Only two Canadians joined a recent trip to Ukraine put together by the Jewish Federations of North America. Linda Frum, board chair of Toronto’s Federation, and Adam Minsky, its president and CEO, travelled to the Polish-Ukrainian border to see firsthand where the millions of dollars raised by Canadians—including $4 million by Jewish Canadians alone—are going.

The United Nations now says 10 million Ukrainians have left their homes because of the war—a quarter of the entire country’s population. Money raised by Canadian Federations has so far mainly gone to help two groups doing work on the ground, the American Jewish Joint Distrubution Committee and the Jewish Agency for Israel. But what does that look like? What is the scene like on the ground, and how are Jewish NGOs helping?

Frum and Minsky join to share what they saw, what they learned and why they don’t expect many Ukrainian refugees to arrive on Canadian soil.

What we talked about:

• Watch a video of their trip from the UJA Federation’s YouTube channel
• Read the StatsCan report on Canadian hate crimes in 2020 at www150.statcan.gc.ca
• Read “The Jewish community in Canada has now raised $4 million for Ukraine—and it’s preparing for the imminent arrival of refugees” at thecjn.ca

Credits

The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Victoria Redden is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To learn how to support the show by subscribing to this podcast, please watch this video.