Large families on a single income
The largest group on our rolls, and the least visible. One salary, six or seven children, and a monthly gap that no amount of careful budgeting closes.
U.S. 501(c)(3) nonprofit
EIN 20-5550560
Serving Beitar Illit since 2007
Where hardship is quiet, help must be too.
Partners is the general charity fund of Beitar Illit. Under the direction of the city's rabbinical authorities, we deliver food, medicine, heating and emergency relief to families who would never ask for it in public — verified, discreet, and usually within a week.
Tax-deductiblein the United States
EIN20-5550560
Rabbinically superviseddistribution
Publishedannual allocations
The city we serve
One of Israel's youngest cities. Also one of its poorest.
Beitar Illit sits in the Judean hills, twenty minutes south of Jerusalem. It is a city of large young families, modest incomes, and almost no industrial employment base.
- 14,500
- Families live in Beitar Illit. More than half the population is under eighteen.
- 1 in 2
- Of the city's families live beneath Israel's official poverty line.
- 6.6
- People in the average family, against a national average of 3.3.
- ₪0
- Public assistance available for a failed refrigerator, a winter heating bill, or a prescription that falls outside the national health basket.
The poverty here is structural rather than exceptional. A typical household has one earner, often in teaching, in a kollel stipend, or in shift work in Jerusalem, supporting six or seven children on an income that would be stretched by three. Housing costs less than in Jerusalem, which is why families came — but the commute costs money, the childcare costs money, and there is almost no local industry to absorb a second earner.
The result is that most families here are not poor because something went wrong. They are poor because nothing went wrong, and it is still not enough. When something does go wrong — an illness, a lost job, a husband who dies — there is no margin at all, and the fall is immediate.
A family here does not go hungry all at once. It happens quietly — first the meat comes off the table, then the fruit, then the milk. By the time anyone notices, it has been months. Distribution coordinator, Partners
Who is on the list
Six kinds of household, one shared problem: no margin.
We do not means-test by category — every application is assessed on its own facts. But after nearly twenty years, the files fall into recognisable shapes.
Single mothers
Divorced or abandoned, raising children alone in a community where the situation still carries quiet stigma. They are the least likely of anyone to ask, and the most likely to be skipping meals so that the children do not.
Widows and orphans
A household that loses its earner loses everything at once. We move first on these files and keep them open longest — often for years, through to the children's weddings.
Families with a chronically ill member
A diagnosis is a financial event as much as a medical one: co-payments, medication outside the health basket, and a parent who has to stop working to provide care.
Young couples starting from nothing
A first apartment with no furniture, no washing machine, and a baby due in four months. A small intervention now prevents a decade of debt later.
The elderly living alone
Often the parents of families who themselves have nothing to spare. Heating, medication and a hot meal, delivered by a volunteer who stays for twenty minutes.
What your gift funds
Six programmes, one principle: relief without exposure.
Nothing we distribute carries our name in public. Vouchers look like any other store credit, bills are paid directly to the supplier, and no recipient's identity leaves the review committee.
Food security
Prepaid vouchers redeemable at four local groceries, sized to household need. For the most acute cases we add a weekly Shabbos package delivered after dark, at the door.
Yom Tov campaigns
Our two largest distributions of the year. Before Pesach, Kimcha d'Pischa covers a full holiday table, clothing and shoes; before Tishrei, a second round repeats it.
Medical & crisis relief
Prescription co-payments, dental and optical care for children, medical equipment, and transport to Jerusalem hospitals for families without a car.
Warmth & utilities
Beitar Illit sits at 700 metres and gets snow. We settle electricity arrears before disconnection, replace failed heaters, and cover gas deliveries from December to March.
Children & education
School registration fees, books, uniforms and shoes each Elul, plus summer day-camp places so that children of working parents are not left at home alone.
Simcha assistance
Hachnasat kallah — helping orphaned and impoverished brides marry with dignity — together with interest-free bridging loans for families facing a one-time shortfall.
Emergency response within 72 hours
A death in the family, a sudden hospitalisation, a father who loses work — these cannot wait for a committee cycle. Two directors are authorised jointly to release emergency funds within three days, subject to full retrospective review at the next monthly meeting.
Rabbinical guidance
Every detail is decided by the rabbonim of the fund
Most months the requests in front of the committee are worth more than the money in the fund. Deciding between one family's medicine and another family's rent is not a question a fundraiser may answer alone, and in this fund it never is.
Harav Chaim Weiss
Rav of Beitar Illit
Harav Yitzchak Mualem
Rav of Beitar Illit
Nothing moves without them
The rabbonim set the halachic order of priority, review the criteria by which families are assessed, and are consulted on every case the committee cannot resolve. Their involvement is the reason the fund has been trusted in this city for nearly twenty years.
