IsraAID Highlights 2015/16HUMANITARIAN AID ORGANIZATION

IsraAID’s mission is to effectively support and meet the changing needs of populations as they move from crisis to reconstruction, rehabilitation, and eventually, to sustainable living. This commitment is expressed in emergency relief and sustainable development, with an emphasis on the transition between them.

MISSION STATEMENT

WHO WE ARE FROM EMERGENCY TOSUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

IMMEDIATEEmergency AidMedical ServicesTrauma Prevention

1 - 3 MONTHSMulti-sector Capacity-Building

5+ YEARSResponsible Exit Strategy

Founded in 2001, IsraAID is an International humanitarian aid organization based in Israel.

Non-profit, non-governmental and apolitical, IsraAID is synonymous with rapid response, technical expertise, and tailor-made programming.

The organization has responded to crises in 39 countries around the world, reaching millions with life-saving missions and long-term projects.

Bringing together 1000+ professionals from around the world, IsraAID subscribes to the “Do no Harm” philosophy, building high- quality and regularly evaluated pro-grams to ensure we never undermine local communities.

IsraAID’s unique approach includes a seamless transition from emergency response to culturally-adapted capacity- building as an instrument for locally led change that lasts.

PAST DEVELOPMENT EMERGENCY

785,863

359

19

BENEFICIARIES WORLDWIDE

PROFESSIONALS DEPLOYED

ONGOING MISSIONS

EXPENDITUREWATER, SANITATION & HYGIENE Drawing on world renown innovative technology from Israel, our engineers bring clean water, safe sanitation, and essential professional skills to thousands around the world.

GENDER-BASED VIOLENCE Combating gender-based violence by emaphasizing prevention and response through treatment, training, education and advocacy for service provision.

3% Fundraising5% Management / General Costs92% Programming

Total Income$4,447,559

DISASTER RELIEF Following a crisis, time is of the essence. Our specialized search and rescue teams are always on stand-by, ready to save lives and bring emergency aid to those in need no matter where they are.

MEDICAL RESPONSEFrom emergency medicine to community services and training for governments and NGOs, we are proud to boast a medical ros-ter of 300+ medical professionals from all around the world.

PSYCHOSOCIAL SUPPORT Preventing long-term post-trauma, and increasing the resilience of communities after a tragedy is a specialty of ours, led by 500 of the world’s best mental health professionals.

COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT After the initial emergency response ends, our professionals continue working with communities and bring economic opportu-nities through shelter, vocational training, agriculture, and other skills.

WHAT WE DO

OVERVIEW 2015/16

After her husband and two of her children were killed in Syria, Sabrina (name changed) took her surviving family and fled. Like so many others in Turkey, they boarded an overcrowded rubber dinghy to Europe. Unfortunately, the borders had al-ready closed, and Sabrina and her children were left stranded on a small Greek island.Once a tourist destination, in 2015 Lesvos became the center of what has been called “Europe’s biggest crisis since World War II” as more than a million Syrians, Iraqis, and Af-ghanis tried their luck on the rough Aegean seas to escape war, violence, and tragedies back home.A year later, tens of thousands of refu-gees remain in limbo like Sabrina – stuck in makeshift camps throughout Greece, terrified of being sent back and anxious to hear of their fate. Traumatized and trapped in a spiral of despair, Sabrina tried to take her own life three times. Miraculously she survived, and recently is better.

Spotlight: Europe Refugee Crisis

medical care on the beaches, caring for shell-shocked and terrified survivors of shipwrecks, and supporting vulnerable families on the treacherous journey to Western Europe.Since then, with borders closed, IsraAID is working to promote community resiliency and minimize the onslaught of Post-Trau-matic Stress Disorder (PTSD) along with depression. “Our usual approach is a holistic one, focusing on tackling the issues of today in hopes of building a better tomorrow” shares Avital Furlager, IsraAID’s Psy-cho-Social Coordinator for Greece, “here it’s so much more challenging - we don’t even know where they will be in a few weeks”.In contrast, over 1.1 million refugees are now adjusting to a new life in Germany. The task there is massive – ensure over a million people from multiple countries integrate over a short time or risk a social and economic crisis of unprecedented proportions. Housed in make-shift shel-ters throughout the country, many of the newcomers hope for some stability and peace. IsraAID’s professional therapists and social workers are on the scene, train-ing local volunteers, and creating support groups for refugees to process the stress of their journey.A special emphasis is placed on the Yazidis, a small ethno-religious group tar-geted by ISIS for mass slaughter, forcing them to abandon Iraq. For them, Germany

