On Sunday morning, on the 2nd February, we were fortunate to hear from Yocheved Ruttenberg, a 24-year-old American with an amazing “can-do attitude”.
Her brother was a lone Soldier serving in the IDF on October 7th 2023. When he called her to tell her the news of what was happening, her first thought was to get on a plane. Whilst her brother made his own way south to join his unit that morning, it took Yocheved 3 days to book and get on a flight having no idea what she was going to do, only knowing that she wanted and needed to help in any way she could.
Whilst there were plenty of opportunities and people who wanted to volunteer, she realised there had to be a better way of putting them together.
Using her marketing and psychology skills, she has built a platform that gives organisations the ability to quickly and easily reach volunteers & vice versa and engage all the organisations to work together for the greater good.
The platform allows volunteers with a few hours, odd days, a week to find out in one place quickly and easily where help is needed https://israelvolunteeropportunities.com or the Facebook Page Sword of Iron Israel volunteering https://www.facebook.com/groups/353201190423242/
The standout point is that the platform allows all agencies to promote where help is needed and for volunteers to mix and match what they do.
All our communities can learn from sharing information about events and working with other communities, which creates critical mass and maximum impact. Offering a variety of dates doesn’t detract but rather gives people the maximum opportunity to attend.
Sword of Iron also runs their own events, and this is where we can help. Their next big project is purchasing and delivering Purim Mishloach Manot to Soldiers. You can log onto their website and buy MM, which will be packed and delivered for you, or better still, take the opportunity to go and do it yourself.
Neil Sint
On behalf of the Stanmore Israel Group
