“Whoever saves a single life, it is as if he has saved an entire world.”
(Sanhedrin 37a)
Jordana Baruchov Greenfield
Twenty years ago, Mendy Reiner saw a heartbreaking reality that most people simply accepted as inevitable. Too many members of the Jewish community were suffering and dying while waiting for kidney transplants, even though healthy people were walking around every day with the ability to save them.
Living kidney donation was almost unheard of. Families often faced years of dialysis, uncertainty and heartbreak, with little hope of finding a living donor. Rather than accepting the status quo, Mendy envisioned an organization that would educate the community, guide families through the transplant process, and inspire ordinary people to perform an extraordinary act of hesed. What began in 2006 as a small organization operating out of a shared office with only a handful of dedicated employees, several working part-time, has grown into a movement that has transformed the landscape of living kidney donation throughout the Jewish world.
Those early years were filled with challenges. Every transplant required months of education, advocacy, fundraising, medical coordination, and emotional support. Every potential donor needed to understand not only the medical process, but also the emotional and spiritual significance of donating a kidney to another person. There were countless meetings with physicians, rabbis, community leaders and families. There were misconceptions to overcome and fears to address. In those days, if Renewal could facilitate ten kidney transplants in a year, it would have been considered an extraordinary accomplishment. Fifteen seemed ambitious. Twenty felt almost unimaginable.
Hashem had much bigger plans.
A Story of Exponential Growth
Last month, Renewal celebrated a milestone that once seemed impossible. The organization facilitated its 1,500th living donor kidney transplant, a remarkable achievement that reflects two decades of unwavering dedication to saving lives. From just two transplants during its first year to a projected record-breaking year in 2026, Renewal has become the leading force behind living kidney donation in the Jewish community. The pace of growth has been astonishing. The first year brought two transplants. The second year brought seven. Last year alone, Renewal facilitated 170 living donor kidney transplants, and this year is on track to surpass even that remarkable number.
Behind every statistic is a human story. Renewal’s youngest kidney recipient was only two years old. The oldest recipient was 86. The youngest donor was 21, while the oldest donor was 77. Each transplant represents far more than a successful surgery. It represents children who get their parent back, grandparents who live to celebrate another simhah, husbands and wives who receive years they feared had been lost, and families whose futures are forever changed.
Renewal’s impact extends far beyond the operating room. Approximately 60 percent of all altruistic kidney donors in New York have come through Renewal, as have one-third of those in New Jersey. Every year the organization processes more than 3,500 cheek swabs from potential donors. Each swab begins a careful process of education, testing, advocacy, and guidance that often spans months. Every donation costs an average of nearly $19,000 to coordinate, yet for Renewal every dollar represents an investment in something priceless – the opportunity to save a life.
Ironically, Renewal’s greatest accomplishment has created its greatest challenge. More people know about the organization than ever before, and more families are turning to Renewal for help. Today, Renewal is assisting more than 640 men, women and children waiting for kidney transplants, representing an increase of more than 200 percent in less than two years. The organization now receives calls from communities across North America that had never even heard of Renewal only a few years ago. Although the overwhelming majority of recipients are Jewish, Renewal has always remained committed to helping anyone in need. Illness does not recognize communal boundaries, and neither does compassion.
The Question That’s Changed Thousands of Lives
Every transplant begins with one simple question.
“Could I be the one?”
That question has changed thousands of lives.
It is also the question that Renewal has spent 20 years encouraging communities to ask themselves.
One of those communities was the Syrian Sephardic community.
Like in every close-knit community, trust could never be expected overnight. It had to be earned. Renewal understood that education would have to come before participation and that relationships would have to come before results. Years ago, when Mendy Reiner and Duvid Shisha first met with respected leaders of the Syrian community to introduce Renewal’s mission, educate about living kidney donation, and seek their partnership, the response was sincere and memorable.
“Our community will help you financially,” they explained. “But you’re not going to get our kidneys.”
It was never meant as a rejection. On the contrary, the Syrian Sephardic community quickly became one of Renewal’s most generous supporters. They believed deeply in the organization’s mission and consistently stepped forward with extraordinary financial support. At that time, however, living kidney donation was still unfamiliar territory for many within the community.
Renewal understood that changing perceptions would take patience.
One of the most significant steps came when AJ Gindi joined the organization. As a respected member of the Syrian community, AJ became far more than a staff member. He became a bridge. Week after week, month after month, he visited synagogues, met with rabbis, answered questions, spoke at community gatherings, and patiently educated families about living kidney donation.
Then AJ did something that transformed every conversation that followed:
He donated one of his own kidneys.
Suddenly, kidney donation was no longer an abstract concept. It had the face of someone the community knew, respected, and trusted. His example inspired conversation around Shabbat tables, in business offices, and in synagogue hallways. More importantly, it inspired action.
Over the years, 47 of AJ’s own friends and family members followed his example and became living kidney donors themselves.
