Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/emmajane/58701026

Whilst visiting Israel I had the privilege of visiting three amazing municipality ‘moadoniot’ (after school centers) set up specifically for children in danger.

A knitting circle had been established by Lorna Toube and Shirley Frenkel of Rishon Lezion's ESRA group; but knowing how to distribute sweaters to these children was difficult. Three members of ESRA approached the municipality to ask them how to reach children who would benefit from these delightful sweaters. They were directed to the after school centers within Rishon that the municipality runs and so the Chanukah knitting program began.

ESRA has a very active branch in Rishon Lezion. Throughout the year its members had been busy knitting sweaters for children and this week I joined three wonderful ladies, Janet Kiesari, Lorna Taube and Lucille Reef, who invited me to accompany them to Chanukah parties for these children. The ladies from the knitting group had hand-knitted 140 sweaters in different colors, styles and sizes.

The excitement of these children was palpable. They, with their bright and shining faces, come from deprived and abusive homes and never have the opportunity of being shown kindness and generosity such as ESRA gives on a regular basis wherever needed.

The second center we visited was for older children, who were so appreciative of what was being done for them. Each one stood up, introduced herself or himself, stated which class she or he was in and why they all enjoyed coming to the center. The children are provided with a cooked meal each day, play with educational toys and are supervised by loving volunteers whilst they do their homework. They are cared for five afternoons a week, until they are collected to go back home in the early evening.

The teacher in charge of this center is devoted and committed to helping these children and each child benefits enormously from this environment. The children ask for nothing other than love and kindness, and the commodities that are in short supply at home, but which are given to them in abundance through the help and generosity of the wonderful ladies from ESRA. The children were so excited when they were given sweets and doughnuts, creating a party-like atmosphere. The sweets and doughnuts had been donated by various companies who were only too delighted to share in the mitzvah of helping these children.

Although I only participated in three of these parties, there were about nine other Chanukah parties, thereby giving pleasure to at least 140 children.

We all left these centers feeling very humbled by the cheerfulness and joy these children felt and showed us strangers who had taken the time to give them something new for themselves without asking anything in return.

Ruth Heller is from London.