January 13, 2010

TORONTO — In response to the devastating earthquake in Haiti, Canadian Jewish Congress’s National President Mark J. Freiman and CEO Bernie M. Farber communicated the following message in a letter to the Haitian chargé d’affaires in Ottawa:

“On behalf of the Jewish community of Canada, we express our deep sorrow on the tremendous loss of life and damage from the earthquake in Haiti. We grieve with you and our fellow Canadians of Haitian origin at this sad time and we extend our condolences to the families of the victims. We pray for a complete recovery of those hurt or ill as a result of this terrible natural disaster and for the expeditious rebuilding of the devastated lands.

You will be interested to know that in response to the crisis, United Jewish Appeal-Federation of Greater Toronto and Combined Jewish Appeal of Montreal have established funds for humanitarian relief aid to the afflicted areas.  This is in keeping with the traditional Jewish concept of “tikkun olam” which translates as “repair of the world”.  It is usually meant in a metaphorical sense but in this instance it will be literal as Haiti works to recover from this devastating earthquake.

We sincerely hope that this will assist in relieving the human suffering experienced in Haiti.”

To contribute to the relief funds in Toronto, go to the UJA Federation of Greater Toronto site at http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=u4apegdab.0.0.aiqaz8aab.0&p=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ujadonations.com%2Flogin.asp%3Fdestinationsite%3Ddonations%26destinationid%3D33&id=preview or call 416-635-2883.

To contribute to the fund in Montreal, go to the Federation CJA site at http://www.federationcja.org/haiti or call 514-345-2600.

For those in other communities across Canada you may wish to check with your federation or United Israel Appeal Federations Canada for any local fundraising initiatives.