Project offers Israeli evacuees quiet rooms with soothing amenities

Since the start of 2024 – and especially over the past seven months – every Israeli deserves some peace and quiet. But more than anyone else, nearly 130,000 Israelis have been evacuated from their homes in the south and north and live in incredibly closed neighborhoods with their families.

Specially designed “quiet rooms” for evacuees have been installed in three of the hotels – the Vert Lagoon in Netanya, the Leonardo Hotel in Tiberias and the Jacob Resort Hotel in Hadera – which house Israeli “refugees” from Sderot and the kibbutz Yad. Mordechai and Kiryat Shmona. With continued speculation of an escalation in northern Israel, hotels now have a working model for setting up a quiet room if even more people need to be evacuated from the north in the coming months.

The joint project, co-sponsored by the Ministry of Health and the Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) Israel, has proven to be incredibly successful, according to those who benefited from it and the organizers. The hotel’s rooms have been enlarged and more quiet rooms have been provided in other facilities. It is also planned that evacuees will replicate the Quiet Rooms and take them with them when they return home in the coming months.

The Quiet Rooms are inspired by the famous Snoezelen Rooms, controlled spaces designed to reduce anxiety and mental stress while providing a place for sensory calm and self-regulation, at Beit Issie Shapiro in Ra’anana, the leading developer and provider of innovative therapies and suppliers in the country. state-of-the-art services for children and adults with disabilities.

Such rooms also exist at Shalva, Jerusalem’s main facility for children with disabilities, which calms them with soft, colorful lights, headphones playing soothing music, pillows and padded floors.

Calm Hotel rooms for evacuees from Israel’s border areas have reduced stress and anxiety by providing much-needed calm. (credit: BEIT ISSIE SHAPIRO)

Since opening the first Snoezelen Room in Israel in 1993, Beit Issie Shapiro has helped create more than 500 such rooms in therapy centers, hospitals, schools and other institutions in Israel and abroad. abroad – and now in hotels. The nonprofit also provides oversight and training for unique spaces designed to address the significant challenges and risks associated with a lack of quiet space,

Since the start of the war, 70,000 residents have been evacuated from kibbutzim, moshavim and other communities near the Gaza Strip, as have another 60,000 residents from the conflict line to the north. Less than ideal living conditions and crowded private and public spaces provide little or no privacy and have contributed to their mental and physical health problems. The traumatic events experienced by evacuees also create a heavy emotional and physical burden.

“At the start of the war, after visiting the hotels, it was clear that a solution needed to be found to help reduce the high levels of auditory and visual noise for the evacuees, so the idea of a space calm was introduced,” explained Shimona Lev-On. of the ministry’s occupational therapy division.

The Quiet Room was adapted in each hotel specifically for evacuees, providing respite from noise and sensory overload. Each room is equipped with a tent to enclose the space, mattresses, a beanbag, weighted blankets, noise-cancelling headphones, dim lighting and virtual reality (VR) glasses. Individuals sign up for 20-minute sessions to use the room, which is run by the evacuees themselves and trained by Beit Issie Shapiro staff. The operators are accompanied by occupational therapists and psychologists.

While more than 700 people have used the rooms since the project began, a third have returned every week.

“We are proud to lead this important initiative and are encouraged by the results we have seen on the ground,” said Dr. Sigal Vax, head of the Service Customization Section at JDC-Israel. Josh Malada-Shahar, program manager for Israel Unlimited, managed the project for JDC. “The enthusiastic response and positive feedback from participants prove that the project meets a real need. »

Occupational therapist Oshrat Nahmias, who is Beit Issie Shapiro’s project coordinator, added that the team saw all the details needed to create and arrange a break room: the purpose of the room, how to install and links to purchase items such as mattresses. and sensory equipment. We provide guidance on how to use it, maintain security, and provide a professional and enjoyable user experience. The idea is that it can be installed easily in any room.

Evacuees seek to bring the project home

Inbar Bettelheim, herself evacuated from Kibbutz Yad Mordechai, supervises the quiet room at the Jacob Resort Hotel in Hadera. “This is a truly extraordinary initiative. “Thanks to this space, children and adults were able to relax in the middle of a very complex reality.” The experience was so positive that kibbutz members decided to bring the room to Yad Mordechai and open it to anyone returning to the kibbutz.

Shani Peretz, a Sderot resident who stayed at the Vert Lagoon Hotel in Netanya, explained that “the room, with its accessories, smell and lighting, creates a feeling of peace. I choose to lie on the beanbag and cover myself with a weighted blanket, which provides a real feeling of security and home. I swam with dolphins wearing virtual reality glasses. It’s an experience that disconnects you from all the thoughts of the day.

As the remaining months in hotels continue to drag on for evacuees, JDC-Israel has renewed the pilot project, keeping the rooms operational. They also plan to expand the project to include additional hotels throughout the country.

According to Yael Yoshei, knowledge resource development and management advisor at Beit Issie Shapiro, the organization continues to receive requests to create break rooms from municipalities across the country, including Ofakim and, more recently, a facility at the Tel Hashomer Medical Center rehabilitation center for recovering soldiers.

“Through our knowledge and understanding of the environment and its impact on a person’s well-being, we are able to provide evacuees with suitable sensory rooms which can reduce stress and help them cope to their current situation,” Yoshei concluded, “and the beauty of the project is that these gazebo-like pieces can be replicated and installed anywhere in just a few hours.