Expanding Safe Havens For Women And Gays (TheJewishWeek)
Group founded by a former HIAS official focuses on refugee status for persecuted women and gays.
Neil Grungras began realizing the world had a problem while working as an immigration lawyer in Israel and coming into contact with Palestinian gays, some of his first clients.
The Palestinians had come to Israel from the West Bank and Gaza, where they faced persecution and even death, Grungras recalled, but Israeli authorities refused their request for asylum, sending them back across the border.
“The coin dropped, and I realized there was this huge issue in the world,” said Grungras, founder and executive director of the Organization for Refuge, Asylum & Migration, a small, nonprofit group based in San Francisco. ORAM is the only worldwide organization focused exclusively on helping women and gays flee persecution because of who they are, said Grungras, 52, a native of Sheepshead Bay who lives in California.
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Complete article at The Jewish Week : http://bit.ly/lCfrGe
