PHOTO LINK BELOW: Last Thursday evening at Rabbi Weinfeld’s shul in Flatbush, a number of Roshei Yeshiva got together to discuss the challenges facing one of the most overlooked groups of Jews in need in Klal Yisrael.

R’ Chaim Yehoshua Hoberman of Longbeach, R’ Malkiel Kotler of Lakewood, R’ Shlomo Feivel Shustal of Torah Temima, R’ Simcha Shustal of Stamford and R’ Elya Ber Wachtfogel of South Fallsburg met with representatives of Kollel America, R’ Shimon Flohr, R’ Shmuel Yosef Gutfreund, and R’ Leibel Tzalberger to address the needs of Americans living in Eretz Yisrael with no outside means of support. 

As part of a Vaad formed on behalf of Kollel America which also includes R’ Shmuel Kaminetzky of Philadelphia, R’ Ahron Schechter of Chaim Berlin, and the Novominsker Rebbe, the intention of the asifa was to highlight the suffering of Americans living with Mesiras Nefesh in Eretz Yisrael and finding a way to combat it.

Who are these people? Often they are people who left their families in America to learn in Eretz Yisrael, maybe with the promise of support for a time, maybe just because they recognized the kedusha of Toras Eretz Yisrael. They were born here, lived in our neighborhoods, but moved up to artzeinu hakedosha. They suffer worse than their Israeli counterparts because they are far away from their families, have no means of support, there are no jobs, and they never learned to “work the system” like their Israeli-born counterparts.

The general image in Eretz Yisrael is that “all Americans are rich.” We in the United States know that’s not true, but the poverty experienced by our brothers in Eretz Yisrael is beyond our comprehension. The Roshei Yeshiva spoke of cases they knew personally which are heartbreaking:

*Children leaving for cheder without breakfast and with empty lunchbags, who frequently stop at a neighbor’s home to plead for something to eat and take with them to school;
*Bochurim begging their Yeshivas not to have an off-Shabbos because there is nothing for them to eat at home;
*Mothers who wash clothes every night because each child has only one set of clothes which they wear seven days a week;
*Increasing numbers of children coming to hospitals with distended stomachs from undernourishment, by which time the damage is already done;
*Decrepit apartments crammed with children, where mattresses or blankets are laid out in the dining room each night because there is nowhere else to sleep.
*Thousands of miles away, without a connection to these people, we cannot begin to imagine the true state of affairs.  But it is our responsibility not to turn away from our brothers in their time of need.

As far back as one hundred and fifty years ago, when very few people were able to move to Eretz Yisrael, the gedolim of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries established funds from each country to be used to support their countrymen who had made the effort to live in our holy land.

Jews from Hungary, Galicia, and across Europe had pushkes into which they would put their kopeks, rubles and whatever other currency they had and the money was sent to their landsleit in Eretz Yisrael.  Batei Ungarn, for example, was built with donations from Hungarian Jews, as part of Kollel Shomrei HaChomos.

Though Judaism in the United States and Canada was a fraction of what it was in Europe, R’ Yehoshua Leib Diskin z”l established Kollel America as a means for North American Jews to support their compatriots who had the mesiras nefesh to move to Eretz Yisrael.  As Americans, these Jews have a halachic status of “Aniyei Ircha,” Jews of our own city.

Over the years, America’s Jewish prominence grew and so did the importance of Kollel America.  For a time it faltered under lack of management, but about a decade ago, some sincere and dedicated askonim got involved and today Kollel America provides for over 1300 needy American-Israeli families in Eretz Yisrael.  Unfortunately, while the list grows longer, the donations haven’t grown in proportion, leaving families with less and less help.

Kollel America spends very little money on advertising and avoids highly-commissioned collectors, ensuring that nearly all the money collected goes straight to those in need.  A proclamation will B’ezras HaShem be forthcoming from the Vaad which is expected to urge American Jews to give as generously as they can and to include Kollel America in their maaser and tzedaka-giving agendas.

YWN PHOTO LINK: Click HERE for photos.

(Jonathan Gewirtz – YWN)