This week I attended part 2 of a Live & Learn class at Meer Apartments. It was taught by Rachel Yoskowitz, 2025 Eight Over 80 Honoree, a longtime refugee advocate and former Director of Resettlement at JFS. Guest speakers Stacy Bahri, Community Initiatives Coordinator at Chaldean Community Foundation and Rasha S shared powerful stories of rebuilding their lives in the United States. Their lived experiences remind us that global displacement is also local as refugees acculturate to our communities, become our neighbors and friends.
Our humanitarian leadership reflected both our values and our history. “For centuries, the American story has always been intertwined with the story of the refugee,” notes the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration.
Between 1933-1945, when Jews fled Germany and Nazi-occupied Europe, the U.S. accepted a mere 200,000 Jewish refugees, a small fraction of those who sought escape. These refugees rebuilt their lives in America, contributed to the economy and enriched the fabric of their communities.
Following the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, about 38,000 Hungarians were resettled in the United States under emergency programs. When Fidel Castro seized power in 1959, approximately 250,000 Cubans fled communist rule. By 1980, more than 600,000 Cuban refugees had made new homes in America, reshaping Florida’s culture and economy.
The Refugee Act of 1980 established the framework that guided refugee admissions for decades providing safe haven for those fleeing persecution. Vietnamese, Laotians, Cambodians, Afghans and Ukrainians have all found sanctuary in our communities. More than 3 million refugees have been welcomed to the USA through the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP), operated jointly with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Today, that program has been gutted and it is proposed that only 7,500 Afrikaner South Africans be admitted this year.
Recent arrivals reflect ongoing global crises in Congo, Syria, Afghanistan, Myanmar, Iraq, and Ukraine. Many Iraqi and Kurdish families joined the dynamic Chaldean community in Michigan, enriching to our state’s landscape.
Rasha S told of her husband’s kidnapping by armed ISIS radicals in Iraq. When he was released, the family left everything and fled to Syria. In 2012, they came to the USA for “peace and education”. Rasha, a Kurdish engineer, resettled in Farmington Hills with her husband and two children. Smiling, she said “Here, I can work again, not in my chosen field, but I can work, and my children can go to school without fear.”
A 2023 report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services found that over 15 years, refugees contributed $123 billion more in taxes than they received in public benefits. Across the country, they have opened businesses, joined the workforce, and served in the military, quietly enriching the nation that gave them safety.
Faith-based and nonprofit groups such as HIAS, The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society and world’s oldest refugee agency founded by Jewish immigrants originally helped Jews fleeing persecution. Today, it applies to refugees of all faiths and backgrounds, operating globally on five continents to provide legal aid, resettlement services, and humanitarian relief. Additionally, Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, and Church World Service continue to lead resettlement efforts. “Welcoming the persecuted is not charity, it’s a renewal of our founding ideals,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, an American lawyer who serves as President and CEO of Global Refuge.
From our ancestors fleeing persecution in the 19th and 20th centuries to Ukrainian mothers rebuilding their lives today, refugees have found shelter, dignity and the chance to begin again in the USA.
Global displacement has reached historic levels. More than 123 million people are displaced. Our nation’s long tradition of welcome stood as a moral duty and a living reflection of who we were: a country built not just by those who arrived in safety, but by those who helped make that safety possible.
Look at us now.
Shabbat Shalom
