"But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself"
Leviticus 19:34
Every refugee has the right to live in safety and dignity. We work with state authorities and other organizations to advance the rights of asylum seekers in Israel, and support these men, women, and children through a wide range of assistance programs.
Leviticus 19:34
ASSAF (Aid Organization for Refugees and Asylum Seekers in Israel) is an Israeli NGO supported by donations from individuals and foundations and by volunteers who strive for an Israel that provides proper and fair treatment to the men, women, and children who fled from dangers in their homelands, seeking protection.
Asylum seekers in Israel have a right to live in security, dignity, inclusion and equality, according to the basic principles of Israeli and international law. Due to a long-standing, relentless government policy that refuses to allow asylum seekers to establish a home in Israel, we present an alternative: Anyone who Israel recognizes is in danger in his homeland deserves access to health and welfare services, equal education, the opportunity to work and support himself and his family, as well as equal treatment by the authorities. Anyone who has been in Israel for many years due to danger in his homeland deserves to be able to find shelter and a home in Israel.
We support policies that advances human and refugee rights, and produce positive and sustainable change by working with state authorities, courts and the Israeli public. We also provide the asylum seeking community with direct assistance through our Advocacy and Support Center, which is open to all asylum seekers in Israel, providing psychosocial services, helping the most vulnerable asylum seekers – minors, survivors of torture, the sick, people with disabilities, single parents and vulnerable women.
If you believe in the responsibility of Israeli society towards refugees, if you want to oppose incitement, if the moral character of the country is important to you, we invite you to join us and support our activities.
We work with government ministries, the Knesset and municipal authorities to promote the rights of refugees and asylum seekers. We publish research documenting the plight of the asylum seeking community and publish proposals and research that promote appropriate solutions and responses. We build partnerships, and work in social media and the public sphere to create a dialogue that promotes the importance of dignity and security for asylum seekers.
We provide direct assistance to the asylum seeking community, especially to the most vulnerable groups within this community. We support asylum seekers through their daily lives, work to apply their rights and make relevant information accessible to them. We run an Advocacy and Support Center and a Youth Club, and assist asylum seekers individually and in groups. We work with and for asylum seekers from a place of awareness and respect for their culture and life experience as an integral part of the process.
Tali Ehrental Executive Director
From the Director
“As the daughter of Holocaust survivors who lost loved ones and lived as refugees for many years, I always saw the importance of supporting people who experienced loss and displacement in difficult conditions and found themselves in a foreign country, without help from the authorities. This is the reason I chose to combine my profession as a social worker with my passion to help asylum seekers.
I am proud to lead ASSAF, an organization working on behalf of people who fled dictatorships, genocide, and wars - women and men who were persecuted, imprisoned, abducted, and severely tortured in their homeland and during their journey to find shelter. I am proud to lead the dedicated and professional team of an organization that works tirelessly for the welfare and rights of asylum seekers in Israel, where the good within Israeli society is so visible.”
Tali was appointed as Director of ASSAF in 2019, following 6 years as Director of the Psychosocial Department. Tali holds a bachelor's degree in communal social work, a master's degree in social work specializing in trauma, and a master's degree in criminology from the Hebrew University. She has worked and volunteered in the social sector since 2005 and has managed various projects for young men and women at risk, trauma victims, refugees and asylum seekers.
