Yotam Polizer
An Unlikely Rescue: IsraAID and Afghanistan
Yotam Polizer - An Unlikely Rescue: IsraAID and Afghanistan
- Good evening, everybody, and welcome back. Tonight, we have a very special event for you. We are going to share our own experience with Yotam Polizer and with Carly, who were involved in working together to save 167 Afghans from the hands of the Taliban. And it has been a journey that’s been very close to all our hearts. Close with my family. We have been close to Yotam and Carly, and really we just say for this amazing feat. So before I hand over to you, I want to say, I’d like to introduce Yotam. Yotam Polizer is the global CEO of IsraAID, overseeing IsraAID’s global operations strategy and partnerships. Following the summer 2021 crisis in Afghanistan, Yotam coordinated the rescue of 167 Afghans from the hands of the Taliban. Following the September, 2015 refugee crisis in Europe, he led IsraAID’s humanitarian mission in Lesbos, Greece to support Syrian refugees on the island and also established IsraAID Germany, which provides long-term support for Yazidi and Syrian refugees in Germany. Over the course of 10 years at IsraAID, Yotam has also built and led programmes in Japan after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami, in the Philippines after Typhoon Haiyan, in Sierra Leone during the 2014 Ebola crisis, and in Nepal following the 2015 earthquake. Wow, Yotam, you have been around. You are certainly an experienced man in dealing in crisis. So thank you for joining us tonight. It’s a great honour to have you with us. I’m so looking forward to this presentation. Thank you, Car, and I’m going to now hand over to the two of you, thank you.
Thank you very much, Wendy. So hilariously, Yotam and I are both in Israel, but as I’m in Jerusalem and he’s in Tel Aviv, we’ve decided to do this over Zoom tonight. So Yotam, before we dig into the story of how IsraAID ended up in Afghanistan, I thought it might be helpful for you to give everybody a couple of sentences, introduction to IsraAID, its purpose and the types of missions you normally do.
Sure, and thank you so much, Wendy, for this kind introduction. I mean, as you’ve all heard, I’ve been chasing disasters for quite some time, but I have to tell you, the biggest disasters of all, like traffic and stuff, I still can’t deal with. So I may need your help with that. But IsraAID, just to clarify, IsraAID is a non-governmental, non-political organisation. We are an independent civil society organisation based out of Israel. We just celebrated last Thursday, our 20th anniversary. So mazel tov to us. And since our establishment, we responded to crisis in 56 countries. But something very important to clarify because people think that we are only doing emergency response, and it’s true, it’s a big part of our DNA, but our work is not just about immediate relief, it’s also about long-term recovery and resilience.
Because unfortunately what happens in many of these crisis, there is something that I call the aid festival. So everybody responds, you know, everybody sends their grandma clothes as a donation, but then typically after a week or two weeks, the media is moving to the next, you know, crisis, the next tweet. And most of the organisations, the volunteers, the donations are gone with it. So we are there to respond immediately, usually within the first 72 hours. But more importantly, we stay when many other organisation leave. And as we speak today, right now we have teams in 14 countries around the world doing work in the health sector, in partnership with The Kirsch Foundation, for instance, we’re doing a big vaccination campaign in Eswatini, formerly Swaziland. We are helping victims and survivors of gender-based violence in Sudan. We are doing water technology and sanitation in Vanuatu in the Pacific. We’re still working with Syrian refugees, and many other occasions. And most recently, the Afghan rescue operation, which we’ll hear all about it soon.
So there’s a big difference between operating in some of the countries you’ve named, which either have diplomatic relationships with Israel or are at least most likely not in a declared war with Israel. So tell us how IsraAID even ended up starting to look at Afghanistan and even considering getting involved.
So it’s actually not the first time we did something in a country without diplomatic relation with Israel. The last time we did it was supporting some of the Yazidi survivors from the hand of ISIS. And we actually had teams on the ground in Iraq. But in terms of the scale, definitely the Afghan rescue operation is much bigger. So the way it all came about was I was actually on a family holiday in Japan in late August. And when the Americans pulled out, we started receiving a lot of requests from Afghans for rescue. And my typical answer, my default answer to them was that we don’t have a team on the ground in Afghanistan, and unfortunately, I don’t think we can help. But then in one day, I think it was August 28th or 9th, really almost the last day of the Americans in Kabul, I received three different phone calls. One was from a journalist friend, her name is Danna Harman, and she was supporting, trying to support the first Afghan Girls Robotics Team that became very famous.
Second is from another philanthropist in Israel who was trying to support the cycling team, the female cycling team, who was also really targeted just for, you know, riding their bikes. And the third phone call, which was actually the most interesting, came from a friend who worked with us with the Syrian refugees and claimed that he has links, he has someone he knows who actually have links to the Taliban and can secure a safe passage. So I was in Japan, some of our team members were in Tel Aviv, this guy was somewhere in Europe, but ready to go to Afghanistan. And I decided to connect all these dots and to try to rescue these two groups. One was the group of robotics, Girls Robotics Team, and the second was the girls cyclist team, using the help of this guy who was able to secure safe passage from the Taliban. And that’s how this whole operation started.
So we’ve now worked together on three missions in Afghanistan. So we’re going to go one by one, although each one in and of itself could be a three-part movie. But let’s start with the first mission. And that was not long after the suicide bombing, not long after there were basically very clear that the Americans and others were really failing to evacuate the last rounds of people they were hoping to get out. So what did those first days on the ground look like, and how did you decide what to do with your group and where to take them?
