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Israeli Delegation Supports Emergency Response Efforts in Florida

Jun 30, 2021

rescue simulator — 100117-N-6070S-010 PORT-AU-PRINCE (Jan. 17, 2010) Members of the Los Angeles County Fire Department Search and Rescue Team rescue a Haitian woman from a collapsed building in downtown Port-au-Prince. The woman had been trapped in the building for five days without food or water. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Justin Stumberg/Released)

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Israel has offered its expertise in search and rescue operations to the US authorities coping with the disastrous collapse of a Florida building.

Israel Defense Force members are among the hundreds of emergency workers responding to the collapse of the oceanside condominium in Surfside, Florida.

The expert IDF recovery team from the Israel Homefront Command specializes in engineering and social care among other proficiencies. “The mission of the delegation is to assist in the life-saving efforts by mapping the challenges at the site of the destruction, assisting the Jewish community and supporting the local rescue forces,” the IDF said.

Working to rescue survivors beneath the rubble of a collapsed 12-story structure, the IDF troops join the roughly 370 emergency workers serving amid the largest non-hurricane deployment in state history, according to floridapolitics.com.

The delegation is led by the commander of the National Rescue Unit in the IDF’s Home Front Command, Col. (res.) Golan Vach, and includes a representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Guy Giladi, the former Deputy Consul General in Miami.

Israel has been dispatching humanitarian aid delegations abroad ever since the mid-1980s. Ever since, many delegations have been dispatched to Greece, Turkey, Haiti, Nepal, Argentina and Kenia.