Students from the three extensions of the Nahshon Pre-military Academy (Mechina) from all over Israel went for a KKL-JNF tour of the area bordering on the Gaza Strip. The visit was organized by the KKL-JNF Education Division so that the young people would become familiar with the daily life of people who live in a complex region from a security standpoint.
The Nahshon Pre-military Academy, a pioneer in the field of social leadership, created a new type of young leadership in Israeli society. Its graduates – male and female, religious and secular - who come from the various sectors of Israeli society, complete the educational process full of a sense of mission and values. They become officers in the Israeli army and fill influential positions in society in education, the environment and more, with the goal of improving and promoting their surroundings. The pre-military academy has three extensions – in Kibbutz Galon, Kibbutz Shoval and the urban community in Sderot.
Academy students at the Shoval extension began their outing with KKL-JNF at Kibbutz Nahal Oz, where they had a view of the Gaza strip. They spoke with Yael Lahiani, the kibbutz spokesperson, who explained about life on the border and told them about the 2014 Operation Protective Edge from a personal perspective.
Itai, an academy student, said that coming to Nahal Oz takes you outside the bubble: “The war experience here was very powerful. To come here and meet someone who lives here, to see Gaza, which is just a stone’s throw away, is a real eye-opener. We understood that it is only life that will defeat terror, which is very important.”
Eitan Elner, KKL-JNF educational coordinator, who organized the visit for the Academy students, noted that the purpose of the visit was “to show the students what KKL-JNF has accomplished in a broader sense.”
KKL-JNF, with the help of its friends around the world, has done a great deal for settlement and agriculture in the Negev. At Kibbutz Nahal Oz, for example, KKL-JNF has made great investments for the welfare of the local residents with the support of friends of JNF Australia including access roads, water reservoirs and much more. At the KKL-JNF Gilat Tree Nursery, the students familiarized themselves with the trees and bushes that are sent to every part of the south – to villages, to security plantings on the Gaza Border, and for planting in KKL-JNF forests.
“At the Southern R&D station, the students learned about the acclimatization of various species of plants to the desert weather conditions and about the methods that make agriculture prosper in the Negev”, said Elner. “We at KKL-JNF play a major role in all these projects and are very pleased with our cooperation with the pre-military academies. We were able to successfully present KKL-JNF Southern Region’s extensive activities to the students from the Nahshon Pre-military Academy. It is important for us to show that KKL-JNF is an integral part of the lives of the people who live on the border and an organization that meets their needs in many different fields such as education, security, education and more.”
