By Jennifer Levine, Senior Director, Israel & Overseas Department
The organization I’ve chosen to spotlight in this issue of the Israel & Overseas Newsletter is Dror Israel.
Dror Israel is one of the largest, most diverse and unique educational organizations in Israel, with over 100,000 participants each year. Dror Israel’s vision for Israel is a society of democracy, equality and peace created through education and community-based Jewish values. Their youth movement is one of the largest in Israel – HaNoar HaOved, with over 90,000 members from 350 locations in Israel.
I chose this organization for a multitude of reasons.
For starters, I remembered that Dror Israel was one of the very first official emergency grants that this community made post October 7th. They called us within the first week to request funding to run 50 evacuation centers serving over 25,000 evacuees from the South of Israel. Dror Israel knew to come to us because we have long been a partner of theirs. In the spring of 2023, we had given them a grant through our Abraham Gertzman fund for a grassroots collaboration between Israeli and Middle Eastern teenagers. The vision of the program was to foster trust and understanding among diverse communities. They sought to bring together tens of thousands of youth from Israel and the Middle East/North Africa region to encounter one another, build friendships and tear down the barriers of fear, mistrust and ignorance. Detroit dollars were specifically used to sponsor a program with youth in Morocco. Before this program could launch, October 7th happened.
While scrolling through my “Dror Israel” file for content for this piece, I came across an email they had sent me on November 23, 2023. It read “Dear Jennifer, A month and a half after October 7 and Israel is still at war….the future is still uncertain.” To read this two years later with our friends and family members still being called up to serve, to continue to feel the weight of the war and its impact on the mental health of myself, my colleagues and friends and family, to know that 20 hostages are still being held. That the future is STILL uncertain left me momentarily gasping for air. But we are a resilient people. And so, we continue to meet each day and to hope and pray for a peaceful end, for the return of the hostages and for a time when we can once again focus on programs like Youth 4MENA.
Next, I was again struck at how incredible Dror Israel is as an organization. They were pioneers after the Abraham Accords in the development of the Youth4MENA program. They pivoted quickly post October 7th to use their strengths and connections to set up and staff evacuation centers. And then, just 7 months later, we were sending them another grant as they had pivoted once more and were focusing their attention on something else they could do in Israel. This time, they requested funding from Detroit (which they received) to provide summer programming for 2,750 evacuees from 27 northern communities.
Dror Israel is committed to continuing to provide for the educational and emotional needs of the children and families most affected by this war. Thanks to the generous support of this community, they have been able to do so since day one.
Finally, this is an opportune time to spotlight Dror Israel, not just because of the incredible work they do in Israel both pre and post October 7th, but also because we are bringing them here LIVE next month.
You see, Dror Israel has a traveling musical ensemble, HaShayara, that is made up of educators and artists of their organization. They use music for social change and healing and they will be coming to Detroit to perform at our October 7th Commemoration “From Sorrow to Song.” I hope you will be able to join us.