So we connected with these groups and we tried with the first thing we said, “Let’s try to evacuate them through the airport,” which is what the Americans tried to do. And as you said, failed pretty badly because the airport was not accessible. And I’m sure you all remembers these horrific, you know, scenes of people hanging on planes, and tens of thousands of people trying to get into the airport. And then the terrible suicide bomb that killed over a hundred people, including 13 American soldiers. So we realised at that point that we wouldn’t be able to evacuate people through flights through the airport. And very quickly, we decided to try a land evacuation. And I think we were the first group to do it. And potentially, that was the reason we were, I think, more successful. So we used the contact that we have, the guy who had links with the Taliban. He had links with a very specific part of the Taliban, you know, that I was not an expert before, but I learned that there are different tribes within the Taliban. And there was a potentially a safe passage through the border of Tajikistan, one of the neighbouring countries. And we organised the bus, and this bus included two groups, the group of the robotics team and the cycling girls team. And this bus crossed five different checkpoints of the Taliban. And in each checkpoint, they checked and they saw the permit that we had to cross. And they literally just let us, let our team go smooth. Now it’s important to clarify, these girls were all covered in burkas so no one could identify their faces. And the Taliban was not allowed to take off their burkas. So that was a very important factor to mention. When they made it to the border, actually without a problem, we realised we actually have a big challenge. And that was to convince Tajikistan to open the border. And that’s more or less, Carly, I think when I called you or texted you, or both, probably. And I told you, “Carly, we have a problem, we need your help and we need everyone’s help to try to open the border to Tajikistan.” Maybe you can chip in on that.
Yes, I think it was the first day of my first holiday in two years. Six o'clock. Six o'clock in the morning, California.
Always happy to jump on your first holiday.
Six o'clock in the morning Californian time when Yotam, who we normally talk to about challenges in Eswatini, and for those of you who’ve been following the news, there has been several of them in the last few months. And vaccinating a country is not an easy feat. So it’s not unusual for an early morning message to come through from Yotam. But in this particular case, it was a slightly garbled, hurried message about looking to evacuate people from Afghanistan, being stuck on the border with Tajikistan. And did we know somebody who could help? I have to be honest that that’s not my area of expertise. And I did have to look up where Tajikistan was on a map and work out exactly, you know, how and where we could help. And look at who we could engage with and who’s part of our network who we could work with. And, you know, that involved, I think several hundred phone calls. Remarkably, most people don’t ask where you got their phone number from when you call them, no matter what time of day or night, and ask them if they can help. And from memory, I think it took several days to get that border open and that’s when the situation-
Yeah, it was three days and two nights, two very long nights.
Yeah. So I’ll hand back over to you for how it was on the ground during that time whilst we were working to try and get the border open.
So yeah, so our team, our group of 42 girls and family members were stuck on the border between Afghanistan and Tajikistan, surrounded by Taliban, which was at that point at least very patient and didn’t try to do anything to them. But we became very stressed and the Taliban started asking them questions. Now, I have to explain that we communicate with them either on WhatsApp or Signal, but surprisingly, Taliban or non-Taliban, internet worked very good in Afghanistan during that time and we were able to communicate with them all the time. I do have to mention that neither the Taliban and many of the evacuees didn’t know that we’re Israelis at that point. And that’s a very important factor. Now, after three days of very intense diplomatic effort and through with the hands of, you know, world-renowned leaders and some investors who are investing in Tajikistan, we also realised that the only person who could approve that is the actual president of Tajikistan. And he received, I think, at least five or six phone calls from different people about this operation. And I guess that in the fifth one he said, “Enough with these people, let them through.”
And it was a big decision because he had hundreds of thousands, and potentially millions of Afghan knocking on his door and his border. So opening the border just for our group was a very big thing that he did, which we are grateful for. And he did it on one condition. And his people told me, “You personally,” me personally, “have to make sure that these people will not stay more than 24 hours in Tajikistan.” To be very honest, I had no idea how am I going to take them out of Tajikistan. But of course, I said, “Yes, of course, Mr. President, I will make sure these people will not stay any hour beyond 24 hours.” And then when they crossed the border, two things happened. First, we were all filled with joy. Second, I was very, very stressed on what the next step would look like. And again, Carly actually introduced me to a friend of her that I also knew somehow. And this friend knew a very prominent person, leader, media figure in the UAE, and he was able to pick up the phone and call the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohamed bin Zayed. And I remember 30 minutes later we received, I received a phone call from this, you know, prominent media person saying that Abu Dhabi, the UAE will take them without a question. And that was beyond any expectation I had.
So this is important to remind everyone of the time of year this was, and actually, this was a few days before the anniversary of the first year of the Abraham Accords.
Correct.
So the UAE knew that this was a IsraAID mission, and it was the first opportunity for humanitarian cooperation to happen through the Abraham Accords. You know, we’ve all seen the business ties, the growing Jewish community, the back and forth shuttle diplomacy between governments and ministers, between Israel and the UAE. But this was the first time that there could be humanitarian cooperation. Now, the UAE had already been accepting refugees, but they weren’t accepting a large number and there was a fair amount of bureaucracy. And mainly, they were accepting those of the American request and agreeing to take them as initial safe passage. They had set up a humanitarian city, which is designed to engage with the humanitarian world, but particularly, also give a place and refuge for refugees. And, you know, that, I think, was also fundamental for the UAE in deciding that actually, you know, they wanted to take this group, which was very fortuitous. Because you had been on the ground in Tajikistan, at that point, for more than 24 hours.
