Towers residents volunteer in Israeli military

In order to give back to the State of Israel while doing more than making a monetary donation, North Shore Towers residents Carolyn Dinofsky, Helen Frank, and Zona Schreiber volunteered with organizations that placed them with military divisions in Israel to do needed work.
As a teacher with summers off, Schreiber got in touch with Sar-el Volunteers for Israel in Manhattan. She first signed up for three weeks in 1993, going again in 1994 and 1995.
“I felt that this is a way of giving to Israel,” Schreiber said. “I think everyone should give to Israel in one way or another.”
Schreiber was assigned to an air force base, where she worked in a munitions factory. She said they were given a task and did that task every day.
Dinofsky also went to Israel through Volunteers for Israel. She volunteered in June of 2006 and spent her three weeks at a naval base in the northern part of the country.
“I went because I have always felt connected to Israel and I’m an ardent Zionist,” she said. “I felt that I should give of myself more than donations to the State of Israel.”
When Frank went to Israel in 1992 and did volunteer work with the army, it was through Hadassah’s Win Program. She had to go through medical kits to make sure that the medications had not expired. Frank at one point asked if they were just trying to find work for the volunteers and was told it was an important task.
“If they didn’t get volunteers to do it, they had to pay people,” Frank said.
During her service, Frank said she was also able to interact with children and at one point was volunteering in a nursery with new immigrants from Ethiopia. There was one little girl who became very attached to Frank, running to her when she got there and saying that she was her grandmother.
“It was a bonding [experience]. These children needed to be loved,” Frank said. “They had gone through terrible times and it was just beautiful to see the way these kids wanted to learn and wanted to know.”
All three women were required to wear uniforms while they were performing their volunteer duties.
“Whatever had to be done we were doing to make the lives of the young Israelis easier,” Dinofsky said.
Schreiber added, “That’s what it’s all about.”
The women had to pay in order to do their volunteer service in Israel, including their airfare. Schreiber said that at one point the soldiers on her base did not realize they were volunteers and thought that they were being paid. She said that when they found out the reality, they were taken aback by it and had a great deal of respect for the volunteers.
“They were very happy about it and sort of took us in as one of them,” Schreiber said.
Dinofsky, who is now an ambassador for Volunteers for Israel, explained that the idea for having volunteers came in the early 1980s when Israel was at war with Lebanon. Seeing a need for manpower, Israeli General Aharon Davidi came up with the concept of recruiting volunteers from the United States. Now, volunteers come from all over the world.
Schreiber said that all of the volunteers became friends through their shared experiences.
“We had a goal,” Schreiber said. “We were all very determined and very, very happy to be there in this heat to give to Israel in our way.”