צְדָקָה תַּצִּיל מִמָּוֶת
“Charity saves from death” — Proverbs 10:2
We do not publish the names of our directors or committee members on a public page. In a city of this size the supervisory list and the recipient list are read side by side, and a family can be identified by inference. Both lists are provided in full, on request, to donors, grant-makers and regulators.
From your card to their kitchen
How a donation actually travels
No single person in this organisation can approve or release a shekel on their own.
A family applies
Referrals arrive through the local rabbinate, a neighbourhood volunteer, or the family itself. Applications are taken in person, never in a public office.
The case is verified
A two-person committee reviews income, debt, household size and existing support. Every approval requires two signatures. Files are anonymised by number.
Aid is released
As a store voucher, a direct payment to the utility or supplier, or a bank transfer. Typical turnaround is five business days; emergencies, three.
The file stays open
Households are reviewed quarterly. Roughly a fifth of families leave our rolls each year because their circumstances have genuinely improved.
Year ended 31 August 2024
What the last filed year looked like
$1.15MDistributed as aid
1,400Families supported monthly
96¢Of every dollar spent reached families
$0Spent on fundraising
Where every dollar went
96% — Direct family assistanceFood, medical, utilities, education, emergency
4% — Management and generalProfessional services, office, accounting. No salaries at all.
The people behind the numbers
What a file looks like from the inside
Four households, drawn from our 2025 casework. Details have been changed to protect privacy.
“My husband was in hospital for eleven weeks. Nobody from the building knew. Every Thursday an envelope was under the door with the shopping card inside, and that was the only reason the children ate properly that winter.”
“I did not want charity. I wanted eight weeks. Partners paid the electricity directly so there was no cut-off, I found work in Jerusalem, and by Pesach we were paying our own bills again.”
“Three of the girls in my class come from families on the fund. I only know because I sit on the committee. Their classmates have no idea, and that is exactly the point.”
“We send them a list of what the household is missing and they answer within the week. In nineteen years I have never had to explain to a family why the help did not come.”
The accounts above are composite illustrations based on real casework. Names, identifying details and circumstances have been altered, and no photographs of recipients are published, in keeping with our policy of protecting the dignity and privacy of every family we assist.
Give through your fund
We accept grants from every major donor-advised fund
Recommend a grant to Partners Charity Fund For Israel, EIN 20-5550560. Most sponsors process a recommendation within five business days, and the deduction was already taken when you funded the account.
DAFFidelity CharitableDAFSchwab CharitableDAFVanguard CharitableJCFJewish Communal FundOJCOJC FundDAFThe Donors FundNPTNational Philanthropic TrustDAFGoldman Sachs Philanthropy FundFEDGreater Miami Jewish FederationDAFRenaissance Charitable
Named sponsors are organisations from which we are able to receive grants. Listing them does not imply any partnership with, or endorsement by, them.
Before you give
Questions donors ask us
Yes. Partners Charity Fund For Israel is a tax-exempt organisation under section 501(c)(3) of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code, EIN 20-5550560. Contributions from U.S. taxpayers are deductible to the extent permitted by law. A written receipt is issued for every gift, and an annual summary receipt is sent each January.
In 2025, 92 cents of every dollar spent went directly to family assistance. Five cents covered administration — accounting, compliance, banking — and three cents covered fundraising and payment-processing costs. Our distribution network in Beitar Illit is run almost entirely by volunteers, which is what keeps that ratio where it is.
A standing review committee operating under the guidance of the rabbinical authorities of Beitar Illit. Every application is assessed against documented criteria — household income, size, debt and existing support — and every approval requires two signatures. No director may approve a disbursement to a family connected to them.
Yes to both. Monthly giving is what allows us to commit to a family for a full season rather than a single week, so it is the support we value most. You may change the amount or cancel at any time by emailing us — there is no notice period and no cancellation fee.
You can. Add a note at checkout or email us and your gift will be restricted to that programme — food security, medical relief, winter heating, education or the Yom Tov campaigns. Undesignated gifts go to the general fund, where the committee can direct them to wherever need is most acute that month.
Card donations are handled by Banquest on their own secure payment page. Pressing the donate button takes you off this website; your card details are entered on Banquest's page over an encrypted connection, never pass through this site, and are never stored on our servers or seen by our staff. See our Privacy Policy for full detail.
Together in times of need
Somebody is going to cover this week's shopping.
One thousand four hundred families in Beitar Illit are counting on it. A monthly gift of $54 covers a full year of grocery vouchers for one family.