BGU | MY PATH, Haim Doron, MD

very tied to Israel and even had family in Kiryat Gat in the northern Negev. In our meeting, which was at his home in the U.S., conversation blossomed, and I told him that I was looking for a donor to establish a modest pediatrics department at Beilenson hospital. I asked him about Schneider. Mr. Foster told me: “Mr. Schneider loves Israel, and he’s nuts about one thing – children’s hospitals. Mr. Schneider established a hospital for children on Long Island. If you are promoting such an idea, perhaps you’ll have some chance at it.” I returned to Israel and devoted some time to this subject. Later, I learned from Teddy Kollek 83 who was friendly with Schneider, that Schneider was planning to visit Israel. Schneider was a member of the board of the Jewish Agency, and he was coming to advise Teddy Kollek about transforming the cavernous Binyanei HaUmah [The Nations' Halls] at the entrance to Jerusalem into a convention center. I had collaborated with the mayor in the past in establishing a health clinic in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. It was on the road to Mt. Scopus and had become a well-established health center for thousands of East Jerusalem residents. Therefore, I asked for Kollek’s assistance in organizing a small dinner gathering in Schneider and his wife’s honor. Kollek promised to assist; and, indeed, we succeeded in holding the dinner party. I called ex-general Mordechai (‘Motta’) Gur, who was Minister of Health, and invited him to dinner. As a matter of friendship, I asked Gur not to ‘kidnap’ Schneider for the government hospitals. He promised and kept his word. I also invited Dr. Aviva Ron, the head of the planning and evaluation department of Clalit, and Yehuda Danon, who at the time was Beilinson’s director. At this dinner, which lasted three hours, Schneider didn’t stop peppering me with tough questions, such as – “Does the State of Israel need a children’s hospital,” “Why should it be within Clalit,” and many more. Although initially I wasn’t convinced of the idea of a children’s hospital, I apparently succeeded in answering Schneider’s questions and met the challenge honorably. As for why the hospital should be within Clalit and located near a large central hospital for other services, there was one reason: A tertiary children’s hospital needs to have a network of primary pediatric clinics spread throughout the entire country. Only Clalit could provide such a network since it already had some 500 clinics of this type in place. I believe this point was the decisive one in favor of Beilinson. When we left the dinner, Teddy Kollek was sitting and waiting for us. As we stood there, Schneider, Kollek, and I, Kollek said to Schneider in English: “Petach Tikva isn’t Jerusalem; but do it in Petach Tikva.” After that dinner, Schneider sent a committee to Israel to investigate the matter. Three individuals sat on the committee: a health services planner; one of the architects of the Children’s Hospital in Boston; and the director of the Schneider Children’s Hospital in New York. They stayed in Israel three weeks, visited all the big hospitals and other places; and in the end, I convinced them to establish a children’s hospital adjacent to Beilinson Hospital despite the fact that there were two more institutions that sought to sway things so the first children’s hospital to be built in Israel would be theirs: Sheba and Hadassah Ein Karem. Schneider loved pomp and ceremony. I went to my friend Shlomo Hillel who was the Speaker of the Knesset and told him about Schneider and his mobilization on behalf of establishing a children’s hospital. Hillel immediately invited Schneider and his wife for lunch at the Knesset, where we conversed pleasantly in an atmosphere of friendship. At the lunch it was agreed that the signing of the agreement between Schneider and Clalit would be held in the Chagall Hall of the Knesset in royal fashion with a crowd of distinguished guests in attendance. And so it was. Attorney Jerry Silbart read the agreement out loud to the assembly, and Schneider and I signed the document. Thus, the planning stage of the hospital was ushered in and placed in the hands of the Americans, with Dr. Yehuda Danon, the director of Beilinson who was slated to be the director of the new children’s hospital, participating. 83 Theodor "Teddy" Kollek (1911 – 2007) was an Israeli politician who served as the mayor of Jerusalem from 1965 to 1993 (six terms). After reluctantly running for a seventh term in 1993 at the age of 82, he lost to Likud candidate and future Prime Minister of Israel, Ehud Olmert. During his tenure, Jerusalem developed into a modern city, especially after its reunification in 1967. He was once called "the greatest builder of Jerusalem since Herod." In 1966, he established the Jerusalem Foundation, a charitable foundation that raises money to invest in projects in the city.

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