WIZO UK Visit Israel

Six WIZO UK leaders have spent a week in Israel witnessing how our projects are meeting the ever-increasing demand for support and participating in the international Meeting of Representatives (MOR).

Our delegation comprised interim Chair Danielle Shane; CEO Maureen Fisher; COO Nicky Miller; Honorary President Ronit Ribak-Madari; Trustee Kate Schnelling and former Trustee Jackie Ellert.

Facilities visited included WIZO’s rocket-proof day care centre in Sderot – less than a mile from Gaza. “If the rocket sirens go off, the kids just continue playing,” Nicky observed. “Mothers are incredibly comforted knowing their children are safe.”

Maureen added that with security of ever-increasing importance, motor sensory shelters have been fitted at 30 other WIZO centres. There are between 7 and 15 seconds to get to a shelter once the siren sounds and that is not easy to do with toddlers, “especially if the shelter is a barren and scary place. Motor sensory shelters are like classrooms, so the children don’t realise they are in a shelter.”

However, many more shelters are needed. “These shelters are vital for the safety of the children and a major item within our Emergency Appeal.”

Among projects visited, the UK delegation also experienced at first hand the work of its Open House in Sderot, providing services such as counselling, mindfulness and legal support to all ages; the Adi Centre for girls at risk housed in the heartwarming community centre in Be’er Sheva and Nahalal youth village in Northern Israel.

At Nahalal, the visitors were taken aback by the solidarity of the boarders from the diaspora. “Their commitment to Israel was incredible,” Maureen said. “They could have gone home – their parents begged them to. Some did for a few days but couldn’t wait to come back.”

Elsewhere, the visitors were inspired by a conversation with Ezra, who is not a WIZO client, but the winner of a song competition run by its vocational school in Beit Hakerem, Jerusalem, whose programme includes a music production qualification.

Ezra was part of a unit that transported over 1,000 bodies for identification on October 7. Taking up the story, Nicky says that Ezra suffered “horrendous PTSD and wrote a very emotional song as a form of therapy”, produced by students at the school. “He performed it for us and said how this had made a great difference to his life.”

The impact of the October 7 atrocities still weighs heavily on Israelis and the UK group found that everyone they encountered had a connection to either a victim of the Hamas attacks, a hostage, or an IDF soldier killed in action. (17 WIZO school graduates are among the fatalities from October 7 and beyond).

The trip coincided with the freeing of the first Israeli hostages under the ceasefire agreement and the UK group’s itinerary included a meeting with Dani Miran, the father of one of the remaining hostages, Omri Miran, who was kidnapped by Hamas from his home in Kibbutz Nahal Oz. There was also an emotional visit to the site of the Nova music festival, where the terrorists killed so many young people and took others captive.

In stark contrast to the sombre atmosphere at Nova, the UK delegation enjoyed a full-throated rendition of Am Yisrael Chai by nursery pupils at the Sderot day centre.

Demand for WIZO’s trauma counselling has risen dramatically during the war and 1,507 professionals have been trained to treat personal and collective trauma in the family unit. They have also gone into businesses to train non-WIZO professionals to spot and treat trauma in the workplace.

In addition, the charity’s hotline for men with anger issues has been expanded to help those back from serving in the reserves reintegrate into society – “in the home, as a parent and in the workplace”.

At MOR – the first in-person conference for international delegates since the Hamas attacks – Danielle delivered the closing remarks, as is traditional for the Chair of the “mother federation”.

She reflected on countless moving moments during the week, not least the hostage releases.

Experiences such as “visiting Nova, standing next to a father who had lost two sons, going to Hostages Square and having the privilege of sitting in the memorial service at Mount Herzl” were almost “impossible to express in words. I felt so many emotions.”

Danielle had long wanted to visit Sderot and felt sure that Margaret Thatcher, who

Officially opened the day care centre, “would be very proud of the services now available at the open house, with the wonderful support of benefactor Fanny Cohen”.

She concluded that delegates from the 20 Federations were returning to their countries with “determination, greater awareness of the increased needs and optimism for a better and brighter future”.

That is certainly true of the UK contingent with Maureen stressing the importance of having the funds to continue to support longstanding clients while assisting those now turning to WIZO – Israel’s largest independent social welfare organisation – with war-connected issues. “This is going to be inter-generational,” she warned.

“This trauma is not going away,” she stresses, “we need to ensure therapies and programmes are in place to address the current needs of a nation in pain and be prepared for the intergenerational trauma that will follow, long after the war is over.”