Israel Active

Israeli entrepreneur Shari Arison launched Good Deeds Day (GDD) in 2007 (reported previously). Many Israeli hi-tech startups organized volunteering activities for GDD 2021. They included Elad Software, GeoEdge, Capitolis, Bezeq Online, Riskified and Urban Place.

Simon & Garfunkel’s Bridge Over Troubled Water in Hebrew, Arabic, and English. Performed by Israel’s “special” Shalva Band, the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, with top UAE musicians including singer, Tareq Al Menhali. Shalva’s 31st anniversary is aptly themed “Building Bridges to the Future.”

In honor of Good Deeds Day, the pilot’s seat of EL AL’s Boeing 737 flight simulator was replaced with a wheelchair. One young woman and three young men from ADI Negev-Nahalat Eran and ADI Jerusalem, each enjoyed 60-minute flight instruction simulations.

Israel has donated two more WaterGen water from the air devices to Colombia (see for previous) – this time to schools in drought-ravished La Guajira. The area accounts for a disproportionate 20% of Colombia’s malnutrition fatalities among children under 5.

Some 60 Israeli and Egyptian officials and businesspeople recently held the largest bilateral meeting in the last two decades. The event in Sharm el-Sheikh aimed to expand economic ties in agriculture, desalination, textiles, food, tourism and much more.

Israel’s national emergency service Magen David Adom (MDA) not only saves lives around the world, but its Arab and Jewish medics are a model example of Israeli coexistence. Israeli-Arab blogger Nas Yassin (famous for Nas Daily - reported previously), shows the reality.

Israeli-Arab teen Mariam Fahoum led her Nazareth classmates in building a fully functional satellite. The students worked on the project for three intense years, including while fasting during Ramadan.

The Woman2Woman program set up by graduates of the IDF’s elite 8200 tech unit is to train women for positions in Israel’s booming hi-tech industry. The program will partner leading tech companies, including Microsoft Israel, Salesforce, Dell and General Motors.

60 residents of Colel Chabad’s centers for Multiple Sclerosis, were able to go on an outing from their rehabilitative residences for the first time in nearly a year. 90 staff members took them to the Galilee’s fully accessible Jordan Valley Village.

Israeli charity Afikim provides children-at-risk in Israel, and their parents, with tools to help escape the cycle of poverty through education. At 230 miles, Run4Afikim (R4A) is the longest organized charity relay run in the world. This year it has already raised over NIS 2 million.