Israel Active

For the second year in a row, the Galilee Druze town of Beit Jann achieved the highest rate (99%) of students passing the high school matriculation exam. The Arab village of Abu al-Hija, outside Karmiel, came in second.

The ten-person team from IsraAID was the only foreign organization in Louisiana aiding flood victims.  They related the gratitude of Louisianans for Israel’s role in recovery efforts, especially that they had come such a long way to help them.

Israeli Foreign Ministry’s MASHAV (Agency for International Development Cooperation) is constructing the Rwanda-Israel Center of Excellence for Horticultural Development near Kigali. It will serve as a hub for agricultural training, using Israeli farming technologies.

Yehia (nicknamed Yaya) is the 16-month-old son of Afghan refugees living in Pakistan and is a walking miracle. Pediatric cardiologists from Israel’s Save a Child’s Heart performed a complex eight-hour operation on Yaya on July 31. The story of Yaya’s journey to Israel is fascinating.

Wisam al-Jamal, a Palestinian Arab doctor from Hebron, writes about his work in an Israeli hospital.

Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs participated in a 4-night backgammon (or “shesh besh”) tournament in Jerusalem.  150 attended the first night and even more on the second.  Different perceptions of the rules caused endless light-hearted disputes, but no conflict.

The Citi Foundation is investing around NIS 1.5 million in PresenTense Israel, a company that encourages social entrepreneurship and technology in Israel’s minorities and the disabled. It will help PresenTense’s programs for Israeli-Arabs in Haifa and Jaffa.

The BBC has highlighted the increasing number of Israel’s ultra-Orthodox Haredi Jews who are proving successful in Israel's tech start-up sector.  Quite positive for the BBC.

When Israeli violinist Itzhak Perlman donated his $1 million Genesis Prize to disabled projects, it inspired a matching $1 million grant from the “Breaking Barriers” program of the Jewish Funders Network. Another $1 million was donated by Roman Abramovich.

In 2002, there were only four Ethiopian-Israelis working in the Israeli high-tech scene. Today, over 400 young Ethiopian-Israeli professionals are pursuing careers in Israeli high-tech firms, thanks to training by Tech-Career - an NGO founded on Kibbutz Nachshon.