were provided much-needed mental health services. With schools remaining closed in numerous locations, JDC organized online and offline educational opportunities for Jewish children, often based in local JCCs, including tutoring in critical subject areas and soft skills like strengthening social connections. JDC delivered financial and employment assistance to community members devastated by skyrocketing inflation and diminished job opportunities, especially middle-aged people who are newly unemployed. This assistance includes access to online remote and freelance work, as well as skill training.In addition to Ukraine, JDC continued to work across the former Soviet Union addressing the humanitarian needs of tens of thousands of vulnerable Jews and building Jewish life. For more than three decades, JDC has done this nonpolitical work across 2,000 locations in 11 countries, from Moldova to Russia, Georgia to Belarus, and nations across the Caucuses and Central Asia. Assistance was delivered through our network of 62 Hesed social service centers, supplemented by a corps of 6,600+ volunteers, trained and deployed through JDC-supported Volunteer Centers across the FSU. In 2023, JDC provided 70,649 of the most vulnerable Jewish elderly in the former Soviet Union (FSU) with much-needed relief and welfare services. JDC also managed to maintain core services (i.e., homecare, food, and medicine) at approximately the same level as before due to major operational efforts on all levels, and the expansion of certain elements (mainly food and medicine). We provided 22,014 needy elderly in the former Soviet Union with approximately more than 22 million hours of homecare.In 2023, JDC remained committed to the needs of the most vulnerable Jewish communities and their members, providing immediate support for the Jewish community in Marrakesh, Morocco, following the powerful earthquake there, as well as swift and long-term assistance to the Jewish community of Djerba, Tunisia after the attack on the annual Lag B'Omer celebration. Additionally, JDC provided social support to Jewish communities in the wake of the October 7th terror attacks which made communities in the region increasingly vulnerable.JDC's continuing work with Jewish communities around the world focused on vulnerable communities, including those in Latin America like Argentina, to provide humanitarian aid and strengthen social services for Jews in poverty and need.

Innovative social services in Israel: JDC assists vulnerable Jews throughout the world. This mission is crucial in Israel, where JDC provides aid to Israel's most vulnerable citizens, including unemployed Israelis, children at risk, elderly and Israelis with disabilities. Before the October 7, 2023 Hamas attacks and subsequent war, one million Israelis every week were touched by social services created by JDC. JDC leveraged its 100+ year presence in Israel to immediately respond to the October 7th attacks and ongoing war. In 2023, JDC provided urgent humanitarian aid to tens of thousands of Israel's most vulnerable, and tens of thousands more who never needed the organization's help before - the evacuated, those (cont. on Sched. O) under fire, and those facing financial hardship, and widespread trauma. This relief effort included: Providing tens of thousands of the hardest-hit Israelis with direct aid, including food and cash assistance; education, welfare, and employment services; mental health solutions, and online and mobile social services. Deploying training and tools to more than 42,000 professionals engaged in crisis response and trauma programs. Guiding and supporting more than 1,800 NGOs and municipalities providing emergency services and relief around Israel.Additionally war-related aid included providing grants and training to small businesses in Israel's south; the deployment of volunteers to support ailing farms and businesses and providing critically needed social services to the elderly and people with disabilities as widespread reserve duty created the absence of professionals from these industries; and the long term rehabilitation of Israeli frontline cities which suffered heavy destruction and losses. JDC uses a unique model, which maximizes our impact. JDC promotes innovation, running pilot programs to develop and test more promising ways to deliver social services. If a new idea succeeds, the Israeli government takes over the program and implements it throughout the nation. JDC uses the acronym "DNA" to describe this approach, since our involvement with a pilot has three stages: 1) design (i.e., coming up with a new idea); 2) nurture (i.e., testing the new program); and 3) accelerate (i.e., if it works, scaling it up and handing it off to be replicated).