Israel Active

An optimistic article that describes how local Palestinian Arab community leaders worked with Jerusalem mayor Barkat to improve security.

Matav, Israel's nursing care non-profit, and Tech for Good, which supports social impact investment, are setting up an incubator for startups developing products and services for senior citizens. The incubator will focus on solutions that extend the time that senior citizens can live at home.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was flown by an ultra-Orthodox female pilot to Thessaloniki, Greece for a trilateral summit with Greek and Cypriot leaders. Nechama Spiegel Novak was the first ultra-Orthodox female to co-pilot a trip for an Israeli prime minister.

Nonprofit social startup ITWorks promotes diversity in the workplace by helping adults living in Israel’s social and geographic periphery to realize their professional potential. ITWorks sets up courses, boot camps and hackathons for women, Arabs, Druze, Circassians, Haredi and the disabled.

The Jerusalem Municipality just launched a new website in French that includes all municipal services, information on absorption in Jerusalem, information on immigrant activities and additional services for French speakers. There is already an English site.

Israeli humanitarian aid organizations IsraAID and iAID have gone to Texas to help residents of Austin and Dallas suffering from the devastation of Hurricane Harvey.  IsraAID will offer trauma counseling and help clean up debris and salvage belongings from flooded homes, whereas iAID will support the National Guard.

I reported previously on Israelis with cerebral palsy who applied to and were accepted into the Israel Defense Forces.  Here is a 4th “Special in Uniform” – Lotan Aroch, who has just completed her 18 months’ service in the IDF. And Daniel Defur became the first blind Israeli to serve in the IDF.

The Israel Rescue Coalition has just flown a team of the United Hatzalah Psychotrauma and Crisis Response Unit to Houston, Texas. It is led by Jerusalem therapist Miriam Ballin, a Haredi woman who founded the pioneering psychological first aid unit.

Israel’s Embassy in Vietnam is donating 100 innovative wheelchairs especially designed for children with disabilities. The Embassy used the budget for Israeli Independence Day celebrations to buy the lightweight wheelchairs from Israel’s “Wheelchairs of Hope.”

StandWithUs sponsored the 2017 Israeli High School Debate Team which recently competed in the 29th annual World Schools Debating Championship in Bali, in (Muslim) Indonesia. The team finished 13th in the world, winning 6 out of 8 initial debates.