Dogs saved from West Bank are up for adoption in Detroit
Bueno's fateful journey from the streets of the Middle East to Michigan is part luck and a big dose of dedication by dozens of dog rescuers with SPCA International who were determined to make sure this pup and 69 others get a better life than living in the occupied West Bank.
A senior dog with vision problems, Bueno had it rough. A family was ready to adopt him years earlier when he was a puppy, but his life took a turn and it would be years before he'd have a second shot at the good life.
The rescue of 70 dogs, including Bueno, is the largest international dog rescue the animal welfare group SPCA International has ever brought to the United States, said the group, whose acronym stands for Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Ten of the dogs ended up in Michigan for adoption.
The dogs were suffering fallout from the Israel-Hamas war, raging on the other side of Israel since Oct. 7 when Hamas attacked Israel, killing some 1,200 people. In retaliation, Israel has pummeled the Gaza Strip and at least 33,000 Palestinian people have been killed, according to various news reports.
Animals throughout the region have been left to fend with the deteriorating conditions, said Diana George Babish from Animal and Environment Association-Bethlehem Palestine, the animal shelter in Bethlehem where the 10 dogs who came to Michigan had lived.
A $275,000 rescue effort
"Bethlehem depends on tourism, but due to the war, Bethlehem didn't receive tourists," George Babish wrote in an email response to questions from the Detroit Free Press. "Restaurants weren't also opened, so animals couldn't find good (food) near the trash containers of hotels or restaurants. Animals were under threat of hunger, dehydration, ticks and fleas, diseases and of course humans' abuse."
It was no easy task to get the 70 dogs out of Israel and to the United States. It was delayed three times and it took the tenacity of nearly 100 people and $275,000 from SPCA International donations to get it done, said Lori Kalef, director of programs at SPCA International.
But on March 14, the dogs flew out of Tel Aviv aboard a commercial chartered flight to JFK Airport in New York. From there, the dogs were flown to various U.S. rescues. Bueno and nine others headed to the Detroit Animal Welfare Group — DAWG — in Romeo.
"It was a long, long road for them," Kalef told the Detroit Free Press. "I don’t think any of us exhaled until they came out of that cage and we saw those wagging tales. But we had two choices: We leave them to an uncertain fate, which could be death or released back on the street, or they go through this 35-hour journey, travel 7,500 miles and get a chance to have a better life. We chose the latter.”
Performing 70 miracles
The rescue started in December, when an acquiantance of Kalef's in the Middle East told Kalef that the Daily Hugz Animal Sanctuary in the West Bank needed to evacuate its 60 dogs. The West Bank is east of Israel and home to about 3 million Palestinians, according to Vox. In 1967, Israel seized the area from Jordan and has occupied it since.
Kalef got on the phone with Maad Abu-Ghazalah, the founder of Daily Hugz. He is a Palestinian American and since the war started, he told her that Israel had been denying him entry to the West Bank because he is Palestinian. He couldn’t get to his dogs in the shelter there, and his staff, who were caring for them in his absence, were quitting to evacuate the area, Kalef said.
“He said, 'I need to get these dogs to safety,' because tensions are starting to grow in the West Bank as well," Kalef said. "Something this grand took a lot of coordination. We started that day.”
In two weeks, Kalef found Fly Alliance, a repurposed 747 with all of its seats removed to transport animals and cargo. Not only would it end up flying the dogs, but it took on some horses during a layover in Belgium, Kalef said.
But despite a target date of Feb. 15, the plans kept getting postponed due to various challenges such as getting through the Israeli checkpoints. Finally, in the early morning hours of March 14, the group loaded the dogs, each in a crate, onto Palestinian trucks. Because they were not allowed to cross in Palestinian trucks into Israel, the group had to carry each dog in a crate across the border and put them into trucks with Israeli license plates, Kalef said.
The group also had to have empty cages sent to the airport in advance for clearance. That created a challenge because the group would not have cages for the dogs in transit.
"So we had to find 70 additional cages 48 hours ahead of the flight and then transfer each dog, one by one, into the new cages at the airport," Kalef said. "Maad Abu-Ghazalah said, 'We didn’t just perform a miracle. We performed 70 of them.' "
'We have to get out of the area'
For Romeo resident Kelley LaBonty, rescuing dogs from other countries is nothing new. She is the director of the Detroit Animal Welfare Group in Romeo. LaBonty six years ago rescued several dogs from the meat trade in Thailand, she said.
So when SPCA International reached out to her Jan. 12 for help in evacuating dogs from the West Bank, LaBonty agreed to take 10 animals. That was the amount the rescue, run entirely by volunteers, could care for.
"They sent us some short biographies on each of the dogs, and we could pick," LaBonty told the Free Press.
Besides the dogs coming from the Daily Hugz Animal Sanctuary in the West Bank, the Bethlehem Animal Shelter had 10 dogs needing help. LaBonty said she would take those dogs.
"The other shelter (Daily Hugz) had to close and evacuate to safety," LaBonty said. "He told (SPCA International), 'I have to leave. It’s unsafe here and we have to get out of the area.'"
