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July 11, 2008
Seeking Renewal
Women and girls who persevere in Sderot and Ashkelon
Phil Jacobs
Executive Editor, SDEROT, ISRAEL
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A bright, yellow blanket of wild sunflowers covered a field as far as the eye could see. This was on the right side of the road.
On the left were rutty, untamed green grasses and weeds cresting at a small hill. There, Israeli police vehicles were parked as bomb specialists tracked down the remnants of yet another Quassam rocket.
Our eyes went back to the right side of the road. In the distance we could see where the Jewish settlements of Gaza once existed. We observed the buildings of Gaza City. Overhead were the ominous white blimps, electronically looking into Gaza, and sending back a warning known as Tzeva Adom, code red, when a Quassam gets launched.
We pass green-and-white highway signs as normal as anything one would see around here on the Beltway or JFX. Instead, the words in English, Hebrew and Arabic were Aza or Gaza, as if it really would be a destination for the Jews inside Sderot or Ashkelon.
The first stop on this United Jewish Communities-sponsored journalists fact-finding trip would be to the Nachal Oz Military Base in Sderot. Our bus pulled up in the main parking lot. A large concrete reinforced wall was there to protect against snipers. This was the headquarters of the IDF’s Northern Gaza Brigade. Before disengagement, the base was located inside Gaza.
There were tanks and armored personnel carriers, covered in desert dust, nearby. Communications towers listened and watched over the fence separating Gaza from Israel.
There are some 30 kibbutzim in the area that must be defended. Also, the base is responsible for security when supply trucks transport goods from Israel to Gaza.
Perhaps the most impressive part of this experience was meeting the squad room of female soldiers who stare at video screens for four hour shifts, 24/7.
These are surveillance images of Gaza. Each soldier knows every stone, every bush, every tree, every person, house and vehicle in their scanned area. If something seems out of routine or out of the ordinary, they will report it to their superiors.
The surveillance has night vision capability, and the ability to zoom in on any person or object. We are told that each one of these soldiers has seen something suspicious and reported it to their commanders. We are shown a video clip of a man dressed all in black snaking his way on his stomach towards the fence. Zooming in, it’s clear to see he carries a weapon and perhaps is bulked up with explosives. A call was made; a helicopter gunship puts an end to his deadly mission and to his life.
The women in the room don’t look any older than 20. In most any other free country, they’d be worrying about final exams in college. Here, outside of some doodling of hearts in purple ink on a notepad, it was pretty much all business.
It is difficult to get one’s arms around all of this.
The human toll in terms of life and death and emotional safety is everywhere we go.
The women we met along this trip are the backbone of this society. They not only watch the enemy in Gaza, they nurture the victims, putting a needed caring touch on all of this, and this is what we saw wherever we traveled in this war zone; and let’s face it, it is a war zone.
We’ll focus on six remarkable girls and women.
• Shirley
• Estee
• Kalin
• Vicky
• Tamar
• Zalmonia
Along the way we’ll learn about words like “periphery” and “grads,” and we’ll learn about their new meanings.
We’ll meet young female soldiers who keep their eyes on the Gaza strip as if their lives depended on it.
We’ll enter a home in Sderot and a doctor’s office in Ashkelon damaged by rocket fire.
And then we’ll get away for a day in the heat of the Negev’s hope, and see a nation deal with its olim, and its Bedouin.
All of this courtesy of our hosts, the United Jewish Communities, who gave a group of Jewish journalists a look at where millions of federation dollars are going to help rescue, teach and secure.
We arrived on a Monday evening and departed three days later.
This is but a snapshot of what we saw and who we met.
Shirley Katzir
To improve Sderot’s ability to respond to residents’ needs, the Joint Distribution Committee has implemented two programs. One is YUVAL, which boosts the organizational resilience of first-response crews; and MATOV, which improves Sderot’s coordination with local nonprofits in providing relief and care.
Also, the ITC, Israel Trauma Coalition, identifies and assesses the needs and services that are found in gaps in the existing infrastructure.
So from the front military lines, we run into the front treatment lines, the Crisis Response Team of Sderot.
We are free to interview anyone from this team made up largely of social workers providing trauma care for Sderot residents.
I catch the eye of Shirley Katzir. It was the best possible match.
Ms. Katzir is the executive director of Eden, an organization working with girls and young women ages 12-18. She runs a residential shelter for these victims of sexual molestation and rape. Most have been abused by their fathers or brothers. This doesn’t even begin to address the mental anguish caused by the Quassams.
