A Once Hungry Child Feeds 9,000 A Month,Elliot Resnick, <i>Jewish Press Staff Reporter</i>

"It takes one to know one," Abraham Israel told The Jewish Press.

As a young boy, Egyptian-born Israel ate in a soup kitchen in France for three-and-a-half years.

Thirty-five years later, after a successful business career in the United States, Israel moved to the Holy Land where he discovered shocking examples of poverty. Remembering his own hungry youth, Israel rented a storefront, employed a cook, and began feeding 17 people.

Today, Hazon Yeshaya - the name of Israel's soup kitchen, which he founded in 1997 - maintains 40 distribution centers that supply 300,000 meals a month. Most of the food's recipients are children - 80 percent - or elderly, including many Holocaust survivors. Seven percent are not Jewish. Servicing non-Jews "causes a lot of good will," Israel said.

Hazon Yeshaya also offers free dental care to 1,600 people a year (although Israel would like to expand this service by 3,400); vocational training in computer skills, office management, bookkeeping, hairdressing, cosmetics and other occupations, for which 1,300 people annually receive government-issued diplomas; after-school programs for poor children which service 6,500 daily; and free weddings and bar mitzvahs.

Hazon Yeshaya Director Abraham Israel with a grateful child

"It's a fantastic feeling when you put a smile on a child's or a Holocaust survivor's face, when you're instrumental in bringing comfort to their lives," Israel said.

Unique among soup kitchens, Israel said, Hazon Yeshaya's doors are open 365 days a year, including Yom Kippur (for children, the sick and the elderly who cannot fast), Sukkos and Pesach.

Additionally, only seven people in the entire organization are paid, the highest salary being $1,500 a month. Israel's office is not air-conditioned, nor does the company own a car. Volunteers from Israel and abroad fuel the organization's activities.

Finally, feeling a responsibility to donors, Hazon Yeshaya investigates each recipient to ensure that he or she is in fact poor.

"We're the most businesslike-run non-profit organization," Israel said.

In total, Israel expects this year's budget to exceed $14 million. Taking no salary, he personally spends six months a year fundraising. The government provides no help.

Although he says he never worked harder in his life, Israel said he's on "cloud nine. I hope no one wakes me up. A person can be Bill Gates but it can't bring you happiness. Only helping others brings happiness."

Forging ahead, Israel hopes in two weeks time to open Hazon Yeshaya's largest facility yet in Ashkelon, which will distribute 4,000 meals a day. And as soon as he can secure the funds, h hopes to erect a 120,000 square foot building in Jerusalem, which will allow Hazon Yeshaya to expand its activities.

We have a responsibility, Israel writes on www.hazonyeshaya.org, to help "those who will one day build [the Jewish state's] future - but only if they have enough to eat today."

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A Once Hungry Child Feeds 9,000 A Month , Elliot Resnick, <i>Jewish Press Staff Reporter</i>