22 August 15 • 2019
jn

Persistence Pays Off

Southfi
 eld teen helps save an elderly Israeli man’
s life. 

P

erhaps Jaden Jubas, 16, of 
Southfield should skip studying 
for his college entrance exams 
and just apply to medical school. 
On July 16, while attending a camp-
ing program in Israel sponsored by 
NCSY Hatzalah Rescue, he and another 
camper, with the guidance of the ambu-
lance team they were shadowing, saved 
the life of an 80-year-old patient. 
The man was initially unresponsive 
to CPR by United Hatzalah ambucycle 
responders after trying to revive and 
stabilize him for nearly an hour. 
On that fateful afternoon, the teens’
 
ambulance was dispatched to a call for 
a semi-responsive patient. While the 
ambulance was on its way, the call was 
upgraded to a “
CPR in progress.
” 
Upon arrival, Jaden’
s team walked 
up a flight of narrow stairs to find that 
two additional EMT teams from United 
Hatzalah and Magen David Adom had 
been working to try to revive the elder-
ly man on the bedroom floor of his tiny 
apartment. The bedroom and apart-
ment overflowed with about 20 tearful 
relatives resigned to the fact their loved 
one had died. 
But Jubas and fellow camper Ben-
jamin Mendelson, 17, of Memphis, 
Tenn., were determined and pleaded 
with their EMT supervisors to keep 
trying. First, Benjamin performed 
compressions and was able to revive 
the man’
s pulse, but the patient once 
again flatlined. Amid the tears of rela-
tives, Jubas insisted he would try again. 
After 90 seconds of performing CPR, 
the patient regained a steadier pulse 
and breathed once again. Jubas said 
everyone in the tiny apartment was 
overjoyed and the boys received shouts 
of “Kol HaKavod” praising them for 
saving the man’
s life. 
In addition to administering CPR, 
Jaden and Benjamin also helped the 
EMT team with running an intrave-
nous line, assisted with oxygen tanks 
and helped transport the patient, 
hooked to many wires and life-saving 
machines, down the narrow flight of 
stairs to the ambulance. 
Jaden said he and Benjamin kept 

their cool thanks to expert guidance 
from their supervisors who guided 
them through the grueling work of 
manually applying compressions to 
the patient’
s heart. Jubas said he hopes 
to continue his training to become an 
EMT by the time he reaches 18. 
The high schoolers were awarded 
medals celebrating their first “
saves” 
as Emergency Medical Responders 
(EMR). On the medal is a quote from 
the Talmud: “He who saves a life it is as 
if they saved a whole world.
” 
The volunteer work was part of 
Jubas’
 summer program with a United 
Hatzalah ambulance crew in Bat Yam, 
a city on Israel’
s central coast. NCSY 
Hatzalah Rescue is a month-long 
program run in partnership with the 
Orthodox Union’
s NCSY Summer and 
United Hatzalah, a volunteer-based 
emergency medical services organiza-
tion in Israel. The program includes 
training teens as EMRs and volunteer-
ing with ambulance crews in Israel.
“
Our summer program is new 
and to have Jaden be one of the first 
to save a life” is just incredible, said 
Cari Immerman, regional director for 
Friends of United Hatzalah of Israel.
“
God used Jaden as messenger to 
help save a man’
s life,
” said Jubas’
 moth-
er, Yehudit. “I am incredibly proud of 
Jaden’
s maturity and determination.
”
On other runs as an EMR in Israel, 

he helped treat people with minor 
lacerations or those “
not feeling well” 
in the hot Israeli sun. Whenever the 
ambulance arrived, Jubas noticed how 
grateful people were to see him and the 
EMT team he was shadowing. 
“We treated a police officer with a 
large cut on his leg and some others 
who were not feeling well,
” Jubas said. 
“Just seeing our ambulance show up 
is enough sometimes to calm people 
down and give them comfort.
”
Jubas, who is just beginning the col-
lege application process as a rising high 
school junior at Farber Hebrew Day 
School in Southfield, has always been 
interested in the medical field. He said 
this experience has given him encour-
agement and a confidence boost. 
 “I was grateful for the opportunity 
to save the life of a person,
” said Jubas, 
who returned home Aug. 2 and plans 
to hang out with friends and gearing 
up for school. “I was determined not 
to give up even though the EMTs were 
ready to call the man’
s death. I was 
taught in my EMR training that the 
success rate for fully reviving a patient 
through CPR is only at 10 percent. 
“Thanks to this program, I know 
what I am capable of accomplishing. 
I hope my actions will inspire others 
to be brave and do good in the world. 
One person can truly make a difference 
in someone’
s life.
” ■

jews d
in 
the

STACY GITTLEMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Jaden Jubas of Southfield, left, and 

Benjamin Mendelson of Memphis 

helped save a man’
s life.

COURTESY JADEN JUBAS

Detroit Jews for Justice 
Hosts Inaugural Wolfgang 
Awards

On Thursday, Sept. 19, from 6-9 
p.m., Detroit Jews for Justice will 
host its first ever fundraising 
gala, the Myra Wolfgang Awards. 
Named for a pioneering Jewish 
labor organizer, the awards are 
being established to honor those 
who have shown principled tenacity 
in pursuit of justice. 
The event will feature a dinner 
catered by Guerilla Food Detroit, 
a silent auction featuring dozens 
of local small businesses and 
organizations, remarks by honorees 
and more. This year’
s honorees are 
Selma Goode and Sylvia Orduño. 
Goode has organized students, 
mothers, grocery workers and 
fellow Democratic Socialists. 
Orduño has deep roots as an anti-
poverty advocate and organizer for 
water, housing and environmental 
justice. 
The awards event will also 
celebrate the legacy of Myra 
Wolfgang. The Jewish Historical 
Society of Michigan (JHSM) 
describes Wolfgang as one of 
the nation’
s first woman union 
organizers. A child of Eastern 
European immigrants, Wolfgang 
was training at art school during 
the Great Depression when she had 
to turn to labor organizing out of 
necessity. 
Wolfgang played critical roles in 
the Woolworth’
s strike, in several 
organizing drives throughout 
Detroit’
s service industries 
and eventually Michigan’
s first 
minimum wage law. 
Throughout her career in 
the labor movement, Wolfgang 
held positions such as secretary 
of the Detroit Local 705 of the 
Waiters and Waitresses Union and 
international vice president of the 
Hotel Employees and Restaurant 
Employees Union. 
Tickets are now available at 
detroitjewsforjustice.org/wolfgang.

