The Jewish Community Center of Greater Baltimore, with support from The Associated: Jewish Federation of Baltimore, has been helping kids connect with Israel for years by sponsoring shlichim to work as counselors at J Camps each summer. But it’s clearly not just the campers that “fall in love” with these Israeli emissaries, but the host parents as well.
This past summer, Howie and Martha Cohen volunteered to take in not one, but three Shlichim to spend nine weeks living in their home.
Whose idea was it to host the shlichim? Martha: After he explained the program to me, I felt that it was really important to do. They are really like ambassadors for their country. And what they’re doing while they’re here, which is being with all of these kids, I just thought, well, why wouldn’t we do this? It just made sense.
Share an example of how they are Ambassadors for Israel.
Howie: I’m semi-retired. We have dogs and a beautiful piece of property with two empty bedrooms. Years ago, somebody sent me an email that said the Owings Mills JCC was looking for a medic for the summer. We learned about the shlichim program and volunteered our first summer to host two Israelis for two weeks. By the second summer we were hosting for at least a month. This past summer we had three shlichim, all summer long.
Martha: They are very proud to be Israeli and it’s just lovely. We had taken them to a 4th of July parade in Hereford County and there were people sitting near us who didn’t know anything about Israel. They did such an admirable job of explaining their country. It brought me to tears. It was unbelievable. So, for us having these kids here is a joy, pure pleasure.
