Gila Yefet interviews Arlene Weisbart, Executive Director of Canadian Friends of Yad Sarah. Here, Arlene gives the audience a primer on the great work of Yad Sarah and its 7,000+ volunteers in Israel. Each volunteer makes it possible that those who live with deficits can live as normal a life as humanly possible. These are unparalleled acts of kindness! The organization assists people in every age group to live their best lives by providing home health care equipment for those being discharged from the hospital to those living with a permanent disability. The concept is that any Israeli of any religion, any political stripe can borrow the equipment for FREE or with a nominal charge. Once returned the equipment is sanitized, maintained, and lent out to another potential patient. This all began with the loan of a vaporizer over 45 years ago!

As the agency learns of new needs, they expand their inventory of goods and services to support the Israeli population.

Yad Sarah has services:

• for moms of newborns
• for children with cognitive and physical disabilities
• for counseling for the protection against domestic violence
• for legal counseling
• in the field of geriatrics – Yad Sarah has one of the leading geriatric programs
• for dealing with the elderly by staying connected in person and through a national call centre
• where people transcribe the life stories of Holocaust survivors
• that touch those in Druze villages, Christians and Arabs bringing them the same services as to the Jewish citizens.
• that have been used for some cross-border refugees

To enable tourists to go to Israel, even if travelers are physically challenged, our office in Toronto can liaise with the team in Israel and coordinate the delivery of the equipment required. Depending on the needs, the equipment can be delivered to the hotel of the traveler or the traveler and his/her party can be picked up at the airport with Yad Sarah’s special vans.

The pages of our website are full of initiatives Yad Sarah takes on every day to make Israelis’ lives better. We encourage you to look through our website and more importantly, we invite you to join us in financially supporting this very giving organization. The Yad Sarah slogan in Hebrew translated to Yad Sarah with a whole heart.