Miriam Meyer Psychosocial Department Director
Orly Levinson-Sela Public Advocacy Director
Emma Eytan Resource Development Director
Daniela Fields Volunteer Manager
Solomon Gebreyohan Co-director of Advocacy and Support Center, Translator and Community Mediator
Yael Federman Co-director of Advocacy and Support Center - Follow Up
Nitsan Feldstein Youth Manager
Eli Amon Youth Club Coordinator and Office Maintenance
Tomer Shore New-Media Coordinator
Tal Harari Community Engagement and Resource Development Manager
Eden Tesfamariam Translator and Community Mediator
Shani Bar- Tuvia Lobbyist
Michal Shechter Social Worker, Coordinator of support program for Torture survivors
Avigail Pinto Social Worker, Coordinator of Support Program for Vulnerable Refugees
Aster Nuguse Sium Translator and Community Mediator
Hila Douvdevani Office Manager
Nur Shodzik-Patishi Social Service
MSW Roee Metzer
Adv. Lea Miller-Forshtat
Jordan Rosenberg
Tali Kaminer
Prof. Jerome Bourdon
Adv. Orit Ronen
Adv. Osnat Cohen Lipshitz
Dror Polak
Zvi Tropp
Many of our activities are made possible thanks to our dedicated and talented team of volunteers. For this reason, we consider it very important to provide professional and personal guidance to our volunteers. Each volunteer at ASSAF receives training, assistance, and guidance before and during the volunteering, in each of our projects. If you too want to join to fight for rights, recognition and status for the asylum seeker community in Israel - join us!
ASSAF (Registered Association 580474955) is a non-profit organization, and as such – we need help and support to continue our activities. We invite you to participate, to contribute to ASSAF, and to assist the refugee and asylum seekers community in Israel.
Golomb 52, Tel Aviv, Postal code 6617141
phone 072-2513838, fax 072-2513837
[email protected]
Golomb 52, Tel Aviv, Postal code 6617141
phone 072-2513838, fax 072-2513837
[email protected]
Psychosocial Department Director
Miriam is a Social Worker and has worked in ASSAF for 5 years. She has been leading several projects and currently working with the most vulnerable people of the community
Public Advocacy Director
Orly joined ASSAF in 2019. A lawyer by trade, she worked for years at the State Comptroller's Office, handling complaints from applicants from weakened groups about government authorities. She joined us following volunteering with asylum seeker children and her many years of promoting the rights of people from the margins of Israeli society.
Resource Development Director
Emma grew up with a dual nationality
of Israel and the U.S. and returned to
Israel in 2018. After completing her M.A.
in Global Migration and Policy, Emma joined ASSAF
in 2021, following several years of international non-profit
work in the field of refugees and asylum seekers.
Volunteer Manager
Daniella started her work in ASSAF in April 2021 as a volunteer director.
She is a community social worker, and has performed her community work practical training in ASSAF, and later on worked
with asylum seekers and the transgender community.
Co-director of Advocacy and Support Center, Translator and Community Mediator
Solomon joined ASSAF's psychosocial department in 2017 as a community mediator and has been coordinating the reception hour of the Advocacy and Support Center since 2019.
Co-director of Advocacy and Support Center - Follow Up
Yael joined the psychosocial department in 2019 and has been running the Advocacy and Support center ever since. An activist for more than a decade. She holds a bachelor's degree in Psychology and Geography and a master's degree in Policy Planning.
Youth Manager
Nitsan holds a bachelor's degree in social work, she joined ASSAF in 2021 after years of working with at-risk youth ,leading groups of girls and accompanying individual processes.
Youth Club Coordinator and Office Maintenance
Eli joined ASSAF in 2012 as a maintenance man for the organization and as a volunteer at the youth club. Since then he has accompanied dozens of teenagers in individual processes and is an integral part of the activities and atmosphere at the club.
New-Media Coordinator
Tomer is responsible for all areas of ASSAF's digital presence since the summer of 2021. Content writer and editor, social and political activist, with a history of writing speeches for public figures and politicians in Israel.
Community Engagement and Resource Development Manager
Tal joined ASSAF in 2021 After volunteering at Mesila. She is a graduate of the Department of Theatre Arts at Tel Aviv University. She was the production director of the Habima Theater, the marketing and advertising director of the Batsheva troupe, the director of the Ruth Kenner Theatre Group and the vice president of Gaga Movement.
