Ahead of the upcoming holiday season where welfare officials are reporting that more Israeli families will require food assistance than in years past, the Jerusalem Pantry Packers charitable organization announced a record number of volunteers who came to their warehouse to package and prepare goods.

Over the course of July and August, Pantry Packers saw 4,480 volunteers at their facility who packed no less than 69,120 kilos of food. According to Rabbi Menachem Traxler, Founder and Director of Pantry Packers, this accounted for 138,240 individual bags of food that will be distributed over the course of the coming weeks.

Pantry Packers is an initiative of the Colel Chabad Charitable Organization, the longest continuously running tzedaka in Israel, founded in 1788 by the Alter Rebbe ZT”L, Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, who instructed his shluchim to set up the organization to benefit the small and struggling Jewish population in Eretz HaKodesh. Pantry Packers invites volunteers, many of whom are tourists, to come to their Talpiot packaging plant and be directly involved in the packaging process.

After packaging, the items are shipped to a central processing facility where they will be added to boxes containing pasta, oil, flour, canned goods and other items to celebrate the holiday – including a jar of honey. The family also receives a voucher to buy chicken and meat at a local grocer.

18,500 families will be receiving food staples for the holiday season, in addition to 81,000 fresh and hot holiday meals being served at the network of Colel Chabad soup kitchens around the country. Partnering with The IFCJ and Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, Colel Chabad http://www.colelchabad.org/ will deliver food to an additional 5,000 of Israel’s elderly.

While Colel Chabad has become one of the leading providers of charitable support in Israel, the organization also works directly with families to try to wean them off of the support. “Our message to recipients is that we will pledge to be there whatever the need but our main goal is to give the confidence and resources to become self-sustainable and get on the road to gainful employment and personal success,” says Rabbi Shalom Duchman, International Director of Kollel Chabad. “The greatest joy for us is when we can cross a family’s name off of our list.”

“The empathy, professionalism and caring for all is the true signature of Colel Chabad’s work,” said Eli Gilad, head of social welfare programming for the city of Ariel. “Since they became involved with the food security initiative, there has been a dramatic change in how the poverty stricken community is perceived, where the perspective has changed from ‘needy’ to ‘deserving’. Today, as a result of the professional and technologically advanced system they have set up, the whole realm of food security has become infused with compassion which is directed at these families. “

“The goal of Pantry Packers is to give people an opportunity to give back by engaging in caring for others in a way that is both fun and educational and gives people of all ages a feeling of real accomplishment,” says Rabbi Traxler. “This work becomes all the more important in the weeks ahead of Rosh Hashanah where the demand for our holiday food packages intensifies considerably.”

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)