Empowering Women and Girls

 

CENTRAL TO THE MISSION OF PROJECT KESHER IS IDENTIFYING, SPOTLIGHTING AND RESPONDING TO THE OFTEN-OVERLOOKED NEEDS OF WOMEN AND GIRLS.

This support is crucial to Ukraine as women have been largely holding the country together since men have been drafted into military service.

 
 
 
 
 

The Women’s Opportunity Fund

a new entity created by Project Kesher Ukraine, is providing grants ranging from $500 to $1500 to support small women’s businesses that need to rebuild or expand.

To date, the fund has made grants totaling $75,000, funding such investments as:

 
 

Cheese-making equipment for a dairy farmer

 
 

A dental chair for a displaced dentist

 
 

A sewing machine for a company training and hiring seamstresses.

 
 

Grant recipients report their newfound ability to support their families, hire additional employees, and give back to the community with in-kind gifts or services from their businesses.

The Women’s Opportunity Fund’s next round of grant-making is currently underway.

 
 
 
 
 

Mother-Daughter Retreats

Project Kesher has a long history of hosting Shabbat retreats for Jewish mother and daughter pairs from Ukraine, where they learn to become partners in building Jewish life and advocating for women and girls in their communities. Retreats work to improve communications, define healthy relationships and boundaries, and empower women and girls to go back to their towns and create social action projects in the areas of interfaith coalitions, women’s health, Jewish life and social justice.

In June 2023, Project Kesher Ukraine hosted an intergenerational Jewish leadership program in Lviv for ten mother-daughter pairs from Jewish communities in Lviv, Kyiv, Khmelnytskyi, Shepetivka and Rivne.

The program focused on:

  • strengthening family bonds

  • learning from experts about the safety of their daughters,

  • finding opportunities to develop L’dor Vador (intergenerational) programs in their communities. 

Participants celebrated Kabbalat Shabbat together with members of Hillel Lviv. Seminars included: 

  • a conversation on puberty with a top OB/GYN, 

  • an interactive lecture on recognizing violence with experts from JurFem, the Ukrainian Women Lawyers Association, 

  • a master class on self-defense with members of The Krav Maga Federation of Ukraine.