New York Jewish Week, December 21, 2001
By Geraldine K. Gross - Jewish Week Correspondent
“There Because We Care”
Caption: Kane Street Synagogue contingent forms backbone of New York delegation in UJC post-terror mission to Israel.
The scene was chillingly familiar, says Rita Cohn. Groups of people were gathered before makeshift memorials, lighting candles, placing wreaths and flowers upon the pavement. Similar images had been flashed on TV screens and appeared on the front pages of newspapers almost continuously since Sept. 11, when terrorists smashed two passenger planes into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center.
But this was not Lower Manhattan. This was Ben Yehuda Street, a busy thoroughfare lined with shops and cafes in the heart of Jerusalem.
On Dec. 2, the very day that Cohn, a member of the Kane Street Synagogue in Cobble Hill, departed New York for Israel, a suicide bomber had blown himself up on Ben Yehuda, killing 10 people and wounding more than 150.
Caila Bitran, director of the Missions Department at United Jewish Communities, which organized the trip, said because of the increase in terrorist violence in Israel, she had expected a number of people to drop out from the Dec. 2 mission, but very few did. The group included almost 500 people from across the United States, 18 from the New York City area.
Ten of the 18 were from the Kane Street, a Conservative congregation, including Cohn and her husband, Werner, and Rabbi Samuel Weintraub.
“We felt it was important to show [Israelis] that American Jews care, that we want to help in every way that we can, not just financially,” said Cohn, who with her husband initiated Kane Street’s participation in the trip. “We want to be there because we care.”
The first meeting was held in the Cohn home, then moved to the synagogue. The cost of airfare and hotels was a factor and so, when it was discovered that UJC sponsors solidarity trips, Rita Cohn recalls, “We said ‘OK, we’ll go with them.’ ”
UJC started the Israel Now program in July, Bitran said, organizing a monthly trip. The groups in those first missions were small, but grew in succeeding months.
The objective of the program, Bitran said, is to have participants “experience Israel and the people. We want them to meet with different segments of the population, with people at risk, such as new immigrants.” Russian families who made aliyah have an additional problem, she said. “They have had to suffer losses.Their children have been killed.”
Most of the 21 young people killed in a suicide bombing June 1 at a Tel Aviv disco were emigres from the former Soviet Union. “We try to deal with these things,” Bitran said. “We try to help.”
Participants in the Dec. 2 mission were taken on tours of facilities funded by UJC, such as the Ashalim program for disabled children and the Jaffa Institute in Tel Aviv that assists disadvantaged children and families. “We want them to know where their money goes,” Bitran said.
The mission was brief — arriving Dec. 3 and leaving Dec. 7 — so its schedule was necessarily crowded, keeping participants busy. For example, upon arrival they were taken directly to the Old City from the airport and strolled the Hess Promenade with its spectacular view of Jerusalem before winding up at the Western Wall.
“Everybody in Jerusalem knew we were coming and was waiting for us,” said Lisa Kleinman, another of the Kane Street sojourners. “When we went to the Cardo on another day, the shopkeepers knew we were coming, that we would be shopping, and were waiting for us.”
On Monday evening, after dinner, the group returned to the Wall. They chanted a memorial prayer, sang “Hatikvah” and waved Israeli flags. Bitran, who accompanied the mission to Israel, said a number of Israelis, amazed by the group’s presence, came up to her wanting to know “Who are all these people?” Bitran responded, “They are American Jews from different cities in the U.S.” Her hand was immediately grasped and shaken. She was told, “Please tell them ‘thank you’ from us.”
It was a frequent occurrence throughout the trip, Kleinman reports — people coming up to her and to others in the group and expressing their gratitude.
“It was heartbreaking,” said Rachel Epstein of the realization that Israelis feel “they have been abandoned by American Jews.”
In addition to visiting the Wall and touring UJC-funded facilities, the group heard from speakers like Avraham Burg, speaker of the Knesset, and Dan Meridor, a member of the cabinet. Deputy Prime Minister Natan Sharansky spoke at the farewell dinner.
Despite the tight schedule, however, some participants managed to find the time for personal pursuits. Rose Rabin and Esperanza Andujar visited the ORT School of Engineering, to which Rabin had made a sizeable donation in her husband’s memory. Rabin has been active in ORT, and her husband had a lifelong interest in the sciences.
Epstein attended her nephew’s bar mitzvah, which coincidentally took place during the mission’s five days. Kleinman admits to some moments of apprehension when she read the banner headline on a newspaper one morning proclaiming “This is war.” She worried that the borders might be closed, that she would be unable to return home to her husband and her three young sons. Her fears were calmed by the fact that “Israelis are going about their business. Life goes on,” she said.
Rabbi Weintraub also was struck by this aspect of the Israeli character. Despite the current problems, he said Israelis “continue to live, not just survive, and also to keep their ideals alive.”
Andujar said she is glad that she visited Israel at “this terrible time.”
“The people of Israel are our sisters and brothers,” she said firmly, “and they need to know that we support them. It is easy to say so from a distance, but the best way is to go there.” She remembered a visit to a school when a man in the group went up to a child, perhaps 8 years old, told him that he was going to return to Israel in a short while, and asked, “What do you want me to bring from America when I come back?”
“More Jews,” the boy said.