Correct, we actually took almost 72 hours, which was the amount that we were given by this transit visa. So they asked for 24, we stayed almost 72 hours, and that was for two reasons. One, we had to get the UAE approval and arrange the rescue flight, which we did. But second, was another challenge that we did not think about, obviously, when we started this mission was that half of this group member, 21 people did not have a passport. And they were able to cross the border from Afghanistan to Tajikistan, thanks to the permit we received, but they could not continue anywhere else without the passports. So then another interesting piece of the story came to life, which is a good friend of mine who is the ex-wife of the Israeli Ambassador to Washington, of the ex ambassador to Washington, not the current one, was in touch with the wife of a very high-level Afghan diplomat, who used to be in Washington and now is in a different country. She connected me with her and then she, the wife connected me with her husband and he kindly offered to issue passports.
Now obviously, this guy does not represent the Taliban, but thank God he’s still, during this transition period in his office, and have access to passports. So he started to create passports, and I could not stop thinking of the Japanese consul, Sugihara, who in the Second World War issued 6,000 visas to Jews and saved their lives. So that’s sort of the vision that I had in my mind when I was thinking about this Afghan diplomat somewhere in the world issuing passports and sending it to us, to Tajikistan via diplomatic courier. They arrived not in 24 hours, but in less than 72 hours. And all these people were able to get on a flight safely and land in the UAE, which is the time that I decided to pick up myself from Japan. And I arrived to the UAE a few hours before the plane landed there. And just to pick on what Carly was mentioning, these group of Afghans received the welcome that usually, you know, reserved to, you know, to diplomats or even to higher level officials. And there’s two reasons. One, because the UAE really decided to help, they decided this is the right and humanitarian thing to do, but not less important, and I heard it from many different UAE officials, they saw it as the first joint humanitarian, Israeli and Iraqi mission, and they refer to it in the media, on social media and was really moving to see the fruits of the Abraham Accords that enabled us to save lives together.
So once the group landed into the UAE, what happened next? Where did they go and what’s their current situation?
So yeah, so as you mentioned, the UAE set up this, I call it five-star refugee camp, for lack of a better word. Of course, there’s always, you know, more services, but really, it’s a beautiful compound that they set up that was actually used for people who were quarantined during the peak of COVID. And they took their refugees there. We were there with them, they provided them all the basic necessities from clothes to COVID tests, to vaccines, to you name it. And we stayed with them a couple of days and we saw that they were safe. It’s important to mention that this was declared as a temporary shelter, meaning that the final destination of this group and other Afghans there is not necessarily the UAE. We’re hoping, and we’re working on resettlement to Canada and the US. Unfortunately, this takes much longer than we anticipated, so that we can touch base upon the end. But I was there in the UAE and meeting a lot of government officials and leveraging this partnership to build relationship and to look for other initiatives. While we were doing that, we were very, very careful with the media before this operation was completed. When it was finally completed, there was a story that came out in “The Telegraph,” and we started to receive hundreds if not thousands of requests from other Afghans for rescue. And the first ones, the first kind of request we received was from family members of this robotics team, from other girls cyclists, apparently there was another group, but later we received other requests, actually, Carly, through your connections with families of Afghan diplomats, with actually a family who was the last Jewish family in Afghanistan. So we realised we need to create a bigger operation.
So you weren’t satisfied with surviving one mission, your Israeli chutzpah thought it would carry to a second mission.
Yeah, I mean it was chutzpah and being very naive, to be very honest. Like, we thought we had it all figured out. We thought we still had the permit from the Taliban. We thought we can get passports ready. We thought the UAE will, you know, take more groups and Tajikistan will provide. So we thought we had it figured out. In fact, I was tempted to do a much bigger rescue, but we said, “Okay, let’s do a hundred people.” And then this a hundred people grew to 125. So we actually arranged three different passes to leave Kabul and do exactly the same route as we did with the first group. This group got all the way to the border without a major issue, but when they made it to the border, at the very last checkpoint, the Taliban there said, “No, you can’t cross.” And not only did they say that, they basically surrounded the group that was staying in a safe shelter just near the border. And we started to receive panicking messages from the people that the Taliban surrounded us. They’re taking our names, they’re taking the mens out. And I have to say that that was probably the lowest point or the most stressful point of this whole operation that lasted, I think about four or five hours. We really, you know, for lack of a better term, we had kind of a hostage situation. And then, you know, us trying to, you know, it’s one thing us trying to convince world leaders to open the border to Tajikistan, but us trying to convince world leaders to get to the Taliban leaders to release our people was, you know, something that I wouldn’t-
Yeah, at that point they were less keen to take our phone calls, the, “Can you help open the border to Tajikistan,” wasn’t such a bad ask. Can you ask someone to call the Northern Taliban commander? Was more of a problematic request.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And what solved the issue eventually was a combination of things, I think, in this operation. One thing we were able, through some contact, actually through the cyclist association that proved to be very useful, the Global Cyclist Association. We reached someone high level in Qatar. And the Qatar is, as you’re probably all aware, have some level of diplomatic relation with the Taliban and are now, you know, taking leading in on the airport kind of reopening. And so they were able to do some phone calls. But I think more than Qatari, the people who were able to take the lead was actually the Afghans themselves. And some of these people in the group with some connections and charisma, they were able to negotiate their way out with the Taliban under one condition. The Taliban told them, “You have to all go back to your homes in Kabul. And if we’ll see you trying to cross the border again, you’ll all be killed. No jail, nothing.” It was a very clear and direct threat. And we heard it from many people who actually heard it from the Taliban people in this safe shelter.
