The Foreign Ministry and IDF's Home Front Command announced Friday that they have sent relief missions to Miami, following the Surfside condo tragedy. United Hatzalah, Israel's largest all-volunteer EMS organization also sent a mission comprising healthcare professionals to the area.
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El Al, Israel's national air carrier, said it would be sponsoring the airfare for the delegations.
The death toll in last week's partial collapse of a 12-story oceanfront residential building in the community of Surfside, Florida, rose to five on Saturday evening, local officials said. As search efforts continued for the third day, 156 people remain missing and 130 people have yet to be accounted for.
US President Joe Biden declared an emergency situation in Florida following the disaster and ordered Federal assistance to supplement state and local response efforts.
A Foreign Ministry statement said that the Israeli delegation is headed by the Home Front Command's National Rescue Unit chief, Col. (res.) Golan Vach, and will include a Foreign Ministry representative – Guy Giladi, the former Deputy Consul General in Miami. In addition, the delegation comprises 10 Home Front Command reservists, all of whom are top experts in engineering and social care efforts.
The delegation's mission is to assist in the life-saving efforts by mapping out the destruction site, assisting the Jewish community in identifying victims and survivors and supporting the local rescue forces generally. Preparations for the delegation were led by the GOC Home Front Command Brig. Gen. Itzik Bar.
The delegation will be received by the staff of the Israeli Consulate General in Miami and the Consul General, Maor Elbaz-Starinsky, who have maintained a regular presence at the site since the tragic collapse and have provided assistance with clothing, medicine, food, emergency lighting, and more.
Consulate staff will liaise with the Miami District Emergency Services and the State of Florida.
Also on Friday, United Hatzalah, Israel's largest all-volunteer EMS organization, announced it was sending a team from its Psychotrauma and Crisis Response Unit to provide psychological support to the families and neighbors of those injured, killed, or affected by the Surfside tragedy.
A statement by the organization said that the team is composed of top PCRU members, and is led by Dov Maisel, the VP Operations for United Hatzalah, and a paramedic, who has led disaster response missions to Nepal, Haiti, and Japan.
Maisel will partner with Einat Kaufman, who serves as the clinical operations director of the PCRU. Kauffman, in addition to being a trained EMT, is one of the top Cognitive Psychotherapists in Israel, and an expert in trauma, grief, and bereavement especially when concerned with mass casualty incidents. She as well as other members of the unit have taken part in several missions as psychological first aid responders, including the missions from United Hatzalah following Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and the Tree Of Life mass shooting that took place in Pittsburgh.
President and Founder of United Hatzalah Eli Beer thanked El Al for their assistance in getting the mission off the ground.
"As soon as the collapse occurred, we began making preparations for the mission to depart. When we contacted El Al about the possibility of having this mission, they were eager to help and decided to fully sponsor the flights for the team. This will be the fourth emergency relief mission conducted by our Psychotrauma and Crisis Response Unit in the United States in as many years.
"El AL is an incredible partner and we are forever grateful for their support of this mission which is to help the community in Surfside that is suffering terribly right now. I myself was the benefactor of the kindness of the entire South Florida community during my fight with Covid-19 last year and if I were able to go myself on this mission I would. I am sending my best people on this mission in order to provide as much help as we can. We stand with you and we are sending you the best of the best to help. They will be there as soon as regulations permit us to arrive," he said.
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