Rudy Giuliani and friend
Judith Nathan. |
ELEM
Saving Lives from
Life on the Street
Story and Photos by Tim Boxer
 IKE
the old friends they are, Jerusalem Mayor Ehud Olmert bounded
onto the dais and gave Rudy Giuliani a great bearhug at
Elem’s 20th anniversary dinner at the Pierre Hotel.
“Ehud is the mayor of the second greatest
city in the world,” the former New York mayor declared.
For his part, Olmert said Giuliani is the only
non-Israeli who is an honorary citizen of Jerusalem. “Rudy will be
a hero forever.”
Both men were honored by Elem, an organization
that provides social services for Israel homeless, abandoned or
runaway street children.
Olmert said he was elected in 1993 by
Jerusalem’s haredim [extreme Orthodox] just as Giuliani was
elected by New York’s haredim. After the elections, he came by the
Giuliani campaign offices and was struck by the hundreds of haredim
milling about, all garbed in black coats and hat.
“Tell me, Rudy,” Olmert said, “are these
haredim yours or mine?”
When Giuliani visited Olmert, he rode on Bus
18, a popular route for suicide bombers at the time.
Arnold and May Forster.
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“Rudy will remain a hero forever in
Jerusalem,” Olmert said.
In saluting Elem, Giuliani said he knows of its
good work through Olmert.
Olmert was introduced to Elem two decades ago
when he was a junior attorney in Jerusalem. Kenneth Bialkin
approached him on behalf of his wife Ann, founder of the
organization, to do volunteer work.
“Ann, a native of Nashville, a graduate of
Sarah Lawrence, and a trained social worker, had a dream of giving
the children of Israel the same opportunities as the children of New
York,” said May Forster, Elem vice president.
As an example of Elem’s success, 16-year-old Oshrat
Mashasha told how she was reconciled with her family and saved
from a life on the streets.
“My parents didn’t understand me,” she
related. “They wanted to live in Israel the same way they lived in
Ethiopia.”
That generation gap caused severe conflict in
the family. One day an Elem social worker paid a visit.
“For the first time I sat together with my
mother and we talked,” Oshrat said, tears streaming down her
cheeks.
Since then her relationship with her parents
blossomed, she gained renewed pride in her culture and roots, and
hopes one day to become the first Ethiopian woman doctor.
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