WHAT DOES MALI HAVE TO DO WITH SUCCOT (it has already passed, BUT will be back next year!)?Natasha

It is interesting that only five days after the most solemn day in the Jewish year, Yom Kippur, we celebrate one of the most joyous. It has a dual significance of being historical and agricultural. Historically it commemorates the forty years in which the children of Israel wandered through the desert. Agriculturally, Succot is a harvest festival sometimes referred to as Chag Ha-Asif, the festival of Ingathering.

When sitting in the succah, we remember these glorious days when we were free and traveling to the land of Israel, and we remember the temporary booths used by the farmers. Along with this joyous occasion of remembrance it is also important not to forget about our neighbours.

Today, all over the world there are people living their lives in shelters that sometimes do not even have the two and a half sides required for a succah. These people are not free but trapped in the entanglement of poverty. Their land may be too eroded or dried up to gather a harvest, and so are unable to sustain themselves agriculturally. This then can bring further repercussions, such as health and sanitation problems. As Jews having survived so much, we must help others to survive through their own circumstances as well. As Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks wrote, “Human life is sacred. It means that in some ultimate sense we are all equal”. Therefore the life that is being lived in vain in other parts of the world should be seen as part of our lives and therefore we have an obligation to act.

Earlier this year, I went to visit a project in Mali, West Africa, Project Muso Ladamunen. Mali is one of the poorest countries in the world, and my visit there was the first time that I had encountered poverty on such a scale. Their impermanent homes have the worry of being washed away everyday during the thunderstorms of the rainy season. Because of this, they live each day in despair. This rain also brings a yearly malaria epidemic. In theory, malaria is as treatable as a broken leg, yet it is still the biggest killer in Mali and in sub-Saharan Africa. It is the people that are living in these impermanent shelters that are most vulnerable to malaria, as they are unable to hang bed-nets, and unable to keep their “homes” sanitary, thus being unable to protect themselves from mosquitoes. Project Muso have a malaria-based program. Through this they are also helping to improve female literacy, sanitation and the general health of the population. The founders of Project Muso are two young American Jews who, through their faith, have an integral necessity to act on social issues while looking at shared values and working a towards common action for the common good.

As my year as a Faiths Act Fellow, a program of the Tony Blair Faith Foundation begins not only have I found that my passion for social justice is pushing me to act on issues that really matter more, but that working as a team and in collaboration with others, is greater than just trying to achieve something on my own. Being based in the Jewish Social Action Hub and hosted by Tzedek, raising awareness about malaria and funds for Project Muso and knowing there are 29 other fellows throughout the world working towards the same cause allows me to be confident that one-day people of the world will no longer be living in impermanent shelters and they will not be dying from malaria.