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February 25, 2005/Adar I 16 5765, Volume 57, No. 26
Federation adopts resolution on immigration
DEBORAH SUSSMAN SUSSER
Associate Editor
The Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix has adopted a resolution on comprehensive immigration reform that draws a parallel between the Jewish experience and that of other immigrants to the United States, including undocumented/illegal migrants from Mexico and South and Central America.
Rich Kasper, co-chairman - along with Julie Marcus - of the Jewish Community Relations Council subcommittee that drafted the resolution, called its adoption by the federation the next step in JCRC's continuing work on immigration reform.
"The issue of immigration is one that is facing Arizona perhaps more so than other parts of the country," Kasper said. "And there are people within the JCRC who felt that the JCRC and the federation ought to be empowered to speak out on these issues."
The "JCRC Resolution on Comprehensive Immigration Reform and the Problems of Undocumented Migration to Arizona," which was adopted by the federation Feb. 7, outlines the JCRC/Jewish federation position on immigration. The document points out that the American-Jewish experience is one of migration and that "our American-Jewish values necessitate confronting difficult immigration challenges facing our community with compassion and understanding."
Michelle Steinberg, JCRC director, brought the issue before the organization in 2003, when she was a volunteer board member.
Steinberg said that she felt compelled to do so by her participation in an interfaith trip to Mexico that year, conducted through the American Jewish Committee and the Catholic Diocese of Tucson.
"The trip was a fact-finding mission to Altar," Steinberg said, "which is a point of entry for many migrants who cross the desert."
Steinberg said that although she had traveled in Central and South America, she had "never seen conditions like that before. I'd never seen such desperation. ... These are people who really and truly feel that they have no choice and they're willing to risk anything and everything to help their family."
In particular, Steinberg was struck by a conversation with an 18-year-old named Pedro, whose family in Chiappas had raised enough money to send him to Altar, where he had hired a "coyote" who was about to smuggle him into the United States. Pedro told Steinberg that there was no hope in Chiappas and that he was watching his family starve to death.
"This was August when I was there," Steinberg recalled. "It was miserable. I remember telling Pedro, 'Do you have any idea how dangerous this is?' and he said, in Spanish, 'I go with God.'"
Steinberg said she returned to the United States determined to raise consciousness about the issue of immigration within the local Jewish community.
"These are people who are risking their lives to come to the U.S. and work," Steinberg explained. "My feeling is that we are those people. Our experience as a people parallels the experience that Mexican and Central American migrants are having now."
According to Steinberg, the JCRC resolution is a way for the Jewish community to say that "we have responsibilities within our own community to give people the tools they need to understand the issue."
Kasper explained that the Tucson JCRC had brought a similar resolution before the Jewish Council on Public Affairs, which is the national umbrella organization for local JCRCs, in the spring of 2004.
Kasper said that the resolution adopted by the Phoenix JCRC is similar to that adopted by the JCPA, but the language had been "fine-tuned in order to achieve consensus in this community."
As for the next step, Kasper said that the JCRC would use its position on immigration reform to reach out to other parts of the community that share its concerns, which includes, but is not limited to, the Hispanic community.
"You could read the resolution as applying to the Jewish immigrant community from Russia, or anybody at all," Kasper said. "That's really the point."
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