OUR COMMUNITY

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ON THE COVER

14 | JANUARY 4 • 2024 J
N

since the first grade, and now he’s 
an only child,
” Shahaf said. “
And 
we know another family with two 
cousins who were murdered at the 
festival.
”
Erela added that her swim teach-
er and the barber of the moshav 
were also killed. 
“Getting the news of everything 
while we were here and not with 
our moshav was really hard,
” 
Shahaf said. “Everybody knows 
someone; it’s really true.
” 

POWER TO IMPACT 
Within a few days, their feelings of 
helplessness from not being home 
to grieve with family and friends 
transformed into an understand-
ing of their even greater purpose, 
responsibility and potential impact 
in Detroit. 
“To have gone back to Israel, 
we would have been just another 
Israeli. We all have the same story. 
But here, you’re the Israeli,
” Erela 
said. “People want to hear what 
you have to say. People are looking 
forward to hearing from you; and 
when you talk and show your pain, 
you have more of an impact and 
ability to connect people to Israel. 
Here, we have much more power 
to impact people than in Israel.
”
A main objective of Shinshinim 
is to encourage Israeli engagement 
that ultimately builds a bridge 
between Michigan and Israel, lead-
ing to relationships that will endure 
for a lifetime. Since Oct. 7, the 
Detroit Shinshinim quickly real-
ized the goal of “bringing Israel to 
Detroit” would be more important 
than ever. 
Since Oct. 7, the Shinshinim 
have worked tirelessly to make sure 
Detroit understands what they’re 
going through, what Israel is going 
through, and to build a bridge that 
will last forever. 
Each week, the Shinshinim have 
main worksites, along with a few 
synagogues where they work at 

TOP: The Shinshinim at 
the March for Israel in 
Washington, D.C.
BOTTOM: One of the 
most difficult tasks they 
took on was reading 
each name of the hos-
tages held by Hamas at 
a vigil at Adat Shalom.