Before you continue the story, I want you to tell everyone a little bit about the makeup of the group. You know, men, women, children, et cetera. So that people understand who it was, who was, you know, risking their lives, taking days to cross and, you know, what potentially stood before them.
So at that point of time, thank you. At that point in time, it was 125 people. Out of this 125 people, we had, as I said, families of African diplomats. We had few female judges who actually prosecuted Taliban before and was at a very high risk. We had another group of female cyclists and other athletes. We had a few last members of the robotics team. We had a human rights activist and journalist, and we had the last Jewish family in Afghanistan. The mother who was born Jewish, which, you know, that story in itself, I can talk about for hours, but she was really the last Jewish person in Afghanistan. And I’m sure some of you maybe heard about the person who claimed to be the last Jew. Apparently, he wasn’t the last Jew. And her daughter in Canada actually reached out to us. She reached out to us through the President Office in Israel and we confirmed her identity, and she was at a high risk because of her Judaism. So that was the group. We had four pregnant women, we had babies, we had this Jewish lady who was actually 83 years old. So, you know, it was very diverse, very vulnerable, very sensitive, and the whole journey was difficult, even if it was smooth, but clearly it wasn’t.
And after this negotiation with the Taliban, we had to really figure out what we’re doing. And I thought we actually have to pull off at that point, we did not know enough that we can keep these people safe. But we did do some research and we realised that there were some evacuations happening through another city called Mazar-i-Sharif, which is a northern city in Afghanistan, but not on the border with Tajikistan. And we realised there are evacuation flights happening there, not commercial flights. So we decided to give it a shot, to give it a last shot and send the group there. And then again, we faced the problem of the passports because it was very clear that nobody without a passport will be able to fly. We did a quick check and we realised that we have 41 members out of the 125 without passports. We contacted our friend, the Afghan diplomat, and he very quickly created these passports and sent it to us. But unlike the first mission where we gave them the passport after they crossed the border, here, we had another challenge. We had to transfer these passports into Afghanistan. And we spoke to the local authorities in Tajikistan and they said, “Yes, it is possible in a very specific border.” I have to tell you honestly, it’s probably the end of the world. Like there’s no closer to that, to the end of the world. You go to the end of the world, you turn left, right and again left, you get to this border. It was really no-man’s land. Somewhere in the middle of the desert on the border between Tajikistan and Afghanistan. There’s like a bridge between these countries. And we went there and we were told there will be a messenger coming from the Afghan side to take it and transfer it to the people.
Again, we were very naive, but it’s not like we had much of other choices at this point of time. And we already booked this rescue flight and we knew that, you know, with the Taliban already knowing about our groups, time is really of the essence. So we transferred these passports to the messenger. And we were waiting to hear confirmation from the Afghan side that these passports reached safely. Unfortunately, we didn’t hear from them, an an hour, two hour, three hours. So that was probably the second part, which was the longest four hours of my life, the second longest four hours of my life. And after four hours, we hear a message from one of the people in the Afghan side saying that the passports were confiscated by the Taliban. And they were able to release some of them somehow, but not all of them. And again, we had to again do a series of phone calls that Carly, I think people were not happy to receive, releasing passports from the Taliban. Let’s just say there’s some countries that, yeah, there’s some countries I am now banned from. I think is probably the safest way to explain it.
I’m sure about that. Anyway here, I think again, the Qatari connection and also, you know, it’s hard for me to explain it, but that’s just what happened. The Taliban people there at the border said that if people from the actual families whose passports were confiscated will come and claim them, they will actually give it to them. And, you know, we did some consultations and we said, “Okay, let’s try.” And a first member came to claim seven passports of his family, and they were given to him. Then another person came. And eventually over the course of about 24 hours, we were able to take back all 41 passports, which was again, a huge sign of relief. But if you think that was the end of it, no, it wasn’t because when the group finally made it to the airport and was ready to go on a flight, the Taliban in the immigration told them, “What are these passports? We didn’t create them.” And then the flight company had to pull out some creative solutions and they were able to magically get everyone on the flight. And 125 people went on this flight. And I have to say that was probably the happiest moment of this operation.
I’m going to remind you of another complication that I think you’ve blocked out, which is the Tajikis weren’t delighted to open the border for them at that point in time.
No. Of course, I remember. Again, it was, you know, it was about a five minutes of relief and joy. And then when the plane flew to Tajikistan for transit, we realised that number one, the Tajikis didn’t want to, you know, they just wanted this group to transit quickly. We also realised that it’s going to be much harder to receive an approval from the UAE to land because between these two groups that we did, there was almost a month passed and a lot of other groups arrived to the UAE. And the UAE wanted to make sure that people who go there have a visa to the next destination, which is a process that takes long. So we had to find another solution, and call Carly.
