Today's message is from Erik Lustgarten, our Annual Campaign Chair:

I'm from Venezuela, and the past couple of weeks have been hard. Watching the earthquake damage there—buildings destroyed or badly damaged, whole neighborhoods affected—is tough no matter where you're from, but it hits differently when it's home. My family is physically okay, thankfully, but their homes sustained some damage.

It has been incredible to see how quickly the local and global community has moved to help everyone affected. Organizations and businesses very quickly set up funds, forwent profit, and are doing everything they can to help with this tragedy. Even here in the U.S., Jewish Federations of North America set up a relief fund almost immediately. Locally (in Venezuela), the Jewish community set up its own fund and opened its institutions to people who were displaced. Seeing that response come together so quickly, from so many directions, has been amazing.

Particularly important has been the presence of an Israeli delegation on the ground assisting with rescue and recovery efforts—the first real collaboration with Venezuela's government since ties were cut 17 years ago. Coincidentally, one of the delegation members is someone I knew from my year in Israel after high school, 20 years ago. It's a small Jewish world. Even in the middle of something this hard, it's a good reminder of how connected we all are.

If you want to help, you can do so through the Jewish Federation's Venezuela Relief Fund here or via the local Venezuelan community directly here.

Times like these remind us what it means to be part of the global Jewish community.