Eli Beer From The Border Of Ukraine With 90 Year Holocaust Survivor To Israel

JERUSALEM (VINnews/Eli Beer) – I was at the border of Ukraine and Moldova on Monday, attending to refugees at our soup kitchen.

I met a 90-year-old holocaust survivor by the name of Mikhael and he couldn’t stop crying. He had to say kaddish for his father and he told me about his mother escaping with him from the Nazis and how he survived by sipping bread in water and milk. It took him 5 days to get to Kishinev, and he had no strength to continue.

I told him we would bring him to Israel, he was hesitant. He didn’t own a passport since he never left the Ukraine. We connected with his family in Israel, and I told him that he is our brother, and we will take care of him.

We looked after Mikhael and got him the necessary permits from the Israeli council general in Moldova. The next day, he was on our bus crying, he couldn’t believe that he was going to Eretz Yisrael.

He was scared to travel, I sat him in the row in front of me on the United Hatzalah rescue flight, from Kishinev to Israel with 160 other refugees, I made sure he felt safe. When we landed, we took him on a wheelchair, and I surprised him by letting him kiss a Torah that was rescued from a shul in Ukraine that suffered a direct hit. He didn’t want to just kiss it, he wanted to hold it as he arrived in Israel.

We made sure that Mikhael and the 160 other refugees who were on this flight, made it to a safe place in Israel.

This is what I’ve been busy with for the past 3 weeks.

Eli Beer is the founder of United Hatzalah of Israel.