Injured IDF soldiers find healing in South Africa

NICOLA MILTZ

Grubin was attending a tea party for injured soldiers and Holocaust survivors in Johannesburg. He had been in the country as part of a delegation of former elite IDF soldiers who were all injured on active duty.

The Auschwitz concentration camp survivor, now wheelchair-bound, shifted something deep down in Grubin’s soul, and somehow just seeing her helped to make sense of the past few years of pain and suffering.

Grubin was stabbed in the neck in 2015 during riots. He, together with a group of injured IDF soldiers from an organisation called Brothers for Life (BFL), visited the country last month as part of an annual travel programme aimed at helping them heal.

“There are no words to describe the look on their faces when they saw each other,” said Mark Kadish, who has been involved with BFL for several years.

“These soldiers sacrifice everything for the sake of world Jewry, for the State of Israel, and to make sure there will never be another Holocaust. They do it without thought to loss of limb and life.”

Each year, the soldiers arrive here broken, both physically and mentally, but when they leave the country, after a week of being feted by caring host families, they feel like heroes and have a new lease of life.

“They arrive here as strangers; they go back as family,” said local organiser Mark Gordon, a board member of BFL who has been involved with the organisation for the past nine years.

The non-profit organisation is known as Achim L’Chaim in Israel, which literally means “brothers for life”. It is run by Israeli officers from elite units who have been injured during service. These combat soldiers are empowered to help recently injured soldiers to reclaim their lives and fulfil their dreams.

Johannesburg and Cape Town are two host cities involved in the programme. Host families “adopt” soldiers for a week, often forming lifelong friendships.

“They go home changed men who have hope for their future,” said Gordon.

Gordon and his wife Bendeta, together with 13 host families from Johannesburg, help to arrange the annual visits to the country. The Gordons decided to become involved in BFL to encourage their three sons to see the world through different eyes. “We wanted our boys to give something back and do something meaningful with their lives. This has opened their eyes,” said Gordon.

The host families dedicate a week of their lives to these injured men and “make them feel like absolute heroes for the sacrifices they have made”, he added.

Hayley Nathan, one of the Johannesburg hosts, told the SA Jewish Report: “When the soldiers arrive, there is this dark, heavy energy, and by the time they leave, not only have they made friends and a family for life, there is a lightness of being which is so tangible.”

The host families keep in touch with every soldier through WhatsApp groups, making regular contact each Shabbos, and on birthdays and special events in their lives.

From the moment the soldiers arrive to the minute they go home, they are kept busy, constantly interacting with different members of the community, and sharing their stories with young and old.

This year, 14 soldiers arrived on 14 February and left on 21 February. They went to the Lion & Safari Park near Magaliesburg, spent three days at a private game farm, attended a Havdalah concert, and enjoyed some nightclubbing, among other activities.

BFL aims to help the soldiers “put their lives back together”, said Gordon. There is a house in Israel called Beit Achim, (House of Brothers), where they are welcome to stay and attend various educational and support programmes. BFL support starts at the soldiers’ bedside in hospital and continues until they are back on their feet, and leading a productive life. BFL members are there to listen to the soldiers’ stories, and often introduce them to a community of other injured soldiers.

Gordon recalled the time Shay Greenshtein visited South Africa.

Greenshtein had suffered a severe head injury during an explosion in Gaza, ending his dream of serving his country in active combat. It left him a broken man. When he arrived in South Africa in 2012 as part of a BFL tour, he weighed 120kg and was a lost soul. His visit to the country and the ongoing support from BFL has turned his life around.

“Today, Shay is a triathlete, and he is married with kids. There are so many success stories. South African Jewry is on another level – these soldiers are made to feel like heroes. They come here as broken men and they go back new souls,” said Gordon.

After last year’s visit, one of the soldiers posted a letter of thanks to the Johannesburg Jewish community on the BFL website. He said: “We just finished our annual delegation to Johannesburg, and it was one of the most powerful, life-changing delegations in our history. Literally thousands of lives were touched, from young people to Holocaust survivors, to our BFL brothers, who saw with their own eyes both the impact they can make on Jewish people as well as the appreciation and love of the Johannesburg Jewish community… They treated us like heroes, and it gave our brothers the opportunity to see themselves through different eyes, which is the greatest kind of healing.”