One person’s decision had become a movement.
Without many people realizing it, a quiet transformation had begun.
Families within the Syrian community began witnessing kidney transplantation firsthand. Donors were no longer strangers from other neighborhoods. Recipients were no longer distant stories. They were relatives, neighbors, classmates, business associates, and lifelong friends. Renewal had become more than an organization serving the community. It had become part of the community itself.
Exceeding Every Expectation
That journey reached an extraordinary milestone on July 19, 2026.
Renewal organized a community-wide swab drive on behalf of six members of the Syrian Sephardic community who are desperately waiting for kidney transplants. Each of the six has a different story. Some chose to publicly share their identities while others preferred to remain anonymous. Some had spent years on dialysis. Others are rapidly approaching kidney failure. Every one of them represents a family praying that somewhere a stranger will choose to help.
To make participation as convenient as possible, six swabbing locations were established throughout Deal, Long Branch, and Oakhurst, including The Deal Synagogue, Park Avenue Synagogue, Sarah’s Tent, Ouri’s Market, the DSN Community Center, and the DSN Beach Club. Volunteers staffed each location from morning until evening – uncertain how many people would respond, but confident that every single swab represented another opportunity to save a life.
What happened exceeded every expectation.
The event took place during shavua shehal bo (the week of Tishah B’Av), in the heart of the Nine Days, when the Jewish people mourn the destruction of the Bet Hamikdash. Our sages teach that the Second Temple was destroyed because of sinat hinam, baseless hatred. Every year we reflect upon that painful lesson and ask ourselves how we can help rebuild what was lost.
On that Sunday, the Syrian Sephardic community answered not with speeches, but with action.
Despite the intense summer heat and one of the busiest weeks of the Jersey Shore season, hundreds of people rearranged their schedules to perform a simple act of hesed. Parents came between family commitments. Business owners stopped during the workday. Young adults arrived with friends. Entire families encouraged one another to participate. Some had planned to attend all week. Others simply saw the signs and decided on the spot that they wanted to help.
Every few minutes, another registration form was completed.
Another cheek was swabbed.
Another person quietly said, “If Hashem created me to save another Jew, I want to find out.”
To an outsider, a cheek swab may seem insignificant. It takes less than a minute. There are no needles, no surgery, and no commitment to donate. Yet Renewal has witnessed enough miracles to understand what can begin with something so simple. Hidden within that tiny cotton swab may be the compatibility that allows a mother to watch her children grow up, a father to dance at his daughter’s wedding, or a grandfather to meet another grandchild.
As the hours passed, the numbers continued climbing.
Fifty.
One hundred.
One hundred fifty.
Two hundred.
By the conclusion of the event, an astonishing 261 members of the community had joined Renewal’s donor registry.
Those 261 swabs represented far more than a successful community event. They represented hope for six families waiting today and for countless others who will need Renewal’s help tomorrow. They represented 20 years of patient education, relationship building, and trust. They represented a community that had embraced Renewal’s mission as its own.
Perhaps the most meaningful number from that day was not 261.
It was one.
One people.
Because when someone is waiting for a kidney, labels disappear. Ashkenazi. Sephardic. Syrian. Chassidic. Modern Orthodox. American. Israeli.
There is only Am Yisrael.
Our Sages teach us, “Kol Yisrael arevim zeh bazeh –All Jews are responsible for one another.”
On July 19, those words came alive.
Hundreds of people volunteered to discover whether Hashem had created them to save someone they might never meet. No promises were made. No commitments to surgery were required. Only a willingness to take the very first step.
Ordinary People Doing the Extraordinary
As volunteers packed away tables and supplies that evening, there was a feeling that everyone present shared. They had witnessed something much greater than a successful swab drive.
They had witnessed another chapter in Renewal’s remarkable story.
Only weeks after celebrating transplant number 1,500, Renewal watched 261 more people step forward, helping to ensure that transplant numbers 1,501, 1,502, and countless more are already waiting somewhere in the future.
That is how Renewal has always grown.
One conversation.
One family.
One donor.
One recipient.
One life at a time.
During the very days when the Jewish people mourn the destruction of the Bet Hamikdash because of sinat hinam, hundreds of Jews answered with ahavat hinam – “baseless love.” They demonstrated that the greatest response to division is unconditional love, that the greatest expression of faith is caring for another Jew, and that the strongest communities are built when people are willing to carry one another’s burdens.
The Syrian Sephardic community did far more than participate in a swab drive. It demonstrated what is possible when education, trust, leadership and compassion come together in pursuit of a sacred mission.
Renewal has now facilitated more than 1,500 kidney transplants, but the work is far from finished. Hundreds of families are still waiting. Hundreds of more miracles are still needed.
If July 19 taught us anything, it is that those miracles begin with ordinary people making extraordinary decisions.
And it has shown us, once again, that “Mi ke’amcha Yisrael – “Who is like Your people, Israel!”