presents a special opportunity, with an established Yazidi diaspora communi-ty to link up with. For IsraAID, this is of particular significance. “The Yazidis that finally make it to Germany can reconnect to long-lost family members and their community, and in some way keep their culture alive” shares Mickey Noam-Alon, Communications Director and head of the ‘Imaging Hope’ program, “through train-ing and visual documentation, we can help them tell their story, record it, and ensure that future generations remem-ber what it means to be a Yazidi”. Some of these young German Yazidis are being inspired to take the story one step further, joining IsraAID teams to help their com-munnity both in Germany and in Greece. “For me as a Yazidi, I have a special bond to these people – they are my community” explains Isa Mahmut, a German volunteer with IsraAID in the Yazidi refugee camp of Petra in Northern Greece, “It is an incred-ible honor to be able to join the team and help my people during our time of need”.With no end to the violence in Syria and Iraq in sight, for the many refugees spread out all across the region the future remains unknown. Yet, what is clear is that no matter where or when, IsraAID will continue its support, as they strive to help themselves.Our usual approach is a holistic one, focusing on tackling the is-sues of today in hopes of build-ing a better tomorrow

Life is still not easy, but now she has hope, a change she credits to the Arabic speaking therapists sent by IsraAID as part of its multi-country response – the single largest campaign ever deployed by the organization. “After 15 years and 39 countries, the rig-ors of disasters are nothing new for us”, explains the Program Director, Naama Gorodischer, “but never have we seen something of this scale, so vast with mas-sive humanitarian needs spread across the entire refugee route-both in Middle East and throughout continental Europe. ” Since the outbreak of the war in Syria, tens of millions from the wider region have been affected, and IsraAID is re-sponding on every front.In Jordan and in Northern Iraq, provid-

ing relief items to tens of thousands of displaced families, IsraAID is working together with local professionals to pro-vide quality education and trauma care. The goal is simple: to try to minimize the impact on what has already been dubbed the “lost generation” of children- raised in camps and makeshift shelters. “The classes combat the mental and physical stagnation”, says Hussein, an ecstatic father in a camp near Erbil, Kurdistan Region of Iraq, “now they are creating, instead of destroying”.As the numbers fleeing grew exponen-tially, and images of 3-year-old Aylan Kurdi’s tragic death were making head-lines, in Greece and throughout the Bal-kans, IsraAID’s response teams were al-ready on the ground, providing emergency

Memorial Ceremony of the Yazidi Community at a Refugee Camp

“AID is something something walla walla”

answered. There was a woman alive under the wreckage. For the next five hours we worked with groups of local authorities and 130 internation-al Search and Rescue workers to save a life. As we fought against the clock, a constant flow of people brought food, snacks and water — an overwhelm-ing outpouring of support. People who had just lost everything and now living on the streets came togeth-er with so much love – inspiring us to push on. As the treacherous work continued, we thought we could hear the faint sound of breathing. I called out again and heard a woman’s voice cry back: “Dukh chha” – “It hurts.” At that moment, I realized; clearly, miracles do happen.

Just 72 hours after the earthquake devastated Nepal, I found myself in the capital with our Search and Rescue team. While IsraAID doctors, nurses and paramedics operated mobile medical clinics, we were scrambling to save lives amid the destruction. Our team working around the clock to recover bodies from under the rubble, enlisting the help of locals and anyone physically able to lift the cement slabs and debris. Five days on, we continued our strenuous efforts, though our optimism of finding life diminished by the hour. But sudden-ly everything came to a halt. We heard a sound. I yelled out in Nepalese, “is any-one there?” A dim voice, barely audible

Spotlight: NepalField Diary of Yotam Polizer, Head of Emergency Mission to Nepal

HoneyAID (Cooperative)

The earthquake crippled the econo-my of Nepal which already had high incidences of poverty and food in-security. To strengthen resilience of individuals and communities, Is-raAID sought to provide livelihoods skills, targeting women in affect-ed villages. The project is training 500 women from rural earthquake affected villages. The training fo-cuses on beekeeping, harvesting, and marketing. The project’s main objective is to empower women by providing them with basic live-lihood skills through beekeeping. By the end of 2015, the project had trained 64 women from the rural communities in Kavre district.

awareness. At the same time, we began to train local professionals across many dif-ferent sectors so they could begin to form their own response framework.Krishna, like so many others, was left jobless by the quake. Regardless of emo-tional stability and schoolbooks, she and her children needed to be able to eat. This lack of income sources in the village was what drove her to leave her village in the first place.Drawing on Israeli expertise, IsraAID began ‘HoneyAID’-training women-led households in remote villages on how to tend to bees, gather honey, and mar-ket the finished product together in the

city. HoneyAID has grown to be a huge success and is on target with our goals of training 500 women/households in income generation and entrepreneurial skills, as well as women’s empowerment.It still never ceases to amaze me that while within minutes one’s entire world can collapse and everything can seem lost forever, the sparks of courage and the spirit of camaraderie still manage to break through. Representing different countries, from places near and far, these incredible moments of unity result both in lives saved, and in many more, like mine, forever inspired.

