African refugee boys get a new start in Israel

Some years ago, while out on jogs a mile and a half from the Sinai border, David Palmach, regularly saw traumatized refugees from Eritrea and Sudan dropping to the sand in exhaustion.

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The refugees had come overland from home countries torn by strife, and had made a long and dangerous journey to Israel, often by way of Bedouin torture camps in the Sinai desert, and past trigger-happy Egyptian soldiers. Up until two years ago, on arrival in Israel they were taken to prison-like facilities for lack of suitable alternatives. In 2010, however, Israel’s lawmakers decided to find ways to house and educate the many teenage boys among these African refugees and asylum-seekers. Palmach was one of the first to step in. Palmach, the director of the Jewish Agency for Israel’s Nitzana Educational Community today runs Tikun Olam, a special boarding school set up for teenage African refugees at Nitzana, an Israeli kibbutz near the Egyptian border. More...

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