“I brought a lot of respect with me to what I do. To me, it was an opportunity to deal with a real social issue in Israel and something that I think is very important.”
By ARIEL DOMINIQUE HENDELMANYad Lebanim’s wall memorializing the names of IDF soldiers who have lost their lives in Israel’s wars(photo credit: ARIEL DOMINIQUE HENDELMAN)
Yad Lebanim is the organization responsible for conserving the memory of Israel’s fallen soldiers. Established just after the War of Independence, for many years thereafter its sole concern was memorializing the soldiers.About eight years ago, the organization realized that depression among bereaved families was a growing issue. These families were having a very hard time resuming their lives, and they had no official support system.In response to this, Yad Lebanim, with the help of both the Defense Ministry and Jerusalem Municipality, began to offer classes under a subsidiary organization called MESHI (a Hebrew acronym for Bereaved Families Create Togetherness).MESHI’s goal is to enable bereaved families to establish a community among themselves. Program director Batya Hirsch says, “We provide a space where they feel that they belong and are understood. They can get together with people who share the same emotions.”By profession, Hirsch is a social worker. For 20 years, she did community work in the line of early childhood education with young families in one of the community centers in Jerusalem. When she found out that there was an opening at Yad Lebanim, she realized this was her calling in life.She says, “We had a staff meeting about it, and my boss said that this was something that needed to be done with nefesh gedola [a generous spirit], and that if any of us knew someone who was capable and who we wanted to recommend, we should do that.”After tossing and turning the whole night, Hirsch came in the next day and said that although she couldn’t recommend herself, she felt this was something she wanted to do.She now works under Yad Lebanim’s Jerusalem branch chairman of over 10 years, Eli Dahan, who is himself a bereaved parent. He lost his son in 1997 when two helicopters taking troops to the security zone in Lebanon collided, killing 73 IDF soldiers. Dahan oversees the committee in charge of many of the items under Yad Lebanim’s wide umbrella, such as the various trips around Israel provided to MESHI members and the memorial service held every Remembrance Day.MESHI’s activities fall into three categories: creative, physical and intellectual.The first category of activities encourages people to deal with their grief through artistic expression. Participants make pictures, beadings, mosaics and sculptures and learn glasswork and creative writing.The second offers activities such as yoga.Hirsch adds, “We’ve learned over the years that for traumatized people, physical activity is very important. Your body awareness suffers a blow, together with the trauma, and you need to reestablish the channels of communication between mind and body.”The third category includes Bible classes, and also courses on the history of Jerusalem as seen through its music. A recent class delved into the music of the Levites during Temple times.Hirsch states, “Everything that we do to strengthen our connection to Am Yisrael [the people of Israel] makes life more meaningful. When you put meaning into the situation, you bring some comfort and consolation to the families.”Yad Lebanim even boasts a choir that meets weekly.There are over 200 members in MESHI. The average age is late 70s, but there are some siblings in their early 30s and sometimes three generations in one class.Hirsch adds, “The number of bereaved families in Jerusalem is over 1,000 people, so it’s much larger than our group of participants. I don’t want, God forbid, for there to be more, but out of the existing population, I would like more people to join us.”The Yad Lebanim building is beautiful, with architecture that’s reminiscent of ancient pyramids, but it is not very easy to get to for people in their 70s and 80s. With creative solutions, like shuttles from the Jerusalem International Convention Center, hopefully more people will come in the future.MESHI operates four days a week, with both morning and afternoon activities. Although the wide range of courses offered is wonderful, it is really a means to an end. The main focus is to connect members of bereaved families to one another, so that they can form a supportive community.Hirsch adds, “At some stage about three years ago, I started to realize that people come at the time that they’re supposed to start their lesson, and when it’s over, they leave. All the activities are not the target; the target is to have this community feeling. I was looking to find a way to do things differently. So Tuesday is that day. It’s the social day.”Tuesdays start with a class on the weekly Torah portion. When that’s over, participants stay to play a variety of games, including bridge, rummy and chess. Yad Lebanim essentially becomes a social games club, so that people will stay together and connect. The results have been quite successful.Next year, she is endeavoring to add an English conversation club, in addition to the computer lessons that are offered now.“Computers are a great means of communication,” she says. “You can be by yourself at home, but if you know how to open the computer and get on the Internet, you can be connected. This is all part of the idea of communication, to which I think English lessons would be a good addition.”The recent changes have paid off, in Hirsch’s estimation. Participants are calling each other to meet outside of the center and are even gathering at one another’s homes to play bridge.She says, “The way I conceive my job is to make it into a warm home.I try to welcome them properly with a big smile. They know my door is always open. There is always a box of tissues, and I offer the best listening that I know how. It starts with me and trickles down to the rest of the staff and to the atmosphere in the classes.”This goal of creating a community became more important than ever last summer with Operation Protective Edge in Gaza, and continues to be vital, as violence and conflict in Israel never cease.In a sense, MESHI is a microcosm of Israel itself; its members range from traditional to secular to religious.Among MESHI members, there is the usual debate over the limits of power, and whether the solution to Israel’s problems should be through the army or through political agreements. But MESHI participants carry within them the flames of loved ones who were lost in all the previous conflicts, and the pain and empathy they feel for the families who have more recently lost those they care about know no limit.Hirsch adds, “Many of the people who come here feel that they made a contribution to the founding of Israel, whether they came as new immigrants and went to one of the settlements on the border, or they cultivated the land. The state was founded with a real hope that this would be a safe haven for Jews. The realization that this is still so far away from us is very difficult. For them, this is the real pain. It’s essential to keep hope and to rebuild it; we cannot afford to lose it. This is what we are trying to do.”In one of the art classes for MESHI members, participants sit and construct mosaics. As they put together the fragments, they enact a bigger metaphor. This is what Yad Lebanim does; it pieces the fractured back together, so that the memory of Israel’s sons will forever live on, and their families who remain here will always have a place to go for comfort and community.Hirsch says, “I’m the first Sabra generation in my family. My mother came from Germany and my father from Ukraine. I was born already into an established state, but within the first 10 years.“To my generation, the phrase ‘Yad Lebanim,’ meaning hand of the sons or memorial of the sons, if you heard that, you felt it’s something sacred, like when you enter a synagogue.“I brought a lot of respect with me to what I do. To me, it was an opportunity to deal with a real social issue in Israel and something that I think is very important.”
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