So at the same time, yes, I’m thinking of changing my phone number. So at the same time… So at the same time as you were in a half renovated air base in Tajikistan trying to convince the Tajikis not to arrest you for holding the group there longer than planned, Wendy was receiving an award in New York on the side of the UN General Assembly by a organisation called the Nizami Ganjavi International Centre, which is a think tank based in Baku. And at this dinner, there was around 60 people, half of whom were current and former world leaders from the Balkans. It was a very diverse group. So when Yotam was calling for help, we had a number of people there ready to assist, whether that was the former prime minister of Croatia, who then happened to be the head of the football association, which we thought might provide leverage over the son of the president of Tajikistan, to Tzipi Livni, the former foreign minister of Israel who knew the former foreign minister of Tajikistan and was prepared to start calling, to also the Afghan ambassador to the UN, whose family had been stuck, but who also was prepared to assist. So this took place about day two or three of Yotam’s original attempted at a second rescue. So we were able to apply additional pressure through some of those dinner guests to the group. And there was one particular dinner guest who joined the evening, and this was the prime minister of Albania. And he and Wendy actually had an association because Wendy had bought a work of his art.
So an artwork of his several years earlier, when at that point he was known as the Artist Edi Rama, and not the Prime Minister Edi Rama. So at the dinner that Wendy hosted, she and he struck up a close bond as two lovers of the arts, but also he’s a very impressive leader who’s really put himself out there in the last few months. He was one of the first with one of the poorest countries in the Bloc to say that he would take refugees. But he also spoke that night with incredible commitment and passion about actually what Albania had done for its Jewish community during the war. And Albania was the only country to end with more Jews than it started. And he was incredibly passionate to explain to the room why that was so important and why Albania would do everything it could to take Afghan refugees. And his speech that night was incredibly moving and one that we would all remember for several weeks to come. So at the point at which Yotam realised he could no longer take the group to the UAE in the appropriate amount of time, we got back on the phone to try and consider where we could take the group next. And after considering Bahrain, after considering Qatar and none of the countries could move fast enough to prevent what was probably going to be Yotam spending a night in a Tajiki jail cell, because he had given his own guarantee that the group would not stay any longer. I called Wendy and asked her if she could call her new friend, the Prime Minister of Albania. And he immediately answered the phone, and within 10 minutes after he asked Wendy how much we knew about the group, what plans we had, he quickly confirmed that he felt Albania could help, and that his foreign minister would be in immediate touch.
And maybe five minutes after that, his foreign minister called and she confirmed that Albania was taking refugees, and that if we had the right vetting process and the ability to bring them there, then Albania would take them. And in less than 12 hours, Albania was ready to receive the 125 refugees that were on the floor of the airbase where they had now been for three nights. And we remind you, before that, they were already travelling for nearly a week. And that Albania was our next destination.
Yeah, exactly, and at that point we, me and Ronnie and Danna, my colleagues who worked with me on that, by the way, I need to give for the idea of Albania. I need to give credit to Danna because she knew of a few Afghans who made it there. And that’s when I told you, “Carly, let’s try Albania.” And then Wendy did an the amazing thing of getting the prime minister to actually take them. But yeah, we were there with them on the flight to Albania and was again, not the destination that they thought they would be going to, but nevertheless, they were extremely happy. And when we arrived to Albania, immediately they gave us also like a VIP treatment. They took them to a nice hotel, which is where they are hosting now, almost 2,000 Afghans already. And they’re planning to take 2,000 more. And we were there with them and finally, after a few hours of seeing that they’re okay, I actually took a flight to Israel after almost five weeks of being in the UAE and Tajikistan to see my twin babies, whom I haven’t seen. I was supposed to just go for three or four days, and that ended up being five weeks. So this is where we are today with Albania. The third mission that I think you are referring to is the Jewish one. So Carly, should I jump to that one or anything else to mention that I forgot?
No, so the only thing I would mention is that the IsraAID/Albania connection has continued.
Correct.
And Yotam, along with the philanthropist, Sylvan Adams, who had also worked on the rescue mission, returned to Albania several days later to meet with the prime minister, who again committed that for more groups IsraAID could rescue, he would be prepared to take them. But more than that, that he wanted to look to IsraAID for partnership, that actually the Albanian government would be delighted to work with IsraAID in the refugee area they had built. And IsraAID now in the last few weeks, has a team on the ground, and I think another four landed today.
Yeah.
This morning. And there is now an IsraAID presence on the ground in Albania, helping the Albanians think about how they engage with the refugees, how they make sure they are being well supported and well taken care of. But as you-
And we’re operating in the camps there in these hotels, some education services, health services, making sure they really have not just the basic needs, but beyond. And we are helping them with a more challenging part, which is their settlement process. And that’s a big initiative that we’re working on right now. First for our groups, but also for others. And it’s a big challenge. It’s a big challenge. And I have to be honest, it’s not our expertise. So we are bringing lawyers and experts who can help with the application process, and that’s a big priority for us right now. I just want to mention the third mission, which was, so this Jewish group that I touched upon very briefly, we knew that actually the family has 32 members, not seven. However, in our group of 125, we could only fit seven because it was already packed with people. So we brought this Jewish woman, two of her kids and four of her grandchildren. We had 25 members who were still in Afghanistan and we knew they were at risk. It was basically her children and grandchildren. And just four days ago, we were able to connect with other organisations who’s doing rescue mission and refer them to this organisation. And this group of 25 Afghans with Jewish heritage landed safely in the UAE again. So that was sort of the third mission that we took parallel.