'He' is Maad Abu-Ghazalah, who said in a statement, "At the time of our greatest despair, it was SPCA International which stepped in to provide hope for the dozens of dogs trapped in an increasingly violent environment. In the face of all the hurdles in our path, our international team, led by SPCAI, showed tenacity to ensure that no dog got left behind. "
SPCA International is still working with the Bethlehem shelter to help it rescue more dogs, but it won’t be an emergency evacuation there anytime soon because it is farther from the conflict zone, Kalef said.
'Tears ... we had been waiting for so long'
On March 17, three days after the dogs landed in New York and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cleared them to enter the country, a Race for Life Rescue animal transport plane with 20 dogs aboard headed to Oakland County International Airport in Waterford.
LaBonty said that she, two volunteers and two airport personnel were waiting for the plane full of dogs. Detroit Animal Welfare Group would take its 10 before the others headed to shelters in Indiana and Ohio, said Janet Austin, one of the group's volunteers who was at the airport.
The plane landed in Oakland County around 2 p.m., sparking an emotional reaction on the ground, LaBonty said.
"Tears. We were all crying. We had been waiting for so long," LaBonty said. "We know it’s quite a task to take in 10 new dogs in a new environment, a new language, a new time zone … they had been traveling since Wednesday and didn’t get to us until Sunday. So they were stressed out and we knew they’d be fearful. We wanted to make it as smooth as possible, so a lot of preparation went into that."
The pilots of Race For Life and SPCA volunteers from the flight helped load the dogs in the shelter's trucks.
"It was just the excitement and knowing the stories of some of these dogs and what they went through to survive," Austin said of her emotional reaction in the moment. "They are beautiful dogs, but they have street scars. They’ve had a bit of a rough life. But it was the excitement of knowing, as they came off the plane: There’s Cody, and there's Falcon and there's Lizzy.”
The dogs' stories
Indeed, each of the dogs has those street scars and a story — often a sad one.
They are all of the Canaan breed, a breed found in the Middle East, LaBonty said. She said they are protective, but not aggressive, and they are smart. They resemble a mix of shepherd/labradors.
"The shelter they came from had no yard, so they could not go out to play and they didn’t have people, because of the war, to walk them," LaBonty said. "So just for them to be able to play in the yard, they just loved, loved, loved it. They don’t know what toys are or bones are … but they are catching on very quickly."
Life is going to be remarkably different for them considering where some of them have been. Take 3-year-old Carl, a thin, tan dog with black and white markings on his face and a shy demeanor. He was rescued after someone had him tied on a chain that was so tight, it left permanent marks around his neck, Austin said.
Cody, who is about 6, is a statuesque cream and tan beauty, who endured cruelty as a puppy. He was rescued from a refugee camp where people thought that if they cut off his ears, he would become more aggressive. It backfired: Cody is a gentle giant, with short nubs as ears now.
Two-year-old Falcon has some black-and-tan in him with the coat of a German shepherd. He'll look you directly in the eye with gentle kindness. He was rescued in Bethlehem in 2019 as a young pup. He was found with a broken leg, rummaging for food in the garbage.
Karim was found four years ago at 6 months old in Hebron, a Palestinian city in the southern West Bank. He was sick and maggots filled his ears. His resilience has carried him through as he patiently waits for a forever home. Austin said he is a bit timid, but his gentle nature and friendliness shine through.
Five-year-old Jimmy is a handsome cream-colored dog who was rescued as a 2-month-old puppy in an area where dogs were being poisoned. At 77 pounds, people shied away from adopting him, but Austin said that despite being big, he's calm and enjoys hugs. He is friendly with people and other dogs.
Carlos, born in March 2018, survived severe abuse alongside his siblings as puppies. Despite his past, Carlos has grown into a big-hearted boy with a friendly and gentle demeanor, Austin said. He finds solace in walks.
A happy ending for Bueno
Then there is Bueno. He was 2 years old in 2020 when he and two other puppies roamed the streets of Bethlehem and got picked up and taken to Bethlehem Animal Shelter. The shelter found a nice family for Bueno, but the night before he was to be adopted, thieves broke into the shelter and stole three dogs, including Bueno. He disappeared for the next three years.
Last year, Bueno was found on the street and his microchip came back to the Bethlehem shelter. He had been partially blinded in one eye during those years. For the shelter, it was imperative that Bueno, now a senior dog with vision problems, be given a good life, Austin said.
He is getting it. On March 30, a local ophthalmologist and his wife "fell in love with the Bueno's story" and with him.
"He and his wife met Bueno and thought he was amazing," Austin said. "They were impressed with his demeanor and personality and said, 'We want him.' "
Bueno was adopted and Lizzy, a 9-month old female from Bethlehem, is being fostered to adopt. The other eight are available for adoption, along with about two dozen other rescue dogs at Detroit Animal Welfare Group. The adoption fee is $175. Austin said shelter workers meet potential adopters for approval.
"We’re picky about where these dogs end up, because these dogs deserve a better life and we want to be sure they are set up for success," Austin said.
The SPCA International is still collecting donations to pay off the cost of the rescue, if you are interested in making a donation you can do so at www.spcai.org/west-bank.
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Contact Jamie L. LaReau: jlareau@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @jlareauan. Read more on General Motors and sign up for our autos newsletter. Become a subscriber.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Dogs rescued from the West Bank are in Detroit and up for adoption
