By Jessica Davis, JTNews Correspondent
Despite its own financial troubles, Seattle Hebrew Academy recently raised $10,500, enough to buy 20 bulletproof vests for children in Israel. The school was the top fund-raiser among some 170 schools worldwide participating in the vest campaign, Rabbi Shmuel Kay, the school’s headmaster, told students at a May assembly.
“I am so proud of you all for participating in this great mitzvah,” Kay said.
The school overwhelmingly passed its initial expectation to raise no more than $500, raising instead, $10,638.72. The seventh- grade class (24 students) collected the most money (about $7,200), mostly in small individual donations. The children presented the check to Barry Goren of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, who will send it on to the Chofetz Chaim Heritage Foundation, the sponsor of the drive.
The foundation is paying half of the cost for the $1,000 vests. The vests are mainly meant to protect the Israeli children on their way to and from school.
“You should be very proud of the mitzvah you have done,” Goren told the children.
Many of the students have strong connections to Israel, whether they have visited there or their families know someone who has died in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, said Kay.
“As Jews, we have an obligation to act,” the headmaster said.
Jeff Slotnick, security consultant for Setracon, Inc., a Tacoma-based security training company, demonstrated how the vests work. If someone wearing a vest gets shot, it is similar to getting punched. The vest saves the person’s bones from breaking. Slotnick told the students at the school assembly that although the vests would likely stop a bullet, they would only provide limited protection from bombs.
At the end of the assembly, the students prayed for those in Israel.