Arele Klein, a voulnteer serving with the Israeli relief team in Haiti writes movingly of the past week and the work he and the team have been doing since arriving last Friday. As Shabbat approaches, his words open our hearts, challenge our minds, fill us with hope and intensify the resolve that things will be that much better by the end of next week.

Haiti Journal: Doing disaster relief

By Arele Klein · January 20, 2010
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (JTA) — Arele Klein, a volunteer for the ZAKA disaster relief organization in Israel, shares his experiences and thoughts in the following journal from the earthquake zone in Haiti.
Thursday, Jan. 14, 2010, 10 A.M.: Two days after the quake, the phone call comes in from ZAKA Operations Commander Haim Weingarten: “You’ve been selected as a member of ZAKA’s delegation to the earthquake disaster in Haiti. We’re talking about a very difficult incident on the scale of the tsunami. Volunteers should be physically fit, mentally prepared and with experience. Please give your permission and ask for your wife’s approval.”
As a ZAKA volunteer of long standing, I have no hesitation. I give a positive answer on the spot, on the condition that my wife agrees. I go home, tell my wife about the mission and ask for her approval.
“My head says no, my heart says yes,” she says. With that, I receive her blessing.
12 P.M.
All members of the delegation arrive at the Home Front Command base for briefings, vaccines and medications against all kinds of diseases that might break out in the disaster area. Only then do I begin to understand what I am about to do. Fear of the unknown begins to creep into my thoughts.

You can read about the rest of his week by clicking here.