Congregants from the Forest Hills Jewish Middle helped rebuild communities in Israel throughout a five-day volunteer mission. This work included engaged on a farm on the Galilee Culinary Institute.
Picture courtesy of the Jewish Nationwide Fund-USA
Greater than 30 congregants from the Forest Hills Jewish Center just lately went to Israel to have interaction instantly in rebuilding, therapeutic and supporting communities that had been impacted by the Hamas terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, 2023.
The congregants helped these communities by way of the Jewish Nationwide Fund-USA’s five-day “Congregational Volunteer in Israel Mission,” which grants the volunteers the chance to attach with the land of Israel whereas collaborating in hands-on initiatives like rebuilding houses, planting timber and enhancing infrastructure.
A lot of the work carried out by the congregants of the Forest Hills Jewish Middle consisted of aiding within the rebuilding of houses of evacuees who’re set to return, planting timber, neighborhood cleanups and extra. In addition they labored within the fields of the Galilee Culinary Institute and visited the Kiryat Shmona Medical Middle. Moreover, the group ready meals for Israel Protection Power troopers in Ofakim, took half within the official Jerusalem Day ceremony at Ammunition Hill and visited the location of the Nova Music Pageant, the place the Oct. 7 assaults occurred.
The volunteer mission was proposed by Forest Hills heart members Matt and Judy Beizer to the synagogue after they took half in a earlier Volunteer in Israel Mission in July 2024. That earlier expertise granted them a deep appreciation of the affect they had been capable of make on the folks of Israel.
“After we volunteered with Jewish Nationwide Fund-USA final yr, we completely liked it,” Matt Beizer mentioned. “We got here again and began speaking to of us, simply saying, ‘Wouldn’t or not it’s nice if we went as a Kehila (neighborhood), if we did this collectively?’”
Forest Hills Jewish Middle Rabbi Daniel Graber and the remainder of the congregation had been instantly invested on this proposal.
“For a yr and a half, we now have been in New York, loving Israel, supporting Israel and doing the whole lot we are able to from afar,” Rabbi Graber mentioned. “However sooner or later, you attain the restrict of what you are able to do at arm’s size, and you might want to go and be there. We had so many individuals who felt the necessity to get their arms soiled within the work of constructing and supporting this nation in its time of want.”
It meant rather a lot to the Beizers for the Forest Hills Jewish Middle to right away act on their proposal and participate in a Volunteer in Israel Mission.
“It was unbelievable—not simply because these had been fellow synagogue members,” Judy Beizer mentioned. “These are our buddies, that is our neighborhood, and to do that collectively made it much more particular.”
“This was very a lot a once-in-a-lifetime expertise to be with our buddies from the neighborhood and assist make a distinction in Israel,” Matt Beizer mentioned. “Jewish Nationwide Fund-USA has been very supportive, it’s been a terrific expertise, and I believe it will be nice for different communities to look inside themselves and do that as effectively.”
By these missions from the Jewish Nationwide Fund-USA, congregants throughout all ages and components of america are introduced collectively to supply much-needed help to households, farmers and frontline communities in Israel. In addition they present an inspiring mix of bodily affect, religious connection and shared function.
Congregations that participate within the Volunteer in Israel Mission are additionally eligible to obtain a $500 subsidy per participant to go to Israel, serving to to make this volunteering alternative extra accessible to those that could also be .