HoneyAID Livelyhood Program

I began to reassure the woman that she was going to be rescued but asked her to try and stay calm and very still. We had cleared a deep path in the wreckage to reach her, but with one wrong move the fragile layers above could collapse on us all.We finally got a glimpse of the young woman and called for a medic to insert an IV into her arm to rehydrate. I waited a few minutes and then asked for her name. “Krishna,” she told me. We learned that Krishna Devi Khadka, 24, was working at a local guesthouse when the earthquake struck.As our team prepared for the final stage of the rescue operation, we coordinated and counted down simultaneously in Hebrew, Nepalese and English until we finally could pull her out to freedom and safety.After being rescued, Krishna was brought to the Israeli field hospital, where her condition stabilized, and then transferred to the Nepali Army Hospital. I closely followed her recovery over the next two months. When I learned she had left her two children in her home village and came to work in Kathmandu in order to support her family, I rushed to bring them to her. At IsraAID we are all too familiar with the effects of trauma and I understood how important it was to have her children with her.To me, the needs of Krishna’s children represented those of every child affected by the earthquake. Beyond the direct suf-

fering and miraculous rescue of Krishna, the family’s challenges were many, and complex.

This helped inform our programming. We started with the most urgent – shelter, launching our “A Roof for All” program to provide 660 semi-permanent houses to families in five districts. Then, we fo-cused on promoting education through our “Back to School” program, providing 4,000 children with backpacks, note-books and pencils.Everyone appreciates the physical sides of recovery from disaster, but too often the emotional and psychological needs are underestimated or forgotten. It was evident from the moment I met Krishna that the Nepali people were resilient. But with every visit I had with Krishna and her children, I understood the ever-present need for psychosocial support.This kind of assistance was highly stig-matized prior to the earthquake, but the psychosocial needs of so many forced it into the foreground. IsraAID takes a com-prehensive and non-traditional approach to overcome stigma. Realizing that Ne-palis love theatre, we dispatched theatre troupes to affected communities to raise

Everyone appreciates the physi-cal sides of recovery from disas-ter, but too often the emotion-al and psychological needs are underestimated or forgotten

Spotlight: South Sudan

As South Sudan struggles with a new round of hostilities and chaos, IsraAID expands its critical work on the ground. The renewed conflict and displacement have dramatically increased the vulnerabilities and violence against innocent civilians, particularly among women and girls. IsraAID has been operating in South Sudan since the country gained independence in 2011. Even prior to the outbreak of the recent conflict, Gender-Based Violence (GBV) was a serious, life threatening, pervasive and under-resourced challenge. The recent outbreak of violence significant-ly exacerbated the risks and occurrence of GBV. Women and girls are deliberately targeted, rape is used as a weapon of war, and domestic violence has significantly increased due to trauma, displacement and violence.

Ms. Judith Denya Bullen

Thus, IsraAID’s work focuses on estab-lishing life-saving protection, medical and psychosocial services for GBV survivors and their communities, and a safer environment for all. IsraAID began a long-term program to train and accompany local service provid-ers in their efforts to design and deliver comprehensive services of quality to vulnerable communities affected by conflict and displacement. Judith Denya Bullen first met IsraAID during an introductory training session on Gender-Based Violence (GBV) conduct-ed by IsraAID in 2012 for social workers employed by the State Ministry of Gender and Social Development of Central Equa-toria State. For Judith, the training was her first exposure to professional material on the subject of GBV. From the very beginning, she showed great interest, professional-ism, and commitment, and continued to participate in the courses developed by IsraAID together with the Ministry.When the 2013 civil war broke out, and with it unspeakable atrocities committed against civilians, Judith was selected – together with other colleagues from the Ministry, to play a central role in provid-ing psychosocial and case management services to communities affected by the conflict, subsequent displacement and resulting trauma. She excelled at her job, gaining tremen-dous trust in the communities by applying

the very skills and tools acquired through IsraAID’s training courses. The Ministry rewarded her dedication, and she was appointed as the first official Case Manager of the Ministry. Her commit-ment paid off, and thanks to her and her peers, countless cases of GBV received a response, and so many more were prevented.

She is now leading the IsraAID’s UNICEF-funded protection program in Juba, reaching in 2015 more than 2,000 community members and train-ing 183 service providers in the process. She developed strong and lasting ties between the police, psychosocial and medical services – providing a solid refer-ral framework for GBV survivors and other vulnerable groups. Her work has been commended by the communities themselves, other service providers, international and national partners and, of course, IsraAID.We are proud to work with Judith, and she is one successful example, among many others, of the importance of strength-ening the capacity of national service providers to ensure long term sustainability. There is need to establish life-saving protection, medi-cal and psychosocial services for GBV survivors and their communities

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