As Israel and Jews around the world mark Yom Hashoah, many of the more than 220,000 Holocaust survivors are living in financial distress, with an estimated 40% of those worldwide and more than a quarter of those in Israel living below the poverty line, subsisting on meager pensions, occasional survivor benefits and welfare support.

For those living in Israel, barring outside intervention, these conditions are not expected to improve significantly as the government’s recently passed budget does not allocate additional funds to Holocaust survivors or elderly Israelis in general, and is expected to cause welfare benefits to stagnate or diminish in the coming years.

With Israel’s National Insurance data showing that the economic reality reveals that Holocaust survivors in Israel face greater economic hardship compared to other elderly individuals in the same age group, the government should make supporting them a priority, Taub Center’s CEO Nir Kaidar told eJewishPhilanthropy this week.

?Most Holocaust survivors in Israel are lonely people who are in a nursing home situation. The State of Israel must ensure that Holocaust survivors are able to live with dignity in Israel and must continue to work to improve the situation of Holocaust survivors,” said Kaidar.

One survey by the Israeli poverty nonprofit Latet, which has a dedicated program for Holocaust survivors, found that 1 in 4 survivors in Israel are living in poverty and 72% require full-time nursing care or other types of daily support. A similar study cited during a hearing last month of the Special Committee for the Treatment of Holocaust Survivors found that 30,000 Holocaust survivors in Israel — out of just under 120,000 — live near the poverty line, relying on annual grants instead of monthly allowances. Israel’s Welfare Ministry has also provided assistance in one form or another to more than 42,000 Holocaust survivors in the past year, it said this week. 

“This is the seventh budget that the current government has passed without allocating a single extra shekel for the survivors and the elderly,” said Merav Cohen, the chair of the special committee, a member of the opposition’s Yesh Atid party. “The response must be quick and effective, providing a response to poor Holocaust survivors is an existential and urgent need.”

Other proposed support measures included accessible services for Russian-speaking survivors, subsidized medical transportation, funding for heating, hot meals and day centers that support elderly well-being.

The committee also questioned why as survivors die, the funds allocated for them in the budget are being returned to state coffers for other uses instead of being redirected to support remaining survivors. A Ministry of Finance representative at the meeting said the government chooses to use the funds for other determined budgetary priorities.

Latet, which runs the Aid for Life Program that provides assistance to 1,600 Holocaust survivors who live in poverty in Israel, conducted a study of its clients earlier this year that found that most — 75% —  said they could not cover their essential needs without this support. The survey found that 74.4% of the survivors they support live alone and that their main financial expenses are housing (39.5%), food (26.9%), health (13.4%), utility bills (11.3%) and transportation (8.8%). 

“For us, the essence of remembrance is to do what is humane, moral, and fundamental — to ensure that those who survived the Holocaust and fought for their existence do not have to live in deprivation once again, eighty years later, in Israel 2025,” said Latet CEO Eran Weintraub in a press statement. “Civilian support is important but partial; only a government policy focused on poverty reduction can truly close the gaps and fulfill the basic right to live with dignity.” 

Greg Schneider, executive vice president of the Claims Conference, told eJP that of the more than 200,000 survivors alive right now, 40% are living in poverty, constituting roughly 90,000 Holocaust survivors worldwide. Many of these are Holocaust survivors from the former Soviet Union, having both endured the Holocaust and then lived under the communist regime, which prevented them from accumulating significant wealth throughout the rest of their lives, leaving them with few savings to rely on as they grow older.

“Understanding these data is critical – where Holocaust survivors live, their individual testimonies of survival, poverty rates – this allows us to clearly map the amount of funding and types of benefits that are most needed. Our population projection indicates that 50% of Holocaust survivors alive today will have passed away within the next six years,” he said. “This means our most important work to provide dignity and a measure of justice to our final heroes from the Holocaust must be done in these coming few years. This is a call to action for all of us who care about Shoah survivors and preserving the memory of what they endured.”

As the population of Holocaust survivors age, their needs have also naturally increased, said Michael Geller, a spokesperson for the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, noting that as a service provider the JDC has been on the ground caring for Holocaust survivors through their Hesed community welfare centers, which serve the Jewish community in former Soviet Union states. The JDC also provides assistance to survivors in other European countries and Israel, he added.

“The Claims Conference has been incredibly adept, and the German government has been incredibly generous in making sure those needs are met. We’re talking about folks who require, in some cases, 24-hour home care. We’re talking about folks who need advanced medications and medical support,” he said.

JDC together with the Claims Conference, cares directly for 20,652 survivors across 11 countries in the former Soviet Union, according to data provided by the JDC. This operation includes 62 Hesed social service centers providing food, medicine, medical care, home care, winter relief, social, cultural and educational activities in thousands of locations to tens of thousands of poor Jewish elderly, including survivors, and other poor and disadvantaged Jews, Geller said. 

“Holocaust survivors in the former Soviet Union live in poverty, but because of the help they get through the Claims Conference and JDC, they’re in a much better [condition than they would be otherwise]. Their help levels are much higher, but they are poor Jews. Jewish elderly in the former Soviet Union can live on pensions as low as $3 or $4 a day,” he said.

In addition, he noted, across Ukraine, Holocaust survivors have had to deal with the trauma of the current war for the past three years and the memories that are brought up by the conflict.

“One client of ours as an example, spent the duration of World War II in Odessa in the basement of the building she currently lives in. At the outbreak of the war [with Russia] and since she has had to spend time in that basement again so there is a great deal of trauma that does exist among survivors and we make sure that they get the care that they need,” Geller said.

According to Israel’s Welfare Ministry, some 2,500 Holocaust survivors were directly affected by the Oct. 7 terror attacks. Some 2,000 of them were forced to flee their homes because of them and the resulting war, and 128 of them are still displaced. 

“The crisis that emerged after Oct. 7, having to be evacuated again, having to live under rocket fire, or, God forbid, being in some of those communities in the Gaza envelope where they saw people killed, that triggers trauma in them,” Geller said.

“The Jewish world has a lot of challenges right now. Our hearts are in many places, particularly in Israel with the war and with the hostages and their families and others. There is also no question that our hearts are large enough for numerous issues,” Geller said. “[Holocaust survivors] continually remind us that you can survive this, you can build vibrant lives after such challenges. I think that that’s incredibly important right now.”