“The situation only makes it worse for these girls and women,” said Ms. Katzir, herself married and a mother of three. The shelter has 24 residents with a waiting list of 10.
At Eden, the clients receive therapy in a safe, warm atmosphere. The younger girls attend school and some of the young women work jobs or attend nearby Sapir College. But all of them return “home” to the shelter each evening.
“You can see a strong regression in their functioning,” Ms. Katzir said. “They have problems sleeping, because of the combination of their sexual victimization and the code red alarms.”
Ms. Katzir added that the Quassam attacks have caused the amount of physical and sexual abuse in Sderot to double in the seven years of the rocketing.
Typically, she said, Sderot’s males become more aggressive, lashing out while females “keep it in”; sometimes, resorting to self-mutilation or cutting.
The shelter, which is located on the grounds of Kibbutz Beit Kama, gives the young people a feeling of security, a place that they can call home.
“They feel like it is their house,” said Ms. Katzir. “We all have a basic need to have this place.”
Ms. Katzir lives with her husband and three children on the kibbutz. They live there by choice, and many times a friend or relative from Tel Aviv has asked them why they don’t leave. Ms. Katzir said she worries about her children all of the time, especially her 16-year-old son, who is on a local swim team and always seems to be out there practicing.
“I guess the way we survive it is when the red alarm goes off, we deny it,” she said. “We remain calm. Otherwise it could drive you crazy.”
Her husband is an electrical engineer, and she said that when they moved to Sderot, there were already rockets being launched.
“If we moved away, what message would we be giving our children?” she asked. “If we go to Tel Aviv, tomorrow, they’ll be bombing Tel Aviv. Then where do we go? It’s a big dilemma, and it’s more complicated because our friends and family from Tel Aviv don’t come here. Sometimes it feels like a ghetto.
“But,” she added with a real sigh on her face, “I love it here. Everything is simple and modest.”
Still, she said, children and adults need therapy. In this part of the Negev, she said some 8,000 girls are victims of physical abuse. In Israel, she added, there are 350,000 youth at risk, with only 50,000 connected in any way to any social services safety net.
What is normal for her clients?
“A day without an alarm going off,” she said. “We support one another and we help the girls feel stronger and stronger all of the time. We want them to enjoy a quality of life one day. If you have a duty or a responsibility for something in life, you are not helpless. When we have a code red, each girl is responsible for a task here. In this crazy situation, they have to make decisions, and it gives them a feeling of control. All of these girls have the potential to succeed even with what they’ve been through.”
Kalin Mymon
She is 17-1/2, funny, articulate and with a real flaie for the dramatic. She wants to study drama, law, or both when she gets out of This organization brings teens together to form support groups in times of crisis. Kalin is part of a drama group from Sderot that visits other cities around Israel. The teens use drama to depict what is happening in Sderot, and they also spend a great deal of time answering questions of other teens from around the country.
Her dad is Israeli and her mom is Irish. Her English is excellent and she has an amazing attitude of optimism even though she said living in the Sderot area “is hard, and a lot of my friends have left.”
“I don’t think we need to leave or run,” she said. “The people who help others here in Sderot have done a wonderful job. Their voices should be heard.”
She said that teenagers in Sderot probably grow up much faster “dealing with something that the average teen in Israel doesn’t know about. C’est la vie. But until you are here living it, you have really no understanding of what it is like.”
“We all know people who have been killed or wounded,” she con-tinued. “We are only 17 years old. Why should 17-year-olds experience this in their lives in Sderot? Other teens don’t feel it.”
In meeting with other teens, she and her AMEN colleagues tell teens that they would love to have the pressure of what she calls “small things,” like learning to drive or having a party without worrying that the alarm will go off and the party ruined. She added that there are many times when class is interrupted more than once for a code red.”
Estee Nemeth
She is a film major at Sderot’s Sapir College, the only higher learning institution in town, and Sderot’s largest employer. The IEC has allocated almost $3 million in scholarships for 2,649 students there.
It’s a liberal arts college, and it is liberal in general. The student population includes Jews, Israeli Arabs and Bedouins.
Again, like everyone else interviewed, Ms. Nemeth, 26, comes with a complicated story.
In the fall of 2006, Ms. Nemeth walked into her cinematography class, which was taught by Nizar Hassan, an Arab-Israeli documentary filmmaker. Ms. Nemeth had sewn into her backpack a credit-card Israeli flag. Her professor asked her, “What is that?” And then he ordered her to turn the bag around so he wouldn’t have to see the flag.