So many will have read the story of the man who claims to be the last Jew from Afghanistan. And there was always this laughable story about this man and his former friend who used to fight so much that when the Taliban arrested them both at one point, they decided they weren’t worth the hassle and they released them in order not to be stuck with them. So it was somewhat of a surprise to the Jewish world to discover that in fact there was another Jew still in Afghanistan. Can you tell us a little bit more, for those who haven’t yet read the story that broke overnight, about her and about her heritage?
Sure, so she, at the age of about 15 or 16, she had some family issues and she left home and married a Muslim guy. As far as we know, as far as she told us, she did not convert to Islam, and she kept some Judaism symbols in her life. And over the years, she stayed in touch with some members of her family. The rest of her family, five brothers and sisters and her parents moved to Israel, like almost all the Afghan community in two waves. One was in the late ‘50s and then again in the early '80s. The only Jews who stayed in Afghanistan until recent years was these two families, two Jews. And in the first Taliban rule in the late '90s, this woman who is called Tova Moradi, I forgot to mention, was actually hiding one of them and supporting one of them. And now with the Taliban taking power again, she started to receive, she and her family all knew of her, you know, all the neighbourhood and surrounding people knew about her Jewish heritage and they started to receive direct threats. So she contacted her daughter in Canada, Khorshid, who then reached out to a Jewish guy that she knew, a Jewish Orthodox guy, his name is Joe. And he reached out to the former Israeli ambassador, or consul, sorry, in Toronto, who reached out to the president office, who reached out to me to say that there is the last Jewish person in Afghanistan and she needs our support.
So that’s how it all came about. And now we didn’t know how many family members she has in Israel. So when the story was finally published, it was in “The Washington Post” two days ago, and her family in Israel started to reach out to us, and we realised she actually have a pretty big family there of three sisters and two brothers. And there’s like every Jewish family, I guess, but more in this case, there’s always some dramas. And I think you can imagine the level of dramas. But her sisters, she didn’t know they were alive and she didn’t talk to them until two days ago, for more than 60 years. So we arranged a Zoom call with her in Albania, her daughter in Canada, and her sisters and their daughters in Israel. And, you know, I cannot describe the level of emotions that this Zoom call. They sent me a picture of all of them basically crying over Zoom, which was amazing. And what we’re trying to do right now is to make sure that she visits Israel, she sees her family. The goal is still to go to Canada or maybe to stay in the UAE, which is another idea we have because the family is more Muslim than Jewish, but it’s very important for her. And she has relatives in Canada, her daughter is there. But it is very important for us that they’ll visit Israel, that she wants to visit her parents’ grave in Jerusalem and to meet with her sister that are still alive. A sad part of the story was that, one, there was one sister who was very connected to her, who kept talking about it for all these years. And she passed away six months ago before this reunion.
So I know having lived through this, although from LA and New York, and I think the UAE for 10 days in the middle there somewhere, that there are, to be honest, many more twists and turns that, you know, we didn’t get to cover. Each one of these missions had maybe 15 or 20 more complexities, you know, whether it was a maintenance problem with the plane or, you know, one border being closed or, you know, somebody missing a bus and chasing it with a taxi in order to a… A 16 year old in order to try and throw themselves on the last bus getting to Mazar. But, you know, now we have got 167 out. You know, how long do you think you can keep doing this? And, you know, what about the resettlement? The first challenge has obviously passed, these groups are safe, but they are now in a state of flux with no clear forward plans.
Yeah, so we realised that a lot of what we need right now is enough funding to help both resettle these people who are in, you know, in a limbo. And we found out so far that the best, most practical route is through private sponsorship, which will get them to Canada or the US fastest. And that just requires a lot of funding. And the second thing is really to get the right type of professionals, which also requires some funding, who could help guide us through this process. In terms of future evacuations, for me, it’s very much tied into the resettlement because what we’re working on very intensively right now is to fundraise and to submit all the applications for these 167. By the way, 47 of them already received their visas to Switzerland and France actually, which was very generous. And it was all people who were connected to the cyclist team, but we still have almost 120 people who did not yet receive their visa. So that’s our number one focus. We received even more requests from before for evacuations. And some of them are not only heartbreaking, but we got to a point now where we can assess the level of risk. So when we see very, very high and immediate risk, we are not thinking about resettlement or anything else. We think about saving lives, and we are finding solutions for evacuation still as we speak. However, we know that the resettlement piece is crucial and hopefully within the next week or two, we will be able to raise funding and we will be able to create a very clear and relatively quick, there’s nothing quick about resettlement, but by quick I mean a six months process that will then enable us to take more people out. ‘Cause we’ll know that we’re not bringing them to be, you know, hanged in limbo in Albania or elsewhere.
So you touched on the fact that, you know, IsraAID was careful to keep their Israeli connections quiet during this mission. But how did the Afghan refugees react when they, you know, the running joke between you and I over WhatsApp was, every photo I saw of you was you in a IsraAID t-shirt for two weeks, and that I’d hoped you taken more than one, including I have to tell the audience that Yotam landed into Tajikistan the same week as the new Iranian president decided to make his first foreign trip, and that was to Tajikistan. So Yotam, being a typical Israeli, thought it was a good laugh to try and get as many photos as possible as close to the Iranian convoy while he was making his way round Tajikistan. I did have to explain to Yotam that the Iranian president travels with the Revolutionary Guard, and I didn’t think they’d take too kindly to an Israeli t-shirt. But once the group were out of Afghanistan, the IsraAID piece was well known. What kind of reactions did you get to that?
