"We were the closest ones" said Dovie Maisel from the ZAKA international rescue unit which was among the first on the ground in Port-au-Prince. "We were there almost alone." As the Israeli rescue team landed in the earthquake zone, the ZAKA leadership placed an urgent phone call to ICEJ Director Malcolm Hedding asking the Embassy to partner with them in their search-and-rescue operations in Haiti.In the gruelling 38-hour operation that followed, Maisel and his team managed to free eight students in a collapsed multi-story university building.