Chana, a 34-year-old mother of six, simply does not have the
money to put bread on the table.
"Every time we seem to find a way that will get us out debt,"
she says, describing her financial situation, "we just seem
to fall deeper in debt."
While Chana's husband is working tirelessly to get his family
out of debt, Chana has been trying to earn money by clearing
and setting tables at a Jerusalem restaurant. She earns only
six dollars a day, which she uses to buy her children the
basic food staples: bread, eggs, and milk. But the money only
stretches so far.
Sometimes, for days at a time, her children are forced to
drink tea instead of milk. Once, on a good day, she gave her
young son a warm cup of milk that wasn't diluted with water.
"Ever since then," she says, "whenever he sees milk in the
house he thinks wistfully of that cup of milk I once gave him
and asks me for milk `like I once had.'
"I have to explain to him," she says, "that I can't give it
all to him; I need it to feed the rest of the family."
Chana's widowed mother, herself suffering from poverty, tries
her best to help Chana and her children. She receives clothes
for the children from charitable organizations, gemachim,
and sometimes, even from the trash bin. She then cleans
and mends them.
"One day, when my mother came to help me with the children,"
Chana recalls, "she made herself coffee and used the milk I
had saved for the baby. When I realized what happened, I
shouted, 'Ima, you took the baby's milk!'
"Then I burst into tears. Where was my kibbud em? I
forgot about it because I couldn't feed my baby."
Yad Eliezer, a Jerusalem-based organization that provides
weekly food packages, baby formula and cooked meals to
hundreds of needy families, has helped Chana tremendously
over the last few years. Each week her family receives a Yad
Eliezer food package that includes such basics as flour, oil
and rice.
"You have no idea how happy the children feel when we receive
a food basket," Chana says.
But while the basket is a big help, it is not enough. Chana's
children still suffer from hunger pangs on a daily basis.
Fresh fruits and vegetables, though necessary for every
child's diet, are a rarity for Chana's children.
"Fruit is a big problem for the children," says Chana.
"Sometimes, when we have fruit for Shabbos, my daughter saves
hers for Sunday and hides in it her lunch bag so she can take
it to nursery school like all the other children."
On another occasion, Chana's son was playing at the neighbors
and their mother gave each child an apple. Chana's son asked
for an apple and was told to go home and ask his own mother
for one.
"I know they didn't mean any harm," says Chana, "but my son
came home very sad and there was nothing I could do to dry
his tears."
In recent months, however, Chana has been able to give her
children fruits and vegetables on a regular basis, as a
result of a new system set up this year by the Center for
Halachic Agriculture that helps Israel's poor receive the
ma'aser oni that is rightfully theirs.
Several years ago HaRav Yosef Shalom Eliashiv issued a
ruling that since the mitzvah of ma'aser oni is still
applicable today, there is no justification whatsoever for
withholding the tithe from the poor.
Since then, the Center for Halachic Agriculture, which is run
by HaRav Yosef Efrati under HaRav Eliashiv's direction, has
been working to develop a method of reinstating ma'aser
oni as a viable means of providing assistance to the poor
people of Eretz Yisroel. This project is part of the
organization's overall efforts to raise the level of
observance and awareness of the mitzvos hatluyos
ba'aretz, of which ma'aser oni is but one.
This year, 5760, is the sixth in the seven-year agriculture
cycle, when ma'aser oni must be given. The center
launched its ma'aser oni project right after Rosh
Hashana this year.
Under the system, ma'aser oni -- in the form of produce
and cash -- is delivered by farmers and produce wholesalers
to nonprofit organizations such as Yad Eliezer, which in
turn transfer it to the poor.
This means that Chana, along with thousands of others, will
be receiving produce and cash valued at a total of 1.5
million shekels a month, or approximately $5 million in the
course of the year. And it is all a direct result of the
center's efforts.
What the Center for Halachic Agriculture is trying to do with
this program, explains HaRav Yosef Efrati, director of the
center, is to reintroduce into Eretz Yisroel the Torah-
prescribed methods of caring for the poor.
"With ma'aser oni," says HaRav Efrati, "the Torah gives
us clear guidelines on how to care for people in the
community who are less fortunate than we. And by instituting
this program, we're putting those guidelines back into
practice, recreating a social safety net to help Israel's
poor."
Leah, a 40-year-old mother of eight, is another one of the
many people the new system is benefiting. Leah's husband
suffers from a mental illness and cannot support his family,
who live in a cramped, two room apartment, with an outdoor
bathroom they share with their next-door neighbors.
While governmental assistance programs pay for water and
electricity and the children's schooling, Leah says she has
no money to pay for everything else. The biggest problem, she
says, is the lack of food.
"The children cry to me," says Leah, "that all the other
children come to school with a roll and chocolate milk, and
they want to know why they always go empty-handed.
"It hurts me so much that they are hungry and can't learn
properly," she continues, wiping the tears from her eyes.
"But what can I do? I just don't have the money."
Leah also receives weekly food packages and chickens, and she
says her children wait all week for the one small piece of
chicken they each get on Shabbos.
On a recent visit to the doctor, however, Leah was told that
her children were severely undernourished and needed more
iron.
"I cannot afford to buy fruits and vegetables," she says.
"Sometimes my neighbor gives me what's left over from her
children and I give it to mine, but it is not enough. My
little one never gets fruit, not a single banana or apple,
and he needs iron."
In the last two months, in addition to the food packages and
chickens, Leah has also been receiving fruits and vegetables
from Yad Eliezer through the Center for Halachic
Agriculture's ma'aser oni program.
A few fruits and vegetables aren't going to cure Leah's
children or solve all her problem, but she says it's making a
big difference.
"That little bit of food, those extra fruits and vegetables,"
says Leah, "bring a smile to my children's faces. I still
can't give them a roll and chocolate milk to take to school,
but at least I can give them apples and oranges, tomatoes and
cucumbers, along with their bread and eggs. Maybe the next
time I go to the doctor, my children will be a little bit
healthier."
