Jewish Delta pilot Alexander Kahn flew Afghani evacuees from Ramstein Air Base in Germany to Dulles Airport outside Washington D.C. as part of a program that mobilized US commercial airlines for the Afghanistan evacuation program. The experience was a special one for Kahn because as he told CNN New Day, he was able to put himself in the refugees’ position due to his father’s experience of arriving in the US bereft of everything after the Holocaust. It wasn’t only Kahn who empathized with the plight of the refugees. “Our flight attendants on their own initiative went out the night before and purchased a bunch of supplies for the children that we knew were going to be on the flights,” he said. “Because we knew these evacuees were coming with no opportunity to prepare the things that you and I would prepare for an international flight.” “Spending their own money, they purchased diapers and wipes and candies and balloons and coloring books and other things they knew the evacuees would need and refused to take any reimbursement from us, from the pilots.” Kahn then explained how the flight hit close to home for him as he’s the son of a Holocaust survivor who also arrived on American shores without anything to his name. “I’m the son of an immigrant of the United States,” he said. “My father was a Holocaust survivor. He was liberated from Buchenwald by Patton’s Third Army and came to the United States not much different than the people coming to the US now. He was coming with the clothes on his back, no family, no English skills, and had to start life over again, and luckily he was starting life over in the land of opportunity.” “I was able to put myself in their position and realize that they’re starting a new life,” Kahn said. “It’s going to be a frightening experience for them but it has the potential to be an excellent experience for them. My father made it into the United States, learned English, put himself through school, became a doctor, and years later actually was back in West Germany as a physician for the US Army, where I became an army brat at the tail end of the Cold War.” “Helping people is what the American people are all about,” Kahn concluded. (YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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