Nemeth refused.
The teacher came over and turned it around himself. But Ms. Nemeth, not having any of it, turned the bag back, showing proudly the flag, and this time placing the bag in her lap. Mr. Hassan took the bag from her lap and put it away in a desk drawer before returning it at the end of class.
It didn’t end here between Ms. Nemeth and Mr. Hassan. Nearing the end of the 2006-2007 school year, the two had a meeting to discuss her documentary project about a 13-year-old Sderot boy who, amid the rockets and the nerve-wracking chaos, had won seventh place in the world ballroom dancing competition.
Ms. Nemeth was wearing a Jewish star around her neck during the meeting. She said that her teacher took offense to it and insisted he did not want to see it. Ms. Nemeth said in an article reported by the Jerusalem Post that “I explained to him that it’s not a religious thing with me but rather that it was out of Zionism, which is something that defines me.”
Ms. Nemeth ended up leaving his class.
But this was nothing new for Mr. Hassan. A year later IDF reservist Eyal Cohen, also a film student of Mr. Hassan, came to class dressed in his green army uniform. He was ridiculed while the whole class watched.
According to the Jerusalem Post, the action resulted in the college’s taking steps of terminating his employment.
Estee Nemeth said that it’s not easy living in Sderot, and it hasn’t been any easier since the disengagement from Gaza two years ago.
“You can see the rockets in the sky, and you sometimes think that nothing bad will happen to you,” she said.
Ms. Nemeth rents an apartment in Sderot. She said that there are “for rent” and “for sale” signs all over the town. She’s been there when the days have been quiet, but she’s also been in her apartment when 30-40 rockets have fallen in a single day.
After a rocket exploded in the parking lot adjacent to her apartment, rattling the building and breaking windows, she ran outside with her camera only to see a 17-year-old boy with his chest cut open by schrapnel on the ground, with his wailing mother screaming for help. The audio she recorded from that incident and others serves as the backdrop sounds for her documentary about Lioz HaTham, the ballroom dancer.
She doesn’t plan to stick around after graduation, perhaps going to Tel Aviv where there are opportunities in film.
Among others, what will be one of her memories of Sderot?
She responds quickly: “The children here have a game. They look for pieces of rockets.”
Vicki Chernak
She’s spunky, filled with defiance and yes, will play outside even if she’s scared.
Vicki Chernak is 8-1/2 years old. She’s a latchkey kid who comes home to an apartment from her school while both of her parents are out working. They came from Russia.
She has lived almost all her life under the siege of the Quassam rockets.
“I’m not afraid to play, it’s just that I’m afraid that the noise of the red siren makes. It seems like it is always there.”
Her other concern as a little girl growing up in the middle of this was the inconsistency of electricity. She said she never knows during a “red siren” if the lights will go on or go off.
Besides these fears, she still loves to watch TV and play with her dolls.
Would she want her family to leave Sderot?
This is where the spunk came in, because she looked at the questioner as if he was kidding.
“I was born here,” she said, command in her voice. “This is where I live.”
Takelah “Tamar” Zami and Zuwalu Samai
We were taken to the Ashkelon Youth Center to meet teen volunteers and psychologists. There were colorful pieces of artwork on the walls, and the hosting teens hurried to bring their journalist guests cold bottles of water to drink and snacks to eat. A circle formed where the youths and social workers talked about their experiences of fear even living in Ashkelon.
On the rim of that discussion, sitting next to a table against a wall were two Ethiopian Jews. They were older, and they were sewing, really in their own world, not taking part in the circle discussion.
Their names were Takelah “Tamar” Zamir and Zuwalu Samai. They are participants in the Ladies Ethiopian Art Project (LEAP).
This project is funded by the Ben and Esther Rosenbloom Foundation of Baltimore.
Over 20 women meet weekly where they are supplied with embroidery materials. It’s so much more than sewing, though. It’s a place where these olim can come and talk to one another, share issues, overcome obstacles and really have some fun. They use their sewing skills to make works of art such as Shabbat challah covers, mezuzot cases and pictures, which are for sale.
On this warm afternoon, Tamar and Zuswalu take a few moments from their handiwork to talk about what they’ve been through to become part of Israeli society.
The next time anyone complains about the cable being out, or a traffic jam, just remember the stories you are about to read.
Let’s start with Tamar.
