Welfare Minister decries ‘photo ops’ of food distribution organizations

Welfare and Social Affairs Minister Moshe Kahlon infuriated several non-profit organizations that distribute food to the needy when he decried on Monday morning what he called the practice of “throwing food at the poor and photographing them” in order to raise funds.

Speaking to talk show host Razi Barkai on Army Radio, Kahlon said that “it is up to the government to take responsibility [for feeding the needy] and we need to take action so that by next year these non-profits will become irrelevant.”

Eran Weintraub, director of the organization “Latet” (To Give), blasted Kahlon’s comments as “patronizing and dismissive.” The Walla news site quoted Weintraub as saying that the minister attacked dozens of organizations and thousands of volunteers whose activities, along with the support of the general public, are the only reason that “hundreds of thousands of families who suffer from lack of food” are not starving.

Weintraub also took exception to Kahlon’s claim that the “directors of these organizations are able to bring in tens of thousands of shekels at the expense of the needy,” countering that Latet gives 93 agurot of every shekel it raises directly to assistance for the needy.

Walla news also quoted Nissim Tzioni, director of Pitchon Lev (“Open your heart”), as saying that he “will gladly send [Kahlon] and the government, tomorrow morning, a report of the total costs necessary to feed starving children and needy families” on the condition that the government takes full responsibility to feed them. Non-profit organizations, Tzioni said, “are enlisted where the government is failing or not taking responsibility.”

Not all of the organizations in Kahlon’s crosshairs were upset, however. Racheli Ibenboim, director of Meir Panim, said that charities cannot keep saying year after year that the government is irresponsible and not caring for the needy. “When the minister of welfare comes and says, ‘I want to handle it,’ charities should embrace and assist him,” Ibenboim said.