I knew that this year wintering in Israel was going to be vastly different. And I wanted to spend it volunteering.
The volunteer work we did during the Hadassah mission inspired me to build my own itinerary, one day at a time, one job at a time. With the help of the Swords of Iron Facebook page, I found many half-day and one-day opportunities to volunteer. Each place I went I made new friends, heard interesting stories and felt that I was part of something special.
Victoria, one of the young women on our mission had come to Israel because her cousin Elisha, age 38, was killed in a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) attack while on his tank fighting in Gaza. Victoria also stayed on after the mission and asked me to go to Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan with her to visit her cousin’s tank mate, Schachar.
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When we got to Schachar’s room, he seemed depressed. His English wasn’t great, so I translated a letter that Victoria’s grandmother had written for the wounded soldiers. He shared with us that the RPG that killed Elisha blew up the lower half of his leg. Schachar had been right next to him in the tank. We left with heavy hearts. The good news is that we found out later that he had recently gotten engaged, and I know he’s since been married.
My husband, Mike, arrived a few days later and we participated in some wonderful volunteer experiences together. On his first day, we prepped lunch and served soldiers from an officer training corps at Hativonit J17, a vegetarian restaurant in Tel Aviv.
We sorted donated clothing for displaced Israelis from the north and south at Eran’s Angels, a giant “chamal” (literally a situation room for a war effort). Eran’s Angels took over a giant parking garage at the Expo Center in Tel Aviv. There were mountains of clothing and housewares donated by local people and big-brand goods from the U.S. and Europe. I sorted women’s clothing while Mike was enlisted to bring a television to someone’s house.
In between our volunteering projects, we visited friends and sites that we love in the country. One special day we went hiking near the Egyptian/Gazan border. We saw over 100 trucks lined up, waiting to get through to deliver humanitarian aid. I can only hope that aid actually got to civilian Palestinians rather than being stolen by Hamas.
We enjoyed a wine and chocolate tasting at Tishbi Winery and met a woman who is the representative for Tishbi in Hong Kong. She’s native Chinese and married to an Israeli.
Another day we went south to volunteer with Reuven Marriott, founder of Israel Microgreens, at his farm in Shapir. On Oct. 7, he was visiting his family in England and the next day he was back in Israel with his unit in milium (on reserve duty).
We planted and watered microgreens, filled bins with soil, measured out seeds for future planting and cleaned bins. Because it’s a small operation, Reuven had to shut down initially while he returned to the army. Through the generosity of volunteers, however, he’s up and running again. I enjoyed the experience so much that I returned for a second day.
My last week, I joined a special challah-baking initiative for soldiers at the International Synagogue in Tel Aviv. Total strangers became friends. There was one young man I met, not Jewish, from Florida. He felt compelled to come help. We exchanged numbers and attended two barbecues for soldiers together—another volunteer program where a barbecue brigade comes up to army bases, rest stops and hospitals to provide meals for soldiers. The first one I witnessed was at Sheba Hospital. It was sponsored by a newly married couple as part of their Sheva Brachot (seven blessings) celebrations for the seven days following their marriage. Wounded soldiers rolled up in wheelchairs, many with missing limbs. (There’s a whole new generation of men and women now without legs.) We set up, cooked, served and cleaned. It was so special to be a part of this volunteer effort.
On one of my last days, I visited my dear friend “BG” (Barbara Goldstein). BG, a legend in Hadassah, is the former deputy director of the Hadassah office in Israel and now its ambassador-at-large. She staffed my trip to Poland and Israel in 2015 when I was a Hadassah Fellow. It was then that she whispered to me that I was the future of Hadassah. At the time, it scared the hell out of me, but her words became my reality as I’ve been on the Hadassah National Assembly for almost five years, working with young women through the national engagement division.
On my final day, I got a ride with a woman from Chicago to work at a horse therapy farm in the south. Of course, we found we had many friends in common as we shared our life stories and our passion for Israel on the way south. We fed and brushed the horses and mucked the stalls. The horses loved all the carrots and apples we fed them!
That evening, I traveled with a busload of volunteers to an undisclosed location next to Gaza to host a barbecue for soldiers. We could hear rocket booms not too far away.
We weren’t allowed to take photos, but I did get permission to take one with a young commander. We talked for a while and he told me that his unit, made up of primarily Bedouin Muslims, was heading into Gaza the next day. I gave him a hug and told him to be careful. He told me something very interesting:
מה שאנחנו עושים בצבא זה מובן מאליו
אבל מה שאתם עושים זה לא מובן מאליו
“What we do here in the army is obvious, but what you do isn’t obvious.”
What he was telling me is that Israelis grow up knowing that they’ll serve in the army; there’s no choice. But what we do by coming to Israel to volunteer and to support them isn’t a given. Still, we come.
It was profound for me to hear that on my last night. I realized that the Israeli friends I’ve had and the new ones I’ve just made are living their lives as usual but a piece of everyone is shattered. You can find the brokenness just below the surface if you stop and listen. Everyone has their Oct. 7 story.
Jody Comins is a member of the Hadassah Writers’ Circle, a dynamic and diverse writing group for leaders and members to express their thoughts and feelings about all the things Hadassah does to make the world a better place, to celebrate their personal Hadassah journeys and to share their Jewish values, family traditions and interpretations of Jewish texts. Since 2019, the Hadassah Writers’ Circle has published nearly 450 columns in the Times of Israel Blog and other Jewish media outlets. Interested? Please contact hwc@hadassah.org.
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