Hopes dim as fire hinders Miami rescue
IDF sent to help as over 150 still missing • Shai flies out to aid community
The search for more than 150 missing residents of a Florida building that collapsed early Thursday morning grew increasingly desperate on Saturday, as a smoldering fire hampered rescue efforts and officials said they have not located any signs of life in the mountain of debris.
Despite around-the-clock work at the site in Surfside, a shore town near Miami with a large Jewish population, search-andrescue teams had not found any additional survivors as of press time, Miami-Dade Mayor Danielle Levine Cava told a briefing. The official death toll remained at four, though that number is certain to rise.
Officials said they still harbored hope that some of the 159 people still unaccounted for might be found alive but acknowledged that a fire somewhere beneath the rubble was slowing rescue teams, filling the area with smoke and frustrating firefighters’ efforts to locate the source.
An emergency delegation from the IDF’s Home Front Command will be sent to Miami to help the rescue effort, Defense Minister Benny Gantz said on Saturday night.
In coordination with the governor’s office in Florida and the Foreign Ministry, Gantz decided to send a team of engineering and rescue specialists.
“We will make every effort to help save human lives, and to offer our support to the Jewish community and to our American friends,” Gantz said.
Diaspora Minister Nachman Shai departed on Saturday night to the disaster area in Florida, where he will meet with Levine Cava and local Jewish community leaders in the coming days. Upon his return to Israel, Shai will present Prime Minister Naftali Bennett plans for assistance to the Jewish community. Ahead of his trip, he said that he intends to explore various ways of assisting the Jewish community in Miami.
“We will do whatever we can to help the Americans in any way they deem fit,” Shai told The Jerusalem Post en route to Miami. “America can learn from Israeli experience. Unfortunately, we have too much experience with disasters.”
Shai said his visit would send a powerful message about the relationship between Israel and American Jewry being a twoway street. He said this was very important to the prime minister.
Israel will send aid to Miami, Bennett promised on Friday
afternoon. In a tweet, he wrote that “we are following with concern the difficult images that are coming out from Florida. Our Foreign Ministry representatives in Miami and Israel are doing everything possible to assist and address the situation.
“The entire nation of Israel prays for the safety of those injured and missing in the disaster,” Bennett wrote. “From here we send support to our brethren in the Jewish community in particular, and to all Florida residents in general, and express our sorrow during this tragic event.”
Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said that at such difficult times, Israel must stand with its friends in America and the Jewish people in Florida in particular. He said it was a badge of pride that Israel could be effective in providing assistance.
United Hatzalah in cooperation with El Al will also be sending a team from its Psychotrauma and Crisis Response Unit (PCRU) to assist victims of the condo collapse in Surfside, Florida.
The team will work to provide psychological support and emotional stabilization to those affected by the collapse, including families and neighbors of those who were killed, injured, missing or in any other way involved in the tragedy. United Hatzalah volunteers will also make themselves available to the wider community.
“As soon as the collapse occurred, we began making preparations for the mission to depart,” said United Hatzalah president and founder Eli Beer. “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.”
The mission will be led by Vice President of Operations for United Hatzalah Dov Maisal, who has led disaster response missions to Nepal, Haiti and Japan as a paramedic. He will partner directly with Clinical Operations Director of the PCRU Einat Kaufman, who is a cognitive psychologist and a trained EMT.
Major American Jewish Organizations officials chairwoman Dianne Lob, CEO William Daroff and vice chairman Malcolm Hoenlein issued a statement saying they were devastated by the disaster and grateful for the ongoing leadership and support shown by the local and broader Jewish community for those impacted by the tragedy.
“As we continue to monitor this developing situation, the American Jewish community prays for the recovery of the victims, and extends condolences to those who lost loved ones,” they said.
At the site of the tragedy on Saturday, rescuers held out hope that air pockets that may have formed in the debris might be keeping possible survivors alive.
“The biggest thing now is hope,” Fire Chief Alan Cominsky said. “That’s what’s driving us. It’s an extremely difficult situation.”
While local officials provided aid and comfort to the families, such as hotel rooms and food, search-and-rescue specialists worked the disaster site on a rotation, with a limited number allowed at any one time to prevent further collapse.
The building had more than 130 units, about 80 of which were occupied, officials said. Roughly half appear to have col
block with arguably the highest concentration of kosher restaurants – low-end and high-end – in the entire country. Most of the pedestrians are visibly Orthodox.
The spiritual bulwark of the community is The Shul of Bal Harbour, a Chabad-affiliated synagogue, located a few blocks from Champlain Towers (as well as from the home of Ivanka and Jared Kushner) on Collins Avenue, the seaside artery running through Miami-Dade County.
Just last month, perhaps as an eerie foreshadowing of tragedy to come, Gov. Ron DeSantis solidified his status among Florida Jews as a great friend of the Jewish people and of Israel when he addressed The Shul and signed a bill allowing volunteer emergency rescue services, including the Jewish-run Hatzalah, to operate as an ambulance service and thus receive certain benefits.
Hatzalah has worked alongside local authorities in the search and recovery efforts, with the organization sending a delegation of therapists, psychologists and first-responders from its Psycho-trauma and Crisis Response Unit to assist. DeSantis has declared a state of emergency for the county to enable federal assistance.