“We are very happy to have this conversation, mainly because it allows us to speak about the good things that are happening in Israel,” says Yaniv Kusevitzky, COO and CFO of Israeli non-profit Sha’ar Shivyon – or in English, The Equalizer.
Kusevitzky, who will appear on a JC panel event next month to discuss football’s role in promoting equality, said The Equalizer “uses the power of sport to promote social cohesion, education, and equality, and to bring communities together”.
The organisation was set up by Liran Gerassi in 2009 while he was a student in Jerusalem as a means of giving disadvantaged children in his neighbourhood a positive after-school activity.
“There was only one condition,” explained Uri Shaham, who co-founded the charity with Gerassi and is now its CEO.
“For every hour that they played football, we would help with their homework. That was the idea.”
Social and educational activities in the classroom (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
The children’s schools soon approached the pair to help them select students who would most benefit from the programme – “based on social problems, behaviour problems, or kids who never participate in sports,” said Shaham.
Nearly two decades on, The Equalizer reaches 12,000 children per year, across 625 teams from around 500 schools. It works with more than half of Israel’s local municipalities, from Majdal Shams in the north to Eilat in the south.
For tickets, scroll to the bottom[Missing Credit]
Today, its football teams are its flagship programme and they comprise three elements: training, social sessions and tournaments.
The football team itself acts as a channel through which the charity can instil values and skills such as respect, leadership, teamwork, and punctuality.
In the social sessions, they use the stories of legends to relate to the children and allow them to develop self-confidence and ambition. “We teach them about dreams and aspirations through the story of Messi and Ronaldo and how they became [superstars],” Kusevitzky said.
The tournament is where it all comes together. Four times a year, in each region, 12 teams compete with each other.
A regional tournament in Migdal HaEmek (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
“The teams are very diverse because we work with all communities,” said Shaham. “Arab and Jewish, religious and secular, immigrants and people who [were born] here, boys and girls.”
How do the values that the children have learnt manifest? “The biggest trophy is for fair play,” he explained. “We have a green card. Every time you do something good, you receive a green card, and the team with the most wins the biggest trophy.
“Sometimes you see kids who are so passionate about these green cards that they run from one side to the other to help other kids who fall.”
A green card being awarded (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
A team celebrates winning the fair play trophy (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
The teams themselves usually contain children with similar backgrounds to one another because schools in Israel tend to be divided along religious lines.
“Everyone feels the belonging of their own community,” Kusevitzky said. “But when you go to the tournament, you learn how you are also part of The Equalizer, which has many teams, and part of Israeli society.
“When the children meet on the pitch and do the shared warm-up or the green card, they learn that you can keep your identity, but you can also accept other identities. You can feel shared values. Israel is all about understanding that we need to trust each other.”
As the teams are quite homogenous, they deliberately choose coaches from different backgrounds. Shaham shared a powerful anecdote to illustrate the significance of such an approach.
“In Akko, we had a [Jewish] kid who didn’t wanted to participate in the session. He said, ‘I’m not speaking with Arabs’. The session starts, the Arab coach, Bilal, amazing person, said, ‘I want to speak with you’. [The boy] said, ‘No, I’m not speaking’.”
“[Bilal] said, ‘You know, I’m a professional goalkeeper. I play for the professional team here in Akko. I want you to take some penalties and see how many you score. I think I can stop everything.’ [The boy] said, ‘No way, I can score a penalty. Let’s do it’.”
“They did five penalties, he scored a few, and after, Bilal told him, ‘Listen, let’s continue. Let’s do some more drills together with the team’. The [other] kids were already interacting, and it gave him the confidence to join in.”
“This kid, from then on, he played in all the sessions,” Shaham smiled. “Bilal’s approach was amazing, as is the fact that you [do this] through football – you don’t do a dialogue about ‘you are Arab and I am Jewish’ – you put them on the same field.”
“That’s what’s nice about sports,” Kusevitzky added. “You have rules. Everyone starts from the same point.”
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A player from a school in the Arab community of Tayibe (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
Running their programmes became “much harder” after October 7, Kusevitzky said, as Jewish parents became “too afraid” to send their children to interact with Arabs, and vice-versa.
The charity has had to contend with supporting evacuated communities from the north of Israel and the Gaza envelope, and it is playing a leading role in their rehabilitation.
“We did a tournament in Jerusalem four months after October 7,” he recounted. “We had two Arab teams from East Jerusalem. We had to call the parents one by one to convince them to come in wartime to West Jerusalem.”
“They trust The Equalizer and they want the kid to participate in sport. So they came. We had three teams from West Jerusalem. We had three teams from the north which were evacuated, and we had three teams from Sderot which were also evacuated.
“I was there, with goosebumps, seeing all this diversity that no one else could have done at this time in Israel, four months after October 7. The only tool that you can do it with is football.”
The tournament in Jerusalem in February 2024, just four months after October 7 (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
Football teams are not The Equalizer’s only initiative; it now has six programmes, including girls’ football and basketball, teams for teenagers with special educational needs, and swimming lessons. They all have the organisation’s core mission in common; social cohesion and building self-confidence through sport.
“The main idea is to change the way that they think,” said Shaham. “At the beginning, they are just afraid about what they don’t know, about the other, and when they see that they love to play football exactly like them, they say, ‘Maybe they are not as bad as we thought. Maybe we can get along together. We can play together.’
“Then if we can play together, we can also talk together and also do other things together.”
A girls' basketball team from The 48ers programme (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
Children with special needs meet Ofir Haim, an Israeli former footballer who now manages the nation's under-19 and under-20 sides, as part of the Special Goals programme (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
Kusevitzky and Shaham want the Equalizer to expand into all corners of Israel.
“Our next step will be to push the government,” said Shaham. Currently, five to ten per cent of their budget comes from central government; the rest is from donations (around 35 to 40 per cent) and the local municipalities (about half).
After October 7, they lost roughly 5 million shekels in government funding which was redirected towards the war effort but recouped it via donations from the Jewish diaspora in the UK and the US.
“This is the really crucial part of the diaspora in what we do,” Kusevitzky said.
A team from the Boatot programme celebrates first place in a tournament (credit: The Equalizer)[Missing Credit]
The charity has had support from various UK-based organisations, including UJIA, throughout its journey.
Former FA chairman David Bernstein CBE, who will also be on the panel at the JC event, is their international president and has supported the organisation for many years with donations and offering his experience.
Prince William and Boris Johnson have also partaken in sessions with The Equalizer since its inception, and Tottenham Hotspur donated some of their kit after a pre-season friendly match against Roma in Haifa in 2022.
The Equalizer is in this for the long run. “We always say we’re not in a sprint,” Kusevitzky said. “We are in marathon, and it’s a long marathon.
“Our vision is that every school in Israel has The Equalizer team, one of our programs, because we really believe that every school has the kids that need this kind of framework.”
The ‘More than a Game’ event will be hosted by the JC on November 19. To book tickets, click here.
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