The Chabad House that formerly served Israel's now-evacuated Gaza Strip unveiled a mobile library to cater to a string of families whose expulsion from the territory left them scattered across the country.
From their new home of Nitzan, a small town in the sand dunes north of Ashkelon where some 2,500 evacuees live, Rabbi Yigal and Tzipora Kirshnzaft – who arrived in the now non-existent Neve Dekalim 25 years ago – help take care of the needs of their former neighbors. They deliver hand-made matzahs for Pesach, conduct programming in nursery schools, host large public holiday celebrations and distribute charity to needy families who used to call the Gaza Strip home before the Israeli government evacuated the coastal strip of land in 2005 in favor of granting control to the Palestinians.
During the summer, they coordinate day camps in 22 different locations throughout Israel housing Gaza evacuees; their Chasidic music festival just a few months ago attracted thousands of people who "strengthened the people of Nitzan," said the rabbi.
But their newest project is the mobile library, a large delivery truck stocked with "books for adults and children, videos, CDs and DVDs, all religious in nature," described Kirshnzaft. It's route will include the tiny village of Bustan Hagalil on Israel's northern Mediterranean tip to the communities of Yated and Yevul along the country's southern border with Egypt.
The evacuees in these locations, said the rabbi, "are very alone. Very stranded."
He hopes the mobile library – an extension of a one they established in Nitzan with some 10,000 volumes and daily children's activities – will bring a little bit of encouragement to a group of people still struggling to settle.
"The Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, of righteous memory, sent us a letter 20 years ago explaining our role," he said, before quoting the letter, "to be happy and make others happy."
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