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Healing for the Healer
I’m a family therapist who’s supposed to be on vacation this week. The only problem — I can’t rest. Because Jewish families in Ethiopia haunt my dreams as I try to sleep here in the USA.
In Israel, the angels, hidden and known, work tirelessly. Among them, the unstoppable Ministering Angel P’nina Tamano-Shata with her Immigration and Absorption Team fighting for Aliya. Jewish Agency staffers like Shira Aman who sacrifice time with their own children to rescue the Jewish children of Ethiopia.
I wake, heart churning with thoughts of Dr. Masresha Dessie in Rehovot. He waits, having made Aliya without his family. Not seeing his three year old daughter Yan and wife Beza (“Redemption” in Amharic) for almost two years.
Dr. Dessie played a key role in building the drumbeat for the rescue of six year old Biniyam Tesfahun who will receive lifesaving heart surgery in Israel this week. Now his family and heart are the ones in need of attention.
As I write, the final flight of Operation Tzur Israel before the upcoming Israeli elections will bring 300 olim from Ethiopia. “Two seats only,” Dr. Dessie says, “that’s all I need.” I know that Israel needs future heart surgeons…
