(NECN: Alysha Palumbo, Boston) – A group of 16 year olds from around the Greater Boston area just returned home from a month-long tour of Israel they will never forget.
“We still got to go to Messada, we still got to go to the Dead Sea, we were in Jerusalem for the first week so we got to get everything in that was really meaningful and important and I’m happy about that,” Ben Goldberg of Needham, Massachusetts, said.
“I still feel like we saw everything we were supposed to,” Max Gross of Marblehead said.
But the Dor L Dor Leadership trip through Wellesley-based Cohen Camps was cut short earlier this week due to concerns over the escalating violence in Israel.
“About halfway through the trip, we had to change the schedule because the rockets started, so we had to go to the north of the country where it was out of range of the rockets,” Phil Batler of Newton said.
“Everyone went home separately which was really weird but it was just how we had to do it to get out and we left a week early,” Josh Rosenbaum of Needham said.
The teens said they were never really overly concerned about the violence and never heard any emergency sirens.
“Like, it’s kind of always in the back of your mind that it’s a little bit dangerous, but at the same time, we were so safe,” Elijah Elmore of Brookline said.
“They made it clear the chances of us actually being in danger of being hit by a missle was so slim that I don’t think many of us were really worried about it,” Matt Solomont of Natick said.
Cohen Camps President Jonathan Cohen says while it’s always stressful to have a group of teens traveling abroad, they weren’t experiencing the violence we’re seeing on the news.
“Tour groups in Israel do something very unique, they’re connected to what is known as the situation room, which is an operation of the police and the army and they keep track of where people are going and they tell them where they shouldn’t go because of – there might be violence, there might be a flood there might be traffic accidents,” he said.
These teens say they returned home with a new appreciation not only for Israeli culture but their sense of duty to serve their country.
“For us we’re like wow, you have to serve in the IDF, and they’re like it’s not something that you have to do, it’s more of something that you want to do,” Jared Chapman of Swampscott said.
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Tags: Boston, Newton, Israel, Brookline, Alysha Palumbo, Marblehead, Hamas, Needham, Gaza Strip