So yeah, obviously we all needed some entertainment with the Iranian convoy, but it was very stressful mission. But, yeah, I mean, the reactions were actually a hundred percent positive. People were quite surprised, naturally. They did not expect us to be a group of Israelis. They thought we were Americans, they thought we are, but when they heard we’re from Israel, again, I call it they were positively shocked. People were very, actually happy, people were, you know, and I think by the way, we saw similar things with the Syrians. I always quote a Syrian refugee who told me, you know, when we pulled him out of the water in Lesbos, he said, “My worst enemy became my biggest supporter. And the people who are supposed to protect me back home are chasing me away.” And we kind of seen the same thing in Afghanistan. We saw, you know, these people were chased and running away from extremists, and then Israelis human rights, you know, and humanitarian aid workers are supporting them. I think it sort of fits well into the narrative that the whole world has basically gone mad. But it was really beautiful and I always, I told you I think, Carly, that now before every Shabbat, and I’m not very observant, to be completely honest, but I do get most of my Jewish blessing, you know, Shabbat shalom from my new Afghan friends on WhatsApp.
Well, I will say that when I had shoulder surgery a few weeks ago and you sent me videos of Afghan refugees from Albania and the UAE wishing me good recovery from my shoulder surgery, you even got me on the emotional edge there.
Wow.
But-
Probably my biggest achievement in this operation.
Yeah, yeah. You came close a few times. And you touched on those kind of four or five hours when the group were under Taliban, you know, hostage situation. I think it’s hard to really translate quite how tense that situation was. But, you know, in a lot of the missions you do, you know that you’ve put IsraAID’s best people on the ground, you know? When we vaccinate in Eswatini, we know you’ve brought Israeli expertise and Israeli know-how. In Afghanistan, you were reliant on, you know, your colleagues and previous relationships from Lesbos in Greece and from fixers and those you had, I guess, hired, is the best description. You know, was there a point at which you were concerned that, you know, you were leading people to their death? And how did you evaluate the risk to really go forwards?
Well, the short answer is, yes, there were points where the level of stress and tension that I felt was so, so heavy on my shoulders. And, you know, people ask me what was more stressful, Afghanistan or the Ebola. 'Cause I was in Sierra Leone at the peak of Ebola in 2014 when the survival rate was 50%. And the truth is, Afghanistan was much more scary because I had the responsibility for these lives in a place that I don’t know, that I have some connections, but can I a hundred percent rely on these connections and on the solutions that I found? Probably no. So, yeah, so the anxiety that, and I’m not a very stressed person doing this work for about 14 years, but that was, you know, I really couldn’t sleep for almost a month. And definitely during these days. I know you didn’t sleep either. So I got a lot of people, at least I felt the solidarity from a lot of people who were extremely helpful. But yes, it was very, very difficult few hours.
And the kind of unspoken piece in all this that I suspect our audience was wondering about is the kind of money trail, you know? We all saw the images, as the Americans pulled out, of things that were left behind of supposedly decommissioned helicopters and, you know, the Taliban’s spoils of war that they got to enjoy. You know, now there was obviously money that changed hands in some of these transactions. You know, how did you think about how you did that and kind of at what point was, you know, was too much money? What point were you worried you were enabling terrorists?
So actually, interestingly enough, the first mission we got the permit without paying practically anything. It was through, you know, connections, but we paid something very symbolic, which, you know, you can say is like a border fee. By symbolic, I mean few hundred dollars for the whole group together. And we heard of other rescue operations and group that were paying $10,000 a person just for the evacuation. We didn’t see any of that. In the second group when things got very difficult, we thought that offering money would help us. And, you know, we found a way to do it. Obviously, we cannot pay the Taliban directly, but for a third party, that did not help us actually, they actually made the things worse. So we did not directly or indirectly paid anything. When we did the rescue flight, eventually, the flight was very expensive, like very, very expensive. And we don’t know how this money is being treated, but we just know that that’s the only way to get these flights out. So that’s what I can say about that part. But altogether, yes, the operation was very, very expensive. And I do have to say again that right now, we are in, you know, in need for more funding for three things. One, is more evacuations. Two, is the paying the cost of these people who are in Albania. Just to give you an example, it’s about 25 euro per person to stay in Albania per day. And most importantly, for the resettlement process and the sponsorship. So there’s a lot of money we were able to raise. So I do thank The Kirsch Foundation, Sylvan Adams and a few others who helped with funding this operation until now, but we will need more in the near future.
And in terms of the future for these refugees, you know, these groups so far, most of them have a unique set of skills. You know, they are either judges or robotics girls, or, you know, certain level of cycling teams. Like, they have a story that we hope will mean that countries will be able to supply them with visas. But as you start to bring in family members and it becomes, you know, a little removed, do you think some of the group will end up settling in Albania, or do you hope to bring most of them to Canada, the US and elsewhere?
