From Jewish Exiles to Sexual Exiles
By Michael Kaminer
A former executive of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society is about to shake up the world of refugee aid. Longtime refugee advocate, Neil Grungras, founded the Organization for Refuge, Asylum, & Migration last January and it is on the verge of launching a historic global survey about prevailing attitudes toward lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender migrants. Starting in January 2010, ORAM will query more than 100 NGOs worldwide about their protocols for helping gay and transgender individuals - “the most persecuted group on the planet,” according to Grungras. The new agency bills itself as “the first international Non-Governmental Organization focusing on refugees fleeing sexual and gender-based violence.” The survey has roots in a June report by ORAM and the human rights group Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly-Turkey about mistreatment of gay refugees in that country. Singling out the United Nations Commission on Human Rights - as well as the Turkish government - for pervasive prejudice, the report concluded that the system was punishing people it was supposed to protect. “We’ve found that workers on the ground reflected the homophobia of the society they live in,” said Grungras, 50, who had most recently served as director for the Middle East and Europe for HIAS. “We want people to understand that even if you don’t approve of homosexuality, or believe transgendered people shouldn’t exist, you should not allow that belief system to result in someone else’s persecution.”