She is 54 and was born in a village called Wakin. She said she knew for most of her life that the only safe place for a Jew was not in Ethiopia, but in Israel. She lost her husband who was drafted into the Ethiopian Army, and whose whereabouts were never disclosed. He was just listed as missing. She tried unsuccessfully for five years to locate connect in 1985 with Operation Moses. She had to lie about her religion, sometimes covering her face as if she was Muslim. Tamar had to survive attacks from robbers, but worse, she was imprisoned by the Sudanese, and spent a year and a half in a forced labor camp.
Tamar made bread and tea, and sold these items to stay alive.
“Thank God, I’m OK,” she said. “I want to say thank you to Israel. I love being here. I’ve made friends.”
She’s also taken courses in math and English and her Hebrew is excellent. And in between almost every sentence, she says, Baruch HaShem. She added that when she got off the plane from Ethiopia, she literally kissed the ground.
Her friend Zuwalu has had a much more difficult time with all of this.
She is a 38-year-old widow with two surviving children; surviving, because her husband, a prison guard, came home one day from work and shot and killed two of her four children before killing himself.
Zuwalu needlepoints a gorgeous Shabbat challah cover, using orange, green and blue threads. But the happy colors are faded a bit by her tears. Tamar offers a warm touch and hug. Zuwalu has been through a great deal.
She came to Israel in 1991 as part of Operation Solomon.
“It helps me to be here with this group,” she said. “But life is difficult.” ••What is normal for her clients?
“A day without an alarm going off,” she said. “We support one another and we help the girls feel stronger and stronger all of the time. We want them to enjoy a quality of life one day. If you have a duty or a responsibility for something in life, you are not helpless. When we have a code red, each girl is responsible for a task here. In this crazy situation, they have to make decisions, and it gives them a feeling of control. All of these girls have the potential to succeed even with what they’ve been through.”
Kalin Mymon
She is 17-1/2, funny, articulate and with a real flaie for the dramatic. She wants to study drama, law, or both when she gets out of the army. Today, Kalin Mymon is a volunteer for JDC’s AMEN program. This organization brings teens together to form support groups in times of crisis. Kalin is part of a drama group from Sderot that visits other cities around Israel. The teens use drama to depict what is happening in Sderot, and they also spend a great deal of time answering questions of other teens from around the country.
Her dad is Israeli and her mom is Irish. Her English is excellent and she has an amazing attitude of optimism even though she said living in the Sderot area “is hard, and a lot of my friends have left.”
“I don’t think we need to leave or run,” she said. “The people who help others here in Sderot have done a wonderful job. Their voices should be heard.”
She said that teenagers in Sderot probably grow up much faster “dealing with something that the average teen in Israel doesn’t know about. C’est la vie. But until you are here living it, you have really no understanding of what it is like.”
“We all know people who have been killed or wounded,” she con-tinued. “We are only 17 years old. Why should 17-year-olds experience this in their lives in Sderot? Other teens don’t feel it.”
In meeting with other teens, she and her AMEN colleagues tell teens that they would love to have the pressure of what she calls “small things,” like learning to drive or having a party without worrying that the alarm will go off and the party ruined. She added that there are many times when class is interrupted more than once for a code red.”
Estee Nemeth
She is a film major at Sderot’s Sapir College, the only higher learning institution in town, and Sderot’s largest employer. The IEC has allocated almost $3 million in scholarships for 2,649 students there.
It’s a liberal arts college, and it is liberal in general. The student population includes Jews, Israeli Arabs and Bedouins.
Again, like everyone else interviewed, Ms. Nemeth, 26, comes with a complicated story.
In the fall of 2006, Ms. Nemeth walked into her cinematography class, which was taught by Nizar Hassan, an Arab-Israeli documentary filmmaker. Ms. Nemeth had sewn into her backpack a credit-card Israeli flag. Her professor asked her, “What is that?” And then he ordered her to turn the bag around so he wouldn’t have to see the flag.
Nemeth refused.
The teacher came over and turned it around himself. But Ms. Nemeth, not having any of it, turned the bag back, showing proudly the flag, and this time placing the bag in her lap. Mr. Hassan took the bag from her lap and put it away in a desk drawer before returning it at the end of class.
It didn’t end here between Ms. Nemeth and Mr. Hassan. Nearing the end of the 2006-2007 school year, the two had a meeting to discuss her documentary project about a 13-year-old Sderot boy who, amid the rockets and the nerve-wracking chaos, had won seventh place in the world ballroom dancing competition.
Ms. Nemeth was wearing a Jewish star around her neck during the meeting. She said that her teacher took offense to it and insisted he did not want to see it. Ms. Nemeth said in an article reported by the Jerusalem Post that “I explained to him that it’s not a religious thing with me but rather that it was out of Zionism, which is something that defines me.”
