Receive Weekly Email Updates:
Share Your Blessings
SEE YOUR IMPACT
Fighting Poverty, Building Hope

The global drop in the economy has affected not only individuals, but entire municipalities that are unable to provide all of the social services that their citizens need. IFCJ donors have made it possible to fill that void by giving $6.5 million to Jerusalem and 140 other Arab and Israeli cities and towns. Read more


Attend the Press Conference in Jerusalem when Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein presented the mayor of Jersusalem with a check for $3.5 million to help hundreds of families escape poverty and become self-sufficient. Watch the Video

Project Facts:
  • 20% of all Israel households live below the poverty line, and 160,000 households receive income maintenance benefits.
  • To supplement faltering social service budgets, this is the seventh year IFCJ has supported an urgent-needs fund for cities and towns, including the capital city of Jerusalem.
  • With over $9 million donated already, more than 50,000 citizens in Arab and Israeli communities have received emergency assistance.
  • Part of the donation will help to fund a "From Dependence to Independence" welfare program that includes support for job training, tutorial aid for school children, and workshops on strengthening the family unit and contributing as productive members of society.
Press Coverage

Kol Israel Radio—
Reporter Mark Weiss interviewed IFCJ Director-General of Israel, Dvora Ganini, about IFCJ’s donation to help Jerusalem’s poor during a mid-day broadcast on 2-26-10 [transcript].

The Jerusalem Post—
IFCJ donates NIS 12m. to municipalities

Jewish Press International—
IFCJ donates NIS 12 m. to municipalities

Religion and State in Israel—
Jerusalem Municipality resumes cooperation with International Fellowship of Christians and Jews

Contributions totaling more than $6.5 million were announced in late February by Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, founder and president of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (IFCJ), to help fund the urgent needs of thousands of families in Jerusalem and approximately 140 other Israeli and Arab communities.

The largest portion of the donation, $3.5 million, was presented by Rabbi Eckstein to Jerusalem's mayor as a way of fighting poverty among Jerusalem's neediest residents and building new self-sufficiency programs. The remaining $3 million will go to 140 other municipalities to maintain "urgent needs" funds to be used at the discretion of social workers who help to supply thousands of poor families with basic products and services. Funds will be distributed based solely on need regardless of race or religious background.

The global economic crisis, which resulted in drastic government cutbacks throughout Israel, also plunged thousands more Israelis into poverty. Local councils have been unable to meet the desperate needs of their poorest citizens. IFCJ's generous donors have made it possible to triple the available government funding to help fill this void.



SEE YOUR IMPACT
Others Being Helped

Despite a lifetime fraught with unimaginable hardship and loss, Mazel, 25, is an incredibly strong and inspirational young woman. She was born in Ethiopia and was raised by her grandmother after her mother died and her father abandoned her. Read more

Leah, a 74-year-old widow, was never able to save anything for her old age. When her husband passed away shortly after he retired, Leah was left deeply in debt. Now, her sole sources of income are a small monthly pension and National Insurance payments. Read more