A story of kindness cuts through grief

‘FROM HEARTACHE TO WHOLENESS’ – the headline on the front page of Sunday Age (5/4) announced over an eye-catching photo of four people hugging in pairs. There was a black woman wearing a hijab and a younger black man, each embracing a white woman. Joy was radiating from all four faces.

The photo and words caught my attention at a period in my own life in which I’m suffering personal heartache, navigating a journey towards, I hope, wholeness.  It was uplifting to be greeted by such a jubilant photo on a Sunday morning, rather than the usual harrowing scenes that have been consuming our media. Perhaps too, it’s when we’re suffering our own personal losses and heartaches that the need for such sanguine stories is greater.

On reading the accompanying explanation of how Naima, a Somalian refugee, together with her son, Feisal, had “found refuge in Australia, thanks to a group of six Jewish friends”,  I couldn’t turn to page four quickly enough, to read the whole story. ‘ “We are family”: Jewish friends give Muslim refugees hope’ – were the words emblazoned in large print that greeted me when I turned the pages.

I’d hesitated when earlier I’d sat before a blank screen on my computer.  The whiteness stared back at me, as though waiting patiently – as if it understood my need to write this, my first story for the AJN since my beloved twin had died in December, but at the same time appreciating that I was not yet ready to write about Jennifer, or how overwhelming the profundity of her death feels to me. That’s for another day.

Before reading the entire story of Naima and Feisal and the group of Jewish friends, I suspected this would be a tale of savagery, war and devastation, contrasted against kindness, friendship and hope.

In these calamitous times for our planet, the world, humanity and all sentient beings, we are craving positive news – as Jews today the world over, we are witnessing a pernicious increase in antisemitic beliefs and atrocities.  We are desperately in need of stories that will give us hope, so we might dare to believe it will be different.

The story behind this joyous photograph in Sunday Age tells of the unimaginable struggles, violence and suffering endured by widowed Naima, alone with her beloved son as they fled their native Somalia, to endure years in refugee camps in Kenya.

A brainwave of six Jewish friends: Karen, Nicole, Dave, Danielle, Lyn and Jennifer resulted in the formation of a Jewish friendship group, Hope for Eden, through which they set out to support and resettle their chosen family through the federal government’s initiative, Community Refugee Integration and Settlement Pilot (CRISP).  Nicole Schlesinger explains, “The main fundraising we did was through our Jewish networks, our friends and family.”  She goes on to say how the experience has restored her faith in humanity.  “It’s been a great antidote to all the animosity that you can’t control.  This is stuff you can control.”

For Naima and Feisal, their closeness to these Jews, from a strikingly different background to themselves – Muslims who had escaped the horror of their past – was illustrated in their shared religious celebrations – Rosh Hashanah, Hanukkah, Ramadan, it was natural – “It’s like one big family.”

Previously, I’ve written of similar poignant bonds in my reporting on organ transplantation in the Middle East between Jews and Arabs.  (AJN 23/7/21)   Raw and deep humanity shines through in such situations and overrides any differences which may have otherwise been perceived as obstacles.

I, like many Jewish readers of Sunday Age I imagine, was overjoyed to read such a story, both for the good fortune that came the way of this refugee family after years of struggle and terror, which included Naima’s hand being chopped off by Islamist extremists for the crime of seeking out English lessons – and even more so for the fact that this kind and caring group of friends who were motivated to devote their time and energy to such a cause, were in fact Jewish.  How we need such stories in our current climate!

An encounter on a recent trip to Beechworth lifted my spirits in the same manner.  As my partner and I explored the Beechworth Cemetery looking for the Jewish graves as indicated on the map, we met a man walking his two glorious dogs.  On my request for directions to the Jewish section, he said he’d never seen it, and knew he would have remembered if he had.  His response prompted me to ask if he was in fact Jewish, although I didn’t think so.  On confirming he wasn’t, he asked the same of me.  When I acknowledged I was Jewish, he responded after hesitating briefly, wanting to apologise on behalf of our country, expressing his dismay and embarrassment that “it had come to this in Australia.”  The empathy and support expressed by this stranger with his dogs on this icy day in a country cemetery moved me enormously, just as the Sunday Agearticle had done.

Janine Joseph is a Melbourne-based writer.