Lobbyist
Shani holds aBachelor's degree in International Relations and Middle Eastern Studies and MA in International Relations from the Hebrew University. Her doctorate, as part of the "Human Rights Under Pressure" program of the Hebrew University and the Free University of Berlin, dealt with policy towards asylum seekers. Volunteered at the Center for the African Community in Jerusalem and taught a course on refugees and asylum seekers at the Hebrew University.
Social Worker, Coordinator of support program for Torture survivors
Michal is a social worker and coordinator of the support program for torture survivors since 2017. In 2014, she was a volunteer in the reception department for ASSAF organization. Michal will soon be graduating from a master’s degree in social work with a specialty in trauma and is working in the mental health field for the past seven years.
Social Worker, Coordinator of Support Program for Vulnerable Refugees
Avigail joined the ASSAF psychosocial department at in 2021, after a year of internship. Holds a bachelor's degree in social work from Tel Aviv University.
Translator and Community Mediator
Esther joined ASSAF in 2020 after taking a community mediation course, out of a desire to help, support and strengthen the refugee community and asylum seekers in Israel
Office Manager
Hila works in ASSAF as an office manager since March 2021. She lives in Shapira neighbourhood, around many assylum seekers, and felt the need to get closer to the subject in order to be an active part of the social reality she lives in.
Social Service
A social and political activist, Nur joined ASSAF as part of her Social Service in September 2021
Chairman
Roee holds a master's degree in social work and is a graduate of the program for counseling and development of psychoanalytic-systemic organizations. He ran the Beit Ariel hostel for girls in Jerusalem. He is a recipient of the Recanati-Coop-Rashi prize for the enterprising social worker, for the development of ‘Diurit’, an independent housing system for young women at risk. He currently manages the therapeutic department at the organization “Otot”, which proposes housing solutions and therapy to youth and young adults at risk from all the sectors of Israeli society.
Lea holds a bachelor's degree in law from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a master's degree in law from Bar-Ilan University, and is a founding partner at SGF law offices in Tel Aviv. She is founder and co-director of the COME TRUE project, which cares for the education and well-being of South Sudanese children who were refugees in Israel, and were deported to South Sudan. She is also a co-founder and board member of the 360 Incubator for social businesses.
Jordan holds a law degree from Tel Aviv University, an International Executive MBA degree at the Kellogg-Recanati Business School, and a certificate in mediation. He worked as a lawyer, as a senior executive in an Internet startup, as a “stay at home dad” and as mediator. For two years he was the chairman of Urim association (in Hakfar Hayarok) that owns and operates a Waldorf education school. In 2019 he completed a teaching certificate at Tel Aviv University. Since then has been teaching English in Gimnasiya Ivrit Herzliya Highschool in Tel Aviv.
Jerome is a graduate of the School of Political Sciences (SciencesPo) in Paris. He holds a PhD in history and a degree in law from Paris1 university. He was a researcher and a documentary producer with the National Institute of Audiovisual (INA) in Paris. In 1997, he joined the Department of Communication at Tel Aviv University, where he is in charge of the doctoral program. He volunteered for four years in the open hours of ASSAF before joining the board.
Orit holds a degree in business administration and accounting and a bachelor's degree in law. She worked as a lawyer in the field of immigration and refugees. She currently works for a production company specializing in documentaries with a social agenda. Since 2007, she has been volunteering at the NGO ‘Kav LaOved', and from 2009 to 2013 she was a member of the NGO's board of directors.
Osnat holds a bachelor's degree in law from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, a master's degree with honors in law from Tel Aviv University, a bachelor's and master's degree with honors in religious sciences and art history from the Hebrew University. Osnat worked at the Hotline for Refugees and Migrants, managed the field of social rights at the NGO "Kav LaOved" and the Clinic for Immigrant Rights at the Academic Center for Law and Business in Ramat Gan. Since 2017 she has been managing the legal department at Gisha, an organization defending the freedom of movement of Palestinian residents.