Special-Needs Projects in Yeruham Receive the 2019 Germaine & Pierre Blum Foundation Award

“The fact that private people choose to donate to this project of ours makes me feel excited about the Zionist dream and the Jewish mission.” -Tal Ohana, Mayor of Yeruham
The Swiss Germaine and Pierre Blum Foundation endowment fund, jointly managed by KKL-JNF Israel and KKL-JNF Switzerland, awarded grants to two institutions in the Negev town of Yeruham: The Yitzhak Sadeh Community Center, which works with special-needs children, and the Yeruham Science Center, whose students developed a special ride-on scooter for children with physical disabilities.

 
On his visit to the southern city on December 24, 2019, Edgar Josefowitz, who serves on the boards of both KKL-JNF Switzerland and the Germaine and Pierre Blum Foundation, was given a warm welcome by Yeruham Mayor Tal Ohana.
“Thank you for helping us,” said Ohana in a private meeting with Josefowitz in her municipal office.
Ohana, who was elected mayor last year, elaborated on her goals to help children with special needs.

“We have created many infrastructures in town to help these children,” said Ohana. “I was very happy when the donation was announced. For me, the fact that private people choose to donate to this project of ours makes me feel excited about the Zionist dream and the Jewish mission.”

The Germaine and Pierre Blum Foundation is a Swiss endowment fund run in Israel in partnership with KKL-JNF Israel and KKL-JNF Switzerland. Each year the foundation gifts a financial donation to nominated projects for children with special needs.

Elisha Mizrahi, representative of resource and development division, and KKL-JNF wills and bequests director Itshak Mopsik accompanied Josefowitz on his tour around Yeruham, which included a visit to the scenic Yeruham promenade built with the support of KKL-JNF Switzerland, and to Yeruham Park.

“One of the important things that we will now be able to provide for children with special needs thanks to your donation is youth movements for them,” said Ohana.

Social worker Shani Tabib noted that the funds will also help finance newly created support groups for parents and siblings of special needs children. The support groups give the entire family access to holistic social care, which gives them the tools to face the unique challenges involved in raising special needs children.

“For the first time we will be dealing with the way having a special needs child impacts on the entire family,” said Ohana. “This is very innovative.”

Liuda Azran and Bat El Maman, mothers to children with special needs, said that the donation to the Yitzhak Sadeh Community Center would enable their children to participate in special after-school activities and receive transportation to school.

“Now, thanks to the donation, when my daughter is old enough next year she will be able to come to youth group activities here. I am very happy about that,” said Azran. “For me the fact that my child can come to after-school social activities and meet other children and grow and develop is very important.”

“I am very impressed with the work you are doing and with the story of the mothers. Though the stories are sad, I am in the end happy that with our financial assistance we can help you improve the situation,” said Josefowitz.

At the Yeruham Science Center, Josefowitz met with high school students who explained their work with developing drones and robots, some of which have received awards. Student Moriel Malinski said that they had created the ride-on scooter especially for children with special needs and have already sold a few dozen of them to kindergartens and schools for a nominal fee.

High school student Osher Azran also told Josefowitz about a special project in which students participate in teaching robotics to children in a neighboring Bedouin community. “They don’t speak the same language [as us], but they do speak the language of robotics”, she said.

“We want to give them equality like us. We have a lot of afterschool activities and we want to give them a chance to have that too,” said Azran. “We went there having all kinds of stigmas about the Bedouin, but when we got to know them we saw how they are children just like us.”