Dear Friends,

As the summer approaches, we part from our twelfth Sela group. They have completed nine full months at Ibim, and are now prepared to continue on their path to an Israeli adulthood, wherever that may lead them – the IDF, university, or employment. They came nine months ago fresh from high school and enthusiastic, yet anxious about taking on a completely different society, climate and culture. They leave us with a new language,

Saying goodbye to the Selah students with gifts and good wishes.

a new future and a solidly Jewish Israeli identity.

As the Selah group departs, we are preparing for three new groups of program participants to settle in the Village over the summer months: another Selah group, Ofek 6 (Ethiopian students preparing to complete their matriculation exams), and a group of Israeli students from Sapir College who will work with our immigrant students – totaling approximately one hundred individuals.

Ibim has recently inaugurated the opening of a second-hand, community store "Country Home", and our students recently took part in the organization of the Sapir College Student Union's" Culture Day".

I hope that following the visit of JAFI Director General Moshe Vigdor in San Diego, you will find a spirit of renewal and a growing bond with the surrounding community.

Best Regards and Wishes for a Good Summer,
Soni Singer and the entire staff of
the Ibim-San Diego Student Village

Skip the Mall:

Community Organizing on Ibim

Given the trendy name "Country Home," a "community" store was opened at Ibim. Housewares, linens, apparel, cosmetics, office and school supplies – some new, some used – are now available to our students at one shekel per item. The store is a joint project of Ibim and the Rector's Office of Sapir College, and both Ibim students and Sapir College students took on the task of soliciting for and collecting the items. Open for business twice a week, the store is managed by students and will prove more than a mere convenience to Ibim students, most of whom have a quite meager dispensable income.

Heading North

Although situated squarely in the middle of the country, the northern Negev is still by all accounts, "the southern" periphery. The vast majority of Israel's population resides north of Ibim. For the Selah program's final trip, the students headed north for two itinerary-packed days in a startling variety of geographic locales. They began in mountainous Jerusalem, and then descended below sea level to the Sea of Galilee and the verdant Jordan Valley.Then, crossing west over the rolling hills of the Galilee, the students reached the Carmel Mountains and Haifa.

In Haifa, at the Aba Hushi Student Absorption Center, the students took part in a scholarship awards ceremony in memory of the fallen soldier Alexey Naikov. Alexey had been a student at Ibim and was killed in the Gaza Strip in 2001 while serving as a soldier in the IDF. Our own Natalia Yochina was awarded a 1000 NIS university scholarship for academic excellence and social involvement.

Prettifying a Harsh Reality

As promised, Ibim's new "safe unit" modules have been painted, prettified and make the best of an unfortunate situation. We hope the units will need to function only as scattered murals, rather than in their intended purpose – as a safe refuge from rockets and other items of destruction the Hamas lobs over the nearby border at civilians (us).

For more information about Ibim-San Diego Student Village:
Contact Soni Singer, Director, SoniS@jafi.org