Issue link: http://viewer.e-digitaledition.com/i/671794
10 April 28 • 2016 Barbara Lewis | Contributing Writer A lla Shapiro remembers the day she arrived in Detroit in June of 1991. She and her family — husband, Eugene, daughter, Zoya, her sister and her husband and their two daughters, plus her parents and her grandmothers — had all left the small town of Tiraspol in Moldova as part of Operation Exodus, the emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union to Israel and the United States. "The Soviet Union was breaking up; there was a lot of fighting," said Shapiro of Oak Park. "Jewish Family Service (JFS) had some- one to meet us as the airport. They had three apartments for our families that were com- pletely furnished. We opened the refrigerator and it was full of groceries." Over the next few days, their case- worker took them to the Secretary of State's office, the Social Security office and the Department of Human Services, and also arranged for everyone to have physicals at Sinai Hospital. "We had no idea how to manage a bank account or what credit cards were because everything in the Soviet Union was done in cash," she said. "We would have been com- pletely lost without our social worker." Now Shapiro is herself a social worker at JFS, working mainly with Russian-speaking Holocaust survivors. "It's a remarkable privi- lege," she said. On May 17 at Congregation Shaarey Zedek, Shapiro will join her JFS colleagues and supporters at the agency's annual meet- ing, headlined "Mission Possible" to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Operation Exodus, as the release and resettlement of Soviet Jews came to be known. Natan Sharansky, chair of the executive of the Jewish Agency in Israel, who became famous as a "refusenik" jailed in Russia because of his efforts on behalf of Soviet Jews, will be the guest speaker. Speaking from his office in Jerusalem, Sharansky said he's looking forward to his visit because the Detroit Jewish community provided such strong support for Soviet Jews. The Jewish Agency continues to rescue Jews from endangered Jewish communities. Last year, the largest numbers came from France, Ukraine and Russia. The Jewish Agency also supports youth villages in Israel, programs that bring young people to Israel for a year of study and shlichim, Israelis who serve as emissaries to Jewish communities in the diaspora. In early April, the Jewish Agency coordi- nated the rescue of 19 Jews from Yemen and declared an end to its programs there. About 50 Jews, who have indicated no desire to move, remain in Yemen. OPERATION EXODUS Operation Exodus brought more than 1.2 million Jews out of the former Soviet Union between 1990 and 1994. More than 1 mil- lion went to Israel. About 200,000 came to the United States and Canada, with 7,000 resettling in Detroit. The JFS expects a good number of those resettled here to attend the annual meeting. Joel Tauber, a local business and philan- thropic leader who is chairing the JFS event, says Operation Exodus is a remarkable story. "1.2 million is just a number, but think of it as moving twice the entire population of Detroit in just a few years," he said. In 1989, Tauber trav- eled to the U.S.S.R. with the late David Hermelin and Marvin Lender of New Haven, Conn., national chair of the United Jewish Appeal's Operation Exodus cam- paign, to try to get some idea of the number of Jews who would leave if they could. Because many Soviet Jews hid their Jewish identities, they underestimated, reporting that about 750,000 people would emigrate. "When they were finally able to leave, we found an awful lot of Jews," he said. Tauber feels the 25th anniversary may be the last opportunity for those who expe- metro » o n t h e c o v e r Mission Possible! Mission Possible! JFS to bring Sharansky to mark the 25th anniversary of Operation Exodus. continued on page 12 Soviet Jewish immigrants settled in Detroit anxiously await the arrival of other family members at the airport. Soviet Jewish families who settled in Detroit were welcomed into furnished apartments provided by local Jewish agencies and donors. The Family to Family programs matched Soviet families with local Jewish families to make the transition easier. Joel Tauber