By Star-Ledger Edi­to­r­ial Board

http://blog.nj.com/njv_editorial_page/2010/01/haitis_pain_stricken_nation_wi.html

AP Photo/Jorge Cruz: Homes affected by an earth­quake are seen in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, after a 7.0-magnitude earth­quake hit the region.

As if life hasn’t been cruel enough for Haitians, they were dealt another ham­mer blow by a dev­as­tat­ing earth­quake that has pul­ver­ized the cap­i­tal, Port au Prince, lev­el­ing the pres­i­den­tial palace and hill­side shacks and almost every­thing in between.

At this point, the death toll is only a guess, but judg­ing from the heart-breaking reports and esti­mates by gov­ern­ment offi­cials, the final num­ber is likely to be mind-numbing.

When the quake hit on Tues­day, the hemisphere’s poor­est nation was still recoil­ing from the mis­ery of 2008, when four storms ripped the island, killing 800 peo­ple and leav­ing $1 bil­lion in dam­age to roads, bridges and irrigation.

It was a series of blows that would have left richer coun­tries reel­ing, let alone a nation where many of its 9 mil­lion peo­ple live on less than $2 a day.

Pres­i­dent Obama has promised an all-out res­cue and human­i­tar­ian effort after the mag­ni­tude 7.0 earth­quake: “We will be there for them in their hour of need,” he said. Of course we will.

This is also the time for the United States to con­sider grant­ing tem­po­rary pro­tected sta­tus to undoc­u­mented Haitians, allow­ing them to remain in this coun­try and hold jobs. Hait­ian immi­grants, legal and ille­gal, send home more than $1 bil­lion a year. Fam­i­lies back home will need that money des­per­ately to rebuild their lives. The Bush admin­is­tra­tion sus­pended depor­ta­tion of Haitians after Hur­ri­cane Ike but wasn’t will­ing to grant offi­cial pro­tected status.

Even after the bod­ies have been buried and the rub­ble has been cleared, Haiti will remain in dire need. If Haiti is ever going to heal from this and other dis­as­ters — and from decades of dic­ta­tor­ship, cor­rup­tion and decay — it’s going to require more than prayers, food and water from the world’s well-wishers.

As this deadly episode will show, the impov­er­ished nation was a cat­a­stro­phe wait­ing to hap­pen. It needs money, trade, invest­ment, infra­struc­ture and a watch­ful polit­i­cal eye from nations who have the com­pas­sion, wealth and wis­dom to pro­vide them.