Well, first of all, we’re looking into what the refugees want, where they want to go. And the big majority want to go to Canada or the US. But I a hundred percent agree with you that these are very educated people, very capable. Many of them speak English or even other languages. And I think they will be a huge gift to any community, to any society, to any country. And I’ve been working with refugees over the last 14 years in many different countries and contexts. I don’t want to compare, but this is really the elite of Afghanistan, which is really sad for the future of this country. But definitely I think gives them a very high chance to integrate fully and successfully in whichever country that will take them.
So for those who are interested in supporting Yotam’s work, about 10 minutes ago, the link went up to be able to support the work in Afghanistan. IsraAID need to raise about $2 million for their initial resettlement costs. This really is a case where every little bit helps because, you know, the lawyers charge $300 an hour and we’re going to need a lot of legal hours, and it will cost around $10,000 to do private sponsorship per person. So, you know, we are hoping that many around the world will look to support this. Especially given that, I think for many people watching particularly of Jewish heritage and who, you know, who know what it’s like to watch regime change and understand that that is going to have a very clear effect on your future. The ability to find a way to practically engage is incredibly important. And Yotam is someone who’s known you for over 10 years. You know, the last year or two has certainly meant I’ve spent more time in a foxhole with you than I would’ve necessarily anticipated. But there are very few people in the world who could have pulled off what you and your team did, along with Danna, along with Ronnie. You know, it was a real eclectic team effort. And I have to say, you know, seeing how current and former world leaders, how philanthropists, how friends, how rabbis, everybody who, you know, who could think of a way to connect really did, you know, and not to lose sight of the fact that actually individual people can make a huge difference. Because actually in this situation, that’s what it was. It was one person doing something that moved it along. So, you know, for us and for working with you, it’s a real privilege. And, you know, this was a real example of bashert of destiny coming together because, you know, there were several moments, be it Wendy’s dinner in New York with the prime minister of Albania that we couldn’t have looked to replicate if we tried. So I dunno how long it would’ve taken us to find him otherwise. And I’m not sure he would’ve answered our phone calls. So, Yotam, it’s been a real privilege to be a part of this with you. And I’m going to hand back over to Wendy.
Carly, you’re a brilliant fundraiser.
[Yotam] Bravo.
Well, as I said, this is the first time, this was a truly, truly excellent presentation. And honestly, I’d just like to say to all our viewers, it really was, it’s been an incredibly stressful couple of weeks and just, you know, this is not really a fundraising, this is not a fundraising platform, but we really did want to give you the opportunity to experience what we’ve been through and what our team has been through. It has been hair raising, it has been terrifying, it’s been frightening. When Carly and I were in the UAE, it, you know, we were waiting for them to land, they didn’t arrive. They were delayed by 24 hours and 48 hours and 72 hours. It was really, we’ve been through a really, really stressful time. And I just wanted to say that when I talk about the Shiite, it was absolutely incredible that about five years ago when I bought Edi Rama’s sculpture that night, I thought to myself, I wonder why I bought this sculpture today. I did go to Marian Goodman, who happens to be a brilliant gallerist and a fantastic gallery, and I love the sculpture, but I thought, really, you know, he’s not African. And it, you know, I actually did think, I wonder what prompted me to do this. And actually four years later when I was going through, when I was looking at the dinner seating and I asked to have a look at the buyers or the people at my table, because, you know, here I was with all the presidents and prime ministers from the Balkans. And I don’t have that much in common with all of them.
And I’m not so versed in all their politics. And when I saw Edi Rama, oh my goodness, I stopped an artist, the penny dropped. And so, of course, you know, I knew immediately that, you know, when I met him, they said to me, you know, I said, “Well, how do I greet him?” And they said, “Well, you say, His Excellency.” And when I saw him, I said to him, “Well, good evening, Prime Minister.” And then I don’t know what got over me, I was quite cheeky. I said, “Hey, Edi.” And he looked up, and I said, “I’ve got your sculpture in my collection.” And I just saw his eyes light up. And it was just an instant almost you have, and we had an instant rapport, and we had a most marvellous evening. And as Carly mentioned, he did speak about the relationship between the Albanians and the Jews. And when he left, he said to me, you know, you know, “Let’s keep in touch.” And he has been in touch with me on a regular basis and we’ve become firm friends. So we are a family on Lockdown University. I’m hoping that we will get Edi to come and speak to us as well, I’m sure he will. There are a lot of people are incredibly amazingly helpful. You’d really saw the heart, the head, the heart, and just the capacity to want to help. So Yotam and Carly, Yotam, you are one of those special angels that was brought to us and has brought to Canada, has dedicated yourself to saving lives. And for that, I salute you. We salute you, my family salute you. And Carly, you’re one of them too. And we really, really feel honoured and blessed to be working with the two of you in order to achieve this incredible mission. So to the two of you, . I want to thank you for sharing your experience with us, and to all of our participants who are with us tonight, thank you for joining us. And it’s just been an incredible journey. And all of those who have been listening to us, I feel that you’ve been part of it too. So-
Thank you so, so much, Wendy, for everything you did on this mission and beyond, and for the whole family. We couldn’t have done it without you.
Oh, well, thank you. I know that my parents are listening, I think, I hope they’re listening in New York. My brother is in LA, and my sister too, she’s in New York. So it’s just wonderful for the whole family to be together. And I just say, send you all my love and say goodnight and thank you very much.
[Yotam] Bravo.
Thanks. Night, night.