Press Release
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THIS IS OUR QUEUE / Motty Rosenblum
They stand waiting for hours, frozen-faced and weary-eyed.
Hundreds of old women marked by years of sadness and younger ones to whom
poverty and hunger are still new - from Russia, Siberia, the Ukraine and
Kazakhstan. These are women from Ethiopia, Argentina, North Africa,
Uzbekistan, White Russia as well as native Israelis of course.
They are standing in a long line and waiting.
The line is long, the hours crawl by and the children are hungry. They are
holding bags of all kinds – large sports-type shoulder bags, checkered
mini-suitcases on wheels, huge plastic bags and nylon bags from the
supermarket.
They stand for hours and wait for the “Lev HaChesed” charity operation to
start distributing food items. Hundreds of poor families with thousands of
hungry children are dependent upon a food basket for the Sabbath, which may
also provide them with leftovers for the week to come.
Around the huge line - which blocks the center of the crowded street on
weekdays as well - there are many other thousands of people finishing off
their shopping for the eve of the Sabbath and gazing inquisitively at those
who are waiting in the constantly growing line.
Taxi drivers stuck in the traffic jam open their windows and ask what is
going on, what is being distributed or whether anybody was hurt and then
proceed to attend to their business.
It is not their line.
That is how it looks every Thursday, on a main, bustling street in the
center of the City of Rishon Lezion and the year – may we remind you – is
2004.
Social Services and the public establishment have given up. The authorities’
severe budgetary problems and an ongoing economic crisis are to blame for
this sad and dreadful spectacle.
This led to the founding of the “Lev HaChesed” soup kitchen by Rishon
Lezion’s chief Chabad House along with many of the City’s inhabitants – both
religious and secular – who undertook to help with providing foodstuffs for
needy families.
Every Thursday, dozens of volunteers distribute food baskets to
approximately 1000 families, which amount to thousands of hungry mouths. New
immigrants and veteran families, the secular and the religious – they all
show up once a week at the “Lev HaChesed Mall” on Rothschild Street (yes, on
the street that bears the name of the well-known benevolent...), to get
their Sabbath food basket.
“Lev HaChesed” is not funded by any government or municipal source. The food
items distributed to the needy are the result of the generosity of the
City’s inhabitants and of those who do not reside in Rishon Lezion, but are
unable to stand aside and witness such a sad sight.
The “Lev HaChesed” volunteers, headed by Rabbi Yitzhak Grozman and
businessmen Mr. Ronen Zinger and Mr. Motty Aroasti from Israel and Mr.
Baruch Deutsch and Dr. Jay Gold from New York who are engaged in this divine
enterprise, cannot single-handedly light up the lives of these hungry
families. Many of us – in the city, in Israel and in the Diaspora – must be
partners to this major and vital endeavor because ultimately, we - the
Jewish People – share responsibility for one another. In fact, this is our
queue
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