Building a living bridge

By GIL TROY

Canadian Jewish News, February 19, 2004

When do we go to Be’er Sheva?" our children kept asking during our recent trip to Israel. We were waiting for Israeli schools to resume after Chanukah. Our eight-year-old daughter Lia, a third grader at Akiva School, and our six-year-old son Yoni, wanted to visit their pen pals at Akiva’s "sister" school Ma’anit in Be’er Sheva, Montreal’s sister city.

On the appointed day, we dropped off both children at their respective classrooms with their lunches and improvised pencil cases. Lia, who had visited the year before too, ran off with her buddies. We did not see her again until school ended. She would later report that she learned English – they practised "Mom," "Dad," "sister" and brother" – as well as computers, science, art and Torah. Lia noted that one student, Ayub, an Arab, learned about the 10 Plagues with the rest of the class – a welcome reminder that Israel is more diverse and multicultural than the world acknowledges.

"It felt good to see my pen pal and my Akiva friends’ pen pals," Lia said. "It was special to see how they did things differently. It felt kind of strange because we were outside so much even though it was winter."

Our first grader, Yoni, had not yet met his pen pal, Re’em. When we entered the class, Re’em was having a tiff with a friend. When he realized that he had a visitor bearing a Montreal Canadiens shirt for him, he smiled and hugged our son. Yoni also learned English that day. He walked away impressed with how well Israeli kids speak English, having been swept up into a game of catch by some girls who insisted on practising the language on him. "I got to go to school while I was on vacation, which is kind of crazy," he said, itching to return.

The challenges facing Israel today have re-emphasized the longstanding question of how to develop friendships between North American Jews and Israelis. This school pen-pal program, part of the Jewish Agency for Israel’s Partnership 2000 program and sponsored by Federation CJA, is a model of mutuality. Through this program, our children have learned the values of tzedakah. Inspired by our visit last year, and regretting that birthdays often degenerate into materialistic gift exchanges, we began donating what we usually spend on birthday presents and bar mitzvah gifts to Ma’anit.

When invited to a party, we gave tribute cards instead of traditional gifts, explaining that the money would help sponsor Ma’anit’s art day, a lovely program endangered in this era of budget cuts. Similarly, a family we know just celebrated a grandfather’s 65th birthday by donating a resource room in his honour for special education teachers in Be’er Sheva’s Montreal-financed Greenberg Education Centre.

But more important than the little tzedakah we have given is the invaluable gift we have received. We have found real friends in a real country beyond the headlines and beyond the abstractions, and we have forged a special connection to one group of kids in one school in one community. We have also seen Birthright participants befriend students from Be’er Sheva in their short visits to the city, and some even made aliyah there, either individually or as part of a garin, a group of magshimim (fulfillers). We have seen friends such as Nancy Gold and Andrea Freedman return glowing from a week of chores to help establish a new pioneering community called Givot Bar – we dare not call it a settlement – outside Be’er Sheva. In the traffic back and forth between our two cities, we have learned that more is more: the more you give, the more you get, and the friendships flourish.

Hanging on one of Ma’anit’s walls is a peace quilt with patches made by dozens of different Akiva families quilted around the slogan "Am Echad, Lev Echad" – one people, one heart. We feel proud to be a part of a people who build bridges of peace with each other, and even now, amid such troubles, seek to create a common constructive language of love and friendship. Our two oldest children are already preparing the return visit – and our two youngest, pre-school children are clamouring to get in on the act. We are thrilled to oblige – for our own sakes.

Gil Troy is Professor of History at McGill University and the author of Why I Am A Zionist: Israel, Jewish Identity and the Challenges of Today.