ICEJ Responds to Appeal

On Thursday (10 July), the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem delivered two portable bomb shelters to the community of Kfar Aza along the Gaza border, which has been repeatedly targeted by Hamas rocket attacks over recent days. The delivery of the shelters came the day after an art school for the community’s children suffered a direct hit by a Kassam rocket from Gaza. The ICEJ’s Executive Director, Dr. Jürgen Bühler, was on hand today for the shelter deliveries as a show of solidarity with the farming village, whose 750 residents have endured hundreds of rocket and mortar barrages over the past decade.

“The Christian Embassy is committed to helping those Israeli communities under the greatest rocket threat to find shelter and weather this storm,” said Dr. Bühler. “It was a great feeling to be able to quickly supply these two new mobile bomb shelters for our embattled friends in Kfar Aza, and we are as grateful as they are for the Christians around the world who made it possible.”

Over the past seven years, the ICEJ has provided more than 40 portable bomb shelters to Israeli communities along the Gaza border suffering under frequent Hamas rocket attacks. The Christian Embassy is currently raising emergency funding from Christians worldwide to cover the costs for more bomb shelters and to meet the urgent social needs of those under the greatest rocket threat in the Gaza periphery.

This latest shelter delivery is the result of an urgent request received by the ICEJ on Tuesday from former MK Shai Hermesh for bomb shelters for his home kibbutz of Kfar Aza. Many residents were in the community dining hall for breakfast that morning when the Code Red siren went off five separate times, with rockets falling all around. But the dining hall does not have any bomb shelter, leaving everyone in distress. So Hermesh contacted the ICEJ with a request for help. The Christian Embassy immediately ordered two portable bomb shelters, which were delivered today.