YESHA consists of 140 yishuvim with a population of tens of thousands of children. The following programs will initiate a phase of services provided to a core of five yishuvim---Elon Moreh, Itamar, Har Bracha, Kfar Tapuach and Yitzhar---that have an approximate population of 1,500 children.
Psychological Counseling for the Children of YESHA
The purpose of this program is to provide psychological couseling for children who are living under constant physical attack and emotional stress due to the traumatic events which they face on a daily basis. We are speaking of children whose homes, cars and school buses are the targets of Arab snipers day and night. Their classmates are orphaned and maimed, their parents may be the victims of terrorist attacks and their teachers and rabbis have been murdered or wounded.
Professional psychologists, such as Miriam Adahan, have determined that both children and teachers are in need of serious crisis and ongoing counseling from trained professionals. Children living in YESHA have come to see the life of terrorism, death and daily threat of harm as normal and have little awareness that they suffer from classic symptoms of stress disorders and post traumatic stress disorder. For example, when an elderly neighbor passed away from natural causes, a six-year-old asked his father---who murdered him? A ten-year-old girl is terrified of taking a shower for fear of Arabs coming into her home and her having to run away naked. When asked what she would want if she could be granted any wish for herself, an eleven-year-old stated that she would wish for the father of her classmate to be returned to his family alive (he had been murdered by Arab terrorists).
1. The children of YESHA need the following immediate help:
A visit by a psychologist once every two weeks for group therapy
One psychologist can be assigned to every two yishuvim to treat all children adequately.
Children who have been personally traumatized will receive one-on-one counseling.
Transportation for the psychologist (bullet-prrof vehicle)
Cost for this program is $6,000 per month
2. Initiate a program to help children increase self-confidence and self esteem. To provide a constructive framework for diffusing stress, tension, fears and anger.
Self defense and karate classes for children
Cost for the program is $45 per month per child; transportation is $20 per month per child.
3. Provide children a source of fun activities which would help to create a feeling of normalization which has been lacking to them for an extended period of time.
Traveling movie-theater, including popcorn machine, soda machine, etc.
Cost for this program is $450 per event. Additional $150 for transportation.
This project will help us, with the help of G-d, to put smiles back on childrens faces and ease their lives and the lives of their families.
For further information about how you can help, please email us at: Help Yesha
"People will say, 'This very land, which had been desolate, has become like the Garden of Eden; and the ruined, desolate and demolished cities have ben fortified, inhabited!' (Yechezkel 36:35)
