Self-Determination in a State of Emergency

ASF: Rotem, if you had to explain to someone in just a few sentences what Kivunim is about, what would you say?

Rotem: Kivunim’s vision is to create a more equitable society for people with disabilities in Israel. Our work is not only about rights or accessibility. Even if all these issues were resolved, young people would still need to learn how to live independently: how to make decisions, manage a home, work, build relationships, organise support, and take responsibility. This is precisely where Kivunim comes in.

ASF: What does your work look like in practice?

Rotem: At the heart of our work is the Mechina programme. Young adults between the ages of 18 and 30 often leave their parents’ home for the first time and move into shared apartments with people of a similar age for two or three years. There, they gradually learn what they need in order to live as independently as possible within the community later in adulthood.

ASF: You work with a very diverse range of people. Who takes part in your programmes?

Rotem: We work in Nahariya, Haifa, and Herzliya. Our participants include young people with physical disabilities, autistic people, and people who are deaf or hard of hearing. We work with both Jewish and Arab communities, of course, and we develop programmes for groups that have often been inadequately reached in the past. One current example is a new programme in Haifa for ultra-Orthodox young women with physical disabilities. In total, we reach approximately 400 to 450 participants each year.

ASF: Israel has been at war since 7 October 2023. How has this affected your work?

Rotem: At first, it was a shock. Many participants initially returned to their parents’ homes, but they quickly realised that this was not a good long-term solution. They had spent years building their independence and did not want to lose it simply because there was a war.

The greatest challenge was safety. In cities such as Nahariya, people usually have only 15 seconds to reach a protected space when a rocket alert sounds. For someone with a physical disability, that is practically impossible. Within a few months, we therefore either moved participants to different apartments or installed a protected room, known as a mamad, in their existing homes.

ASF: Many people would probably say that protection is the most important priority during a war. But you also place great emphasis on self-determination. Why?

Rotem: Because protection is not only about physical safety. Of course, we have to protect people. But if we take every decision away from them, they lose something very important: the feeling that they are still capable of taking action and shaping their own lives.

For example, we faced the question of what to do when a young person wanted to go to work despite the security situation. During a rocket alert, being outside is more dangerous than staying at home. And yet it is their job, their daily routine, and part of their identity. Do we then tell them: You are not allowed to go?

Kivunim’s approach is that autonomy remains autonomy, even during a crisis. We prepare the person. We explain what to do if a siren sounds. We ask them to let us know when they leave and when they arrive. But we do not automatically forbid them from going. Going to work also provides a form of security: emotional security and a sense of identity.

ASF: At the same time, people with disabilities face additional challenges during the war.

Rotem: Yes, and that begins with the protected spaces themselves. Many of them are not accessible. A large number are located underground and can only be reached by stairs. In older buildings, the doors are often very narrow. This excludes people who use wheelchairs.

But there is more to it than that. People must be able to enter quickly. They must be able to close the door and windows. Accessibility does not happen by accident. Unless protected spaces are designed with accessibility in mind, they are usually not genuinely accessible.

ASF: Are there other barriers that people without disabilities often do not even consider in such situations?

Rotem: Yes, of course. A deaf person, for example, will not hear a siren at night. The Home Front Command has an app that not only emits a loud alert during a rocket attack but also flashes and vibrates. However, it will not necessarily wake someone who is asleep. In one of our programmes, the participants therefore slept together in the protected room.

ASF: Several years ago, you founded the Smadar Institute, which provides psychotherapy for people with disabilities and their families. Why was this necessary?

Rotem: Because people with disabilities need therapeutic services that genuinely meet their needs. People need therapy in a language in which they can express themselves. For example, there are not many therapists who know sign language.

The lived experience of disability must also be allowed to play a role within the therapeutic setting. People with disabilities face many of the same issues as everyone else, but they also have different experiences.

ASF: Israeli society places great emphasis on achievement, military service, perseverance, and remaining functional. How does this affect people who cannot or do not want to meet these expectations?

Rotem: Interestingly, the picture is somewhat more complex. Of course, some of our participants experience intense anxiety, barely leave their homes, or sleep with the door of the protected room closed. But opportunities sometimes emerge as well. During periods when many people were serving in the reserves and there was a shortage of workers, some of our participants found it easier to obtain employment, for example stocking shelves in supermarkets.

Another example comes to mind. Shortly after the war began, we received a large donation of toys from a toy shop that had gone bankrupt. We had no use for such a large quantity ourselves. We therefore decided to sort the toys and send them to various protected spaces in northern Israel, where children often had to remain for hours at a time.

At that moment, our participants were not simply people who needed assistance. They were able to give something to others. That is why we no longer ask: How do we get through this period? Instead, we ask: How can we learn to live with uncertainty? Because we do not know when the next crisis will come.

ASF: Kivunim operates in a society shaped by many languages, religions, and cultural identities. What role does this diversity play?

Rotem: For many participants, Kivunim offers an opportunity to move beyond their own social bubble. Disability can sometimes create a shared space that transcends language, culture, religion, gender, or social background.

But the war has also made this more difficult within our organisation. We now hear more racist statements, particularly against Arab people. Sometimes a participant does not understand that a statement such as “Death to the Arabs” also harms the Arab person sitting next to them or an Arab member of staff.

We try to confront this actively. We want to create shared spaces in which different cultures are visible and people can encounter one another.

ASF: One particular area of your work concerns people with disabilities who are also LGBTQ+. Why are specific services needed for them?

Rotem: Because many people experience exclusion on two levels. Within the LGBTQ+ community, people with disabilities are often not truly seen. And within groups for people with disabilities, queer identities are not always accepted.

Over the years, we have observed that moving out of the parental home is often a moment when questions of identity become more prominent. Who am I? How do I want to live? Autistic people, in particular, relatively often begin exploring questions relating to their gender identity during this phase. We have therefore developed specialised services together with organisations from the queer community.

I am thinking of a young man from an ultra-Orthodox family. When he came to us, he had already begun to follow a different religious path. Later, he also realised that he was gay. In a sense, his family had to learn to accept him anew three times: as an autistic child, as a son who had become secular, and as a gay man.

It was a long process. Today, he is studying in Haifa and building a life for himself. Stories like his demonstrate why this kind of support is so important.

ASF: If readers were to take away just one message from this conversation, what would you want it to be?

Rotem: Israeli society needs contact with people from outside the country, and for our participants, contact with ASF volunteers may be more important today than ever before. The volunteers are not authority figures. They meet our participants as equals and become their friends. For many of our young people, it is the first time they have developed a deep connection with someone who does not come from Israel.

For ASF volunteers, it is also an opportunity to experience Israeli society. Not merely the image presented by the media or political discourse. Beneath these layers, there are many good and committed people who want Israel to become a better place. These bridges between countries are more important today than ever before.

The interview was conducted by Uriel Kashi, ASF Country Representative in Israel.