Ms. Nemeth ended up leaving his class.
But this was nothing new for Mr. Hassan. A year later IDF reservist Eyal Cohen, also a film student of Mr. Hassan, came to class dressed in his green army uniform. He was ridiculed while the whole class watched.
According to the Jerusalem Post, the action resulted in the college’s taking steps of terminating his employment.
Estee Nemeth said that it’s not easy living in Sderot, and it hasn’t been any easier since the disengagement from Gaza two years ago.
“You can see the rockets in the sky, and you sometimes think that nothing bad will happen to you,” she said.
Ms. Nemeth rents an apartment in Sderot. She said that there are “for rent” and “for sale” signs all over the town. She’s been there when the days have been quiet, but she’s also been in her apartment when 30-40 rockets have fallen in a single day.
After a rocket exploded in the parking lot adjacent to her apartment, rattling the building and breaking windows, she ran outside with her camera only to see a 17-year-old boy with his chest cut open by schrapnel on the ground, with his wailing mother screaming for help. The audio she recorded from that incident and others serves as the backdrop sounds for her documentary about Lioz HaTham, the ballroom dancer.
She doesn’t plan to stick around after graduation, perhaps going to Tel Aviv where there are opportunities in film.
Among others, what will be one of her memories of Sderot?
She responds quickly: “The children here have a game. They look for
Vicki Chernak
She’s spunky, filled with defiance and yes, will play outside even if she’s scared.
Vicki Chernak is 8-1/2 years old. She’s a latchkey kid who comes home to an apartment from her school while both of her parents are out working. They came from Russia.
She has lived almost all her life under the siege of the Quassam rockets.
“I’m not afraid to play, it’s just that I’m afraid that the noise of the red siren makes. It seems like it is always there.”
Her other concern as a little girl growing up in the middle of this was the inconsistency of electricity. She said she never knows during a “red siren” if the lights will go on or go off.
Besides these fears, she still loves to watch TV and play with her dolls.
Would she want her family to leave Sderot?
This is where the spunk came in, because she looked at the questioner as if he was kidding.
“I was born here,” she said, command in her voice. “This is where I live.”
Takelah “Tamar” Zami and Zuwalu Samai
We were taken to the Ashkelon Youth Center to meet teen volunteers and psychologists. There were colorful pieces of artwork on the walls, and the hosting teens hurried to bring their journalist guests cold bottles of water to drink and snacks to eat. A circle formed where the youths and social workers talked about their experiences of fear even living in Ashkelon.
On the rim of that discussion, sitting next to a table against a wall were two Ethiopian Jews. They were older, and they were sewing, really in their own world, not taking part in the circle discussion.
Their names were Takelah “Tamar” Zamir and Zuwalu Samai. They are participants in the Ladies Ethiopian Art Project (LEAP).
This project is funded by the Ben and Esther Rosenbloom Foundation of Baltimore.
Over 20 women meet weekly where they are supplied with embroidery materials. It’s so much more than sewing, though. It’s a place where these olim can come and talk to one another, share issues, overcome obstacles and really have some fun. They use their sewing skills to make works of art such as Shabbat challah covers, mezuzot cases and pictures, which are for sale.
On this warm afternoon, Tamar and Zuswalu take a few moments from their handiwork to talk about what they’ve been through to become part of Israeli society.
The next time anyone complains about the cable being out, or a traffic jam, just remember the stories you are about to read.
Let’s start with Tamar.
She is 54 and was born in a village called Wakin. She said she knew for most of her life that the only safe place for a Jew was not in Ethiopia, but in Israel. She lost her husband who was drafted into the Ethiopian Army, and whose whereabouts were never disclosed. He was just listed as missing. She tried unsuccessfully for five years to locate him. This included walking from the Sudan to Ethiopia to connect in 1985 with Operation Moses. She had to lie about her religion, sometimes covering her face as if she was Muslim. Tamar had to survive attacks from robbers, but worse, she was imprisoned by the Sudanese, and spent a year and a half in a forced labor camp.
Tamar made bread and tea, and sold these items to stay alive.
“Thank God, I’m OK,” she said. “I want to say thank you to Israel. I love being here. I’ve made friends.”
She’s also taken courses in math and English and her Hebrew is excellent. And in between almost every sentence, she says, Baruch HaShem. She added that when she got off the plane from Ethiopia, she literally kissed the ground.
Her friend Zuwalu has had a much more difficult time with all of this.
