The trauma inflicted on the residents of Southern Israel doesn’t just “go away” and children are particularly vulnerable. For nearly a decade, Connections and Links has initiated programs in conjunction with and under the auspices of the Sdot Negev Resilience Center to teach coping skills to children, parents, and their communities.

Hitachdut of Olei Britannia (HOB), a long-established group of Anglos who made aliyah and Connections and Links-From Trauma to Resilience, an Israeli non-profit organization dedicated to providing resilience training to the children of Israel teamed up to conduct an unusual tour of Southern Israel and show support for its children.

The tour of Southern Israel, coordinated by David and Esther Miller of HOB and aided by Judy Spanglet, MSW, executive director of Connections and Links featured a visit to the Beit HaGeddi School. There HOB members met the first-grade class completing a year of resilience training using Treasures of the Winning Couple, a mind-body integration program presented by Connections and Links.

Weeks before their visit to Beit HaGeddi School, HOB took upon themselves to raise the funds to redesign, print and distribute a new, 2019 edition of the Treasures of the Winning Couple Card Collection, an important tool in the resilience training program. Then, during their visit to the school, the HOB group presented a packaged Card Collection to each of the first-grade students. In turn, each student presented each member of the HOB group with a rose to express their gratitude.

Following the presentation of gifts, some of the first-grade students and their parents spoke to the group and explained what the resilience training means to them. These six-year-old children were able to describe their own trauma and how they deal with it using the resilience tools they have learned. They shared drawings illustrating their experiences as they spoke openly about their feelings

Perhaps the most moving moment of the encounter was when a mother of one of the students expressed her deep gratitude to HOB for the donation of the Card Collections. This mother went on to explain how during the last series of rocket attacks, she was highly impressed with the way her first-grade daughter was able to calm herself with a “self- hug”, one of the techniques from the Treasures of the Winning Couple program. Now, with the Card Collection - and her daughter’s help - this mother plans to learn these resilience techniques to help herself and members of her family cope with stress and trauma.

This was the first collaboration between HOB and Connections and Links. 

Seven hundred incoming rockets in 48 hours, countless red alert sirens, running to and sleeping in safe rooms/shelters, seeing damaged homes and shrapnel in the streets inflict invisible trauma on the nervous system. Children feel isolated and are negatively impacted. Their self-esteem, performance in school, and interpersonal relationships are affected. HOB and Connections and Links plan to continue to help these children cope. 

Judy amd Rabbi Mark Spanglet served as shalichim in Baltimore from 1981-84. The Spanglets have five married children and their young families livning in Israel. Two children and families are living in Sderot, daughter Sari is married to Sderot Deputy Mayor Elad Kalimi.

Connections and LInks