Rabbi Aryeh Sokoloff of Kew Gardens Synagogue Adas Yeshurun made an abrupt decision to take the trip just two weeks ago. As he told Arutz-7, "it occurred to me that the plight of the Gush Katif expellees just didn't make sense."
"We had assumed all along that the government would not throw them out of their homes without taking care of them," he said. "But then I heard about a jump in the number of teens at risk, about the unemployment, about the lack of permanent homes, about the lack of concern for their remaining together as communities - and it just didn't make sense. How could it be? So I decided to go and look for myself."
Helping him come to this realization, the rabbi said, were three people: "I met with two Israeli emissaries representing the hareidi-religious public, who gave me some eye-openers, and I also received an important letter on this topic from Rabbi Pesach Lerner of the Young Israel movement."
Rabbi Sokoloff quickly made arrangements for a trip to Israel, packed up two suitcases worth of toys, clothing and other gifts for Gush Katif children, and set off.
His itinerary included almost every place in which the refugees of Gush Katif and northern Shomron landed throughout the country. They included: Kfar Nofesh Hotel in Ashkelon, Kibbutz Carmiya, Ashkelon (where he met with three people who have rented apartments on their own), Faith City near Netivot, Hispin in the Golan, Nitzan, Yad Mordechai, Ein Tzurim, Jerusalem, and Yad Binyamin.
The rabbi said he came away thoroughly impressed by their determination to remain together as communities, and shocked at the amount of help they still need. "The government should be helping them," he said, "but wherever the government leaves off, we in the U.S. will have to do it."
"They face many challenges in day-to-day life," Rabbi Sokoloff said. "They must try to retain normal family life, even though many of them are living in hotel rooms or in tent sites. Many of them don't have jobs and have not received their promised compensation money, and yet still - unbelievably - have to pay their mortgage on the houses that were taken from them."
"They feel disenfranchised and abandoned, they feel trampled upon, and they feel stripped of their dignity. At the same time, they have a burning desire to stay together, and have sacrificed much to do so, in the knowledge that this is no mere luxury; remaining together is their key to survival."
The rabbi was impressed by the school in Faith City (Ir HaEmunah):
"People there told me that it was the school that kept them going, and helped them retain a sense of stability. They tried to keep the Kollel [adult Torah study group] going as well, but the adults found that they couldn't concentrate, what with everything going on around them, and so they moved the Kollel to another place. But the children kept on studying - and psychologists said they were among the most well-adjusted of the expellees."
Asked what help he feels he can offer them, Rabbi Sokoloff said, "They need to rebuild their kehillot [communities] - and so we must initiate a program of 'kehillot building kehillot.' This of course involves money - but much more than money as well. I hope that we will be able to come through."
Among the burning issues he encountered was the need among former N'vei Dekalim residents for homes for families that are not eligible for government help. "These include recently-married young couples who never had a home in Gush Katif but who would naturally have built their home there, or families who rented long-term but never owned a home. A way must be found to provide them with the same caravillas - poor-quality temporary homes supplied by the government - that the other families have."
It was reported this week that 190 of the expelled families still live in the difficult conditions of hotels or tent sites. Some of them are scheduled to move to the Lachish area in a number of weeks, while others hope to move into caravillas in Ein Tzurim by the Passover holiday - eight months after the expulsion.
Almost 1,500 former Gush Katif residents are not working, of whom 600-650 are actively looking for work. "The others have not even 'gotten it together' yet to begin looking for work," said Zevulun Kalfa, who represents the N'vei Dekalim community in Nitzan.
Other needs, Rabbi Sokoloff said, include "medical bills, jobs - and even a Tu B'Shvat program at which the wandering families can finally get together and see each other again."
Rabbi Sokoloff spent this past Sabbath at the second-largest of the temporary Gush Katif communities - and possibly the most permanent. He was a guest in Yad Binyamin, home to both the Yeshivat Torat HaChaim community, originally of N'vei Dekalim, and the Ganei Tal community.
Torat HaChaim includes dozens of families who study there, teach there or otherwise wish to be part of the community. Some of the younger couples, however, and even some small families with one child, were not provided with the caravillas - and are forced to make their home in two refurbished dormitory rooms. "I was told that the yeshiva is short about 25 caravillas," the rabbi said.
Unlike Ganei Tal, whose residents plan to build their permanent community in nearby Chafetz Chaim, Yeshivat Torat HaChaim appears to be ready to settle in Yad Binyamin - between Ashdod and Beit Shemesh - for the long haul.
Some accuse the residents of contributing to their own problems by refusing to accept the possibility of an expulsion or to talk with the government. "This is nonsense," Rabbi Sokoloff said. "I was told by Atty. Yossi Fuchs of the Land of Israel Legal Forum that he told the government many months beforehand that even though this is the stance of the residents, this does not excuse the government from providing solutions for them. Some government officials said that they had prepared 800 apartments spread out in different areas - but that was a joke, since everyone knew that they had to remain together."
"In short," Rabbi Sokoloff said, "many in the U.S. were under the mistaken impression that everything was taken care of. The fact is, however, that many acute needs remain, and we must step in where the [Israeli] government has failed."
The leading organization helping the expellees is Lemaan Achai (For My Brothers).