She is a 38-year-old widow with two surviving children; surviving, because her husband, a prison guard, came home one day from work and shot and killed two of her four children before killing himself.
Zuwalu needlepoints a gorgeous Shabbat challah cover, using orange, green and blue threads. But the happy colors are faded a bit by her tears. Tamar offers a warm touch and hug. Zuwalu has been through a great deal.
She came to Israel in 1991 as part of Operation Solomon.
“It helps me to be here with this group,” she said. “But life is difficult.” ••••C Guide To Israel’s Crisis
• United Jewish Communities and the federations of North America, including the Associated: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore, response to the conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon. More than $360 million has been raised.
• The allocations responded to immediate needs and long-term strengthening of the regions impacted. These needs can include summer camps providing children with a safe environment, and programming to help children and adults cope with trauma as well as upgrading of bomb shelters.
• IEC funds have bolstered Israeli social service networks to respond effectively in times of crisis.
Funding Examples:
• War emergency — summer camps for children in north and south; safe camps for Israeli Arab children; Amen volunteer activities for children in shelters; school supplies for indigent; bomb shelter kits for disadvantaged children; emergency small business grants; equipping bomb shelters with air conditioners and T s; immediate emergency relief through Israel Trauma Coalition; emergency psychological support; Yuval program, helping those who help.
• Post-Trauma Intervention
• Sderot, Ashkelon and Surrounding Region — incentive scholarships for Sapir College freshmen; grants to small businessmen; Sderot basic emergency supplies; Sderot respite for elderly and disabled; Sderot security for upgrades of facilities; Asheklon, helping the helpers; Ashkelon, strengthening leadership for times of crisis; Ashkelon summer camps, emergency vehicles, havens of calm for school children, respite trips and even Amharic radio emergency broadcasts for Ethiopians.
It’s been over seven years since the Kassam rocket attacks have started, menacing on almost daily basis the communities of Sderot and Ashkelon.
There have been about 15 deaths and more than 50 seriously wounded civilians. The emotional wounds are incalculable. UJC’s Israel Emergency Campaign has implemented impactful programs to help victims and to help the therapists, themselves, cope, with what they’re saying.
War emergency programs include:
• Activity kits for children in shelters.
• Enrichment, recreation and lunch programs provided to children at risk.
• Families taken from region for respite.
• ictims of Terror Fund provided relief for victims residing in the south.
• Quiet rooms were built in elementary schools, creating therapeutic safe harbors for the children.A UJC Guide To Israel’s Crisis
• United Jewish Communities and the federations of North America, including the Associated: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore, started the Israel Emergency Campaign (IEC) in July of 2006 in response to the conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon. More than $360 million has been raised.
• The allocations responded to immediate needs and long-term strengthening of the regions impacted. These needs can include summer camps providing children with a safe environment, and programming to help children and adults cope with trauma as well as upgrading of bomb shelters.
• IEC funds have bolstered Israeli social service networks to respond effectively in times of crisis.
Funding Examples:
• War emergency — summer camps for children in north and south; safe camps for Israeli Arab children; Amen volunteer activities for children in shelters; school supplies for indigent; bomb shelter kits for disadvantaged children; emergency small business grants; equipping bomb shelters with air conditioners and T s; immediate emergency relief through Israel Trauma Coalition; emergency psychological support; Yuval program, helping those who help.
• Post-Trauma Intervention
• Sderot, Ashkelon and Surrounding Region — incentive scholarships for Sapir College freshmen; grants to small businessmen; Sderot basic emergency supplies; Sderot respite for elderly and disabled; Sderot security for upgrades of facilities; Asheklon, helping the helpers; Ashkelon, strengthening leadership for times of crisis; Ashkelon summer camps, emergency vehicles, havens of calm for school children, respite trips and even Amharic radio emergency broadcasts for Ethiopians.
It’s been over seven years since the Kassam rocket attacks have started, menacing on almost daily basis the communities of Sderot and Ashkelon.
There have been about 15 deaths and more than 50 seriously wounded civilians. The emotional wounds are incalculable. UJC’s Israel Emergency Campaign has implemented impactful programs to help victims and to help the therapists, themselves, cope, with what they’re saying.
War emergency programs include:
• Activity kits for children in shelters.
• Enrichment, recreation and lunch programs provided to children at risk.
• Families taken from region for respite.
• ictims of Terror Fund provided relief for victims residing in the south.
• Quiet rooms were built in elementary schools, creating therapeutic safe harbors for the children.