An uplifting and appreciative event was held this week at the Bnei Brak Mayor's Office, when city officials gathered for a special meeting to commemorate and salute 75 years of activity of the Yad L'Achim organization - the organization that has been at the forefront of the struggle and success against the missions and sects for decades.
The special meeting was led by Mayor Hanoch Seibert and the Municipality's CEO, Israel Ironstein, who hosted in their office the top management of Yad L'Achim, department directors and senior activists, alongside the dedicated department coordinators.
The yeshiva opened with a moving historical overview of the circumstances surrounding the establishment of the organization 75 years ago in the city of Bnei Brak, by the great founder, a man of dedication, the late Rabbi Shalom Dov Lipshitz.
An activity that began from a small room in the house of the city's unforgettable Chief Rabbi, the late Rabbi Yaakov Landa, who from the very first moment extended his patronage to the activities of the organization that stood in those early days in the fateful campaign for the spiritual absorption of Yemenite immigrants, against the injustices inflicted on them in the camps.
Since then, for over seven decades, the organization's activists have literally saved thousands of souls. Tens of thousands have entered religious and ultra-Orthodox educational frameworks, and many thousands have been rescued from the clutches of the mission and returned to the bosom of their Father in Heaven and to their quarry, all while saving souls in both spiritual and physical dangers.
In warm words delivered by Mayor Hanoch Seibert, he expressed his deep excitement and emphasized the wonderful privilege of the city of Bnei Brak to have housed the headquarters of the holy organization for all these years. "The city of Bnei Brak has been blessed by having this holy and sublime organization operating among its citizens. Over the years, thousands of residents have benefited from and participated in the uplifting activities of Yad Laachim. This is a source of immense pride and honor for our city. This holy activity, most of which is done in modesty and secrecy and away from the eyes of the beholder, saves entire worlds.".
Rabbi Shmuel Lipshitz, one of the leaders of Yad L'Achim, moved those present with his words when he linked the flourishing of Torah in Bnei Brak to the divine assistance that advances the organization's activists in the field every day and hour: "The Yad L'Achim organization draws its full strength from the power of the Torah of Bnei Brak. The city, steeped in Torah, in the sacred yeshiva halls, in the kollels and in the midrash houses, is the beating heart that provides the power. Torah for its own sake connects the souls of tens of thousands of Jews to their Father in Heaven. The thousands of hours of study and the Torah privilege of the City of the Torah and the Hasidism, connect and sustain the activity and bring about such miracles.".
During the festive meeting, the head of the Department for Combating the Mission, Rabbi Yoav Robinson, also spoke, reviewing some of the emergency operations and the challenges currently facing them. Rabbi Chaim Eisenberg, one of the activists' senior leaders, also raised a number of practical ideas for expanding cooperation between the municipality and the organization.
The mayor warmly welcomed the initiatives and promised that the municipality will stand by the organization in whatever is necessary to raise its voice and assist in continuing the work of kindness and rescue.
The climax of the event was recorded when the mayor presented the Yad L'Achim management with a magnificent certificate of appreciation on behalf of the residents of Bnei Brak and Francia, expressing deep and moving appreciation for all the activists and workers who work day and night, for the common good and the individual, to bring out the precious from the perishable, to fight back against the perpetrators of the covenant, and to bring our brothers, the children of Israel, closer to their Father in Heaven.
