“It’s like a movie.”

“You have given me strength to go back.”

“I haven’t laughed this much in so long.”

“This is the first real joy I have felt since 10/7.”

These were just a few of the reactions shared with me since the Jewish Federation of Northeastern New York (JFedNENY) joined forces with Tali Roitman, the Jewish Agency for Israel’s Partnership 2gether Eshkol regional director, and Moshe Leiba, chief pedagogical and R&D officer of World ORT Kadima Mada, to bring 40 Israeli teens to the Capital Region of New York for an authentic American day camp experience and respite trip in July.

For 20 years, our partnership region of Eshkol has remained one of the hardest-hit areas in Israel, their communities suffering repeated violent attacks directed from Gaza. But the unprecedented events of 10/7 and its aftermath have strained even their resilience. 

After our appeal for the Fund for Victims of Terror, many people continued coming to us at JFedNENY seeking ways to help further. Volunteering services and making donations are meaningful and incredibly helpful, but we have learned from our partnership with Eshkol that nothing is more impactful than relationships. 

We knew that JAFI was sending Israeli kids to sleepaway camps in the U.S. and all across Europe. These kids have had the toughest year of their lives; many lost family members or friends and are suffering from unimaginable fears while dealing with uncertain living situations. Our impulse was to find a way to really hold them — to provide small opportunities for uninhibited joy, to give them access to surrogate parents who could lend a listening ear, to hug them close to ensure they knew how very important they are to all of us in the Diaspora. With all this in mind, we began to design a trip for 9th-11th grade Israeli teens that would give them the space and support to be exactly what they are: kids coping with national, communal and personal trauma.

Our partnerships with local organizations showcased their value when we called on Albany and Schenectady JCCs as well as Camp Givah to provide 10 days of free day camp to 40 kids and their seven chaperones. Each camp crafted special experiences for the teens, reconfiguring schedules and organizing trips to local attractions and events to create opportunities for building friendships. 

The ORT group participated in JCC Teen Camp programming and trips, while the Eshkol group came prepared to be camp leaders, serving as madrichim (junior counselors). They led the youngest campers in the morning and participated in camp activities in the afternoon. All the visiting Israeli teens swam, hiked, created artwork and experienced all that our day camps had to offer. Each camp also allowed the teens to craft lasting mementos of their time here as well as memorials for those lost on and after 10/7.

In the evenings, the teens would experience the support of the local Jewish — and sometimes non-Jewish — community. Congregations and organizations all vied for opportunities to sponsor activities like boat rides, pool parties, a drive-in movie night — and a minor league baseball game featuring the Tri-City ValleyCats. A Catholic parish even co-sponsored an interfaith minigolf and ice cream night! 

Local community members also showed up to engage with the kids, which was crucial; and the teens engaged as well, marching with our local Run for Their Lives group and creating art installations in spaces maintained by our partner organizations that depict their hopes for the hostages in Gaza. 

When it came to plans for the Fourth of July, we wanted to keep the festivities going, but we weren’t sure how kids who spent the past months hearing, seeing and feeling bursts of rockets and artillery would respond to the booms and bursts of local fireworks. We worried that the experience would cause their anxiety to spike and potentially aggravate PTSD symptoms. 

Given these concerns, one of our JFedNENY staffers arranged an amazing day at Lake George in the homes of incredibly generous donors. The visiting teens ate, relaxed, took boat rides and truly got away for the day. And as it turned out, many of them requested to attend the fireworks display downtown anyway, where they laughed and danced to music beneath the luminous displays with their host families.

As with all initiatives of this size and complexity, there was a tremendous amount of planning and details to arrange and prepare, and volunteers were going to be critical from day one. From the moment we hit send on the email with the volunteer sign-up form, we were uplifted by a torrent of support from folks who stepped up to support the program. Within the first week of planning, we had 75 locals on board and eager to seize the opportunity to welcome and embrace these teens — and that number only grew. People signed up for shopping and packing food bags, for being on-call as volunteer medical personnel, for hosting two to four kids for the full 10-day trip. They rushed to assist with driving, meals and evening activities. We had to bring on a volunteer just to help coordinate all the transportation needs for the trip. We called in one of our favorite local Microsoft Excel experts, and she created a full AirTable database for the trip to make managing the pieces easier! Everyone on our JFedNENY staff team jumped in to help with details large and small, and our local Israeli emissaries (shinshinim) got in on the action. Even community members who didn’t have the time to volunteer or space to host still financially contributed by donating to support the trip. 

We are already discussing making this program an annual experience and facilitating a teen trip to Israel in early 2025 to strengthen our newly cemented bond with this group of teens. The WhatsApp chatter is loud with gratitude and ideas. The trip was for the kids, and their thank-you cards highlight how incredibly meaningful it was for them — but it was also healing for us. Politics were put aside. Denominational divides were bridged. Lasting relationships were formed. Our community was unified by a singular purpose: to show these kids how valuable they are and how important our Jewish future is, and in the face of the worst hate Jews have faced in generations, to simply love.

K.B. Goodkin is the director of The LAB: Center for Learning And Belonging, the Jewish Federation of Northeastern New York’s deep dive into collaborative innovation, engagement and education.