Imagine bringing a fragile newborn home from the hospital. Now, imagine doing it while the piercing wail of sirens echoes through your city. Your husband has been drafted. Schools are disrupted, meaning your older children are restless and anxious at home. And at 3:00 AM, you are forced to grab your baby and your toddlers, rushing out of your apartment to a bomb shelter—sometimes outside your building—in the freezing dark.
This frantic rush can happen five or six times a night. In fact, Holon currently ranks second in the entire country for the number of sirens and the amount of time residents are forced to spend in bomb shelters.
This is not a nightmare. This is the surreal, everyday reality for new mothers in Holon right now during Operation Lion’s Roar.
In a time that should be filled with quiet bonding and healing, these mothers are operating on pure adrenaline and exhaustion. But they are not doing it alone. Shifra & Puah of Holon has completely transformed its operations, working around the clock to create a massive, unprecedented envelope of support for these families.
Because the needs have skyrocketed, the organization has dramatically increased its services to provide a lifeline in an impossible situation. Their emergency war-time operations now include:
Sheltered Playrooms & Shelter Kits: Shifra & Puah has set up dedicated communal playrooms entirely within protected spaces (Miklat). Volunteers and babysitters take the older children to these safe zones, engage them with activities, and even serve them dinner. In addition to these playrooms, the organization is distributing specialized board game kits for families to use in their own home shelters, ensuring that even when locked down, children have calming activities to distract them.
The Gift of Sleep: Exhaustion is one of the greatest threats to a new mother’s wellbeing right now. Volunteers are coming directly into homes to watch the newborns, allowing exhausted mothers to simply close their eyes and sleep in their own beds.
Sustenance for the Whole Family: The organization has massively increased its food distribution. Beyond the standard hot, nutritious meals for the parents, they are now preparing and delivering fresh sandwiches for all the older children who are stuck at home.
Physical and Emotional Relief: The stress of war takes a severe toll on the body and mind. Shifra & Puah is sending in cleaning help to keep households from falling apart, alongside professional doulas and massage therapists to help mothers release the immense physical tension they are carrying.
Mental Health First Aid: Recognizing the heavy emotional toll of the sirens and the absence of drafted husbands, the organization has launched dedicated telephone support lines and is conducting in-person home visits to ensure no mother feels abandoned.
Shifra & Puah of Holon is currently operating a 24/7 front line of chessed (loving-kindness). They are providing everything in vastly increased quantities, stepping in as the husbands, the schools, and the village that these mothers are desperately missing.
But this massive expansion of services requires immediate resources. They cannot sustain this around-the-clock war effort without the help of the global community.
Your prayers for our brothers and sisters in Israel are incredibly important, but we simply cannot sustain this life-saving envelope of support without your financial donations. Surely, you will not stand idly by during this critical hour.
The need is critical, and the time to act is right now. Your donation directly funds the hot meals, safe playrooms, and emergency babysitting hours that are keeping these families afloat. Step up for the mothers of Holon, relieve their impossible burden, and be the village they are missing today.
Click here to support the mothers of Holon and donate to the Shifra & Puah Emergency Campaign
