OREK COMMUNITIES

OREK – Group and Community Support (Public Benefit Company) has been operating since 2019 to build long-term community-based support systems for people living without stable family support.

For people who do not have a functioning family support network, a health, financial, or personal crisis can quickly lead to loneliness, instability, and prolonged dependence on support systems.

OREK has developed a model for building small, sustainable communities that function as an alternative community-based support system and gradually develop into self-managed communities. These communities are based on trust, belonging, mutual responsibility, and shared capacities.

Throughout the process, mutual-aid mechanisms, community roles, and decision-making structures are developed, alongside community-based economic infrastructure, such as a community fund, resource sharing, collective purchasing, and additional tools that make it possible to transform individual capacities into capacities of the community as a whole.

The process enables a profound transition from “I am dealing with this alone” to “We have the capacity to deal with this together.”

OREK communities join a nationwide network that enables social and economic cooperation between communities at both the municipal and national levels. In this way, the community serves as a support system for its members, while the network strengthens the communities themselves.

Among the communities we have established and developed are communities for women who have experienced domestic violence, single mothers and mothers by choice, immigrants without a family support network in Israel, older adults, people with disabilities, and additional populations.

Our long-term goal is to build a broad infrastructure of independent communities across Israel, so that people living without family support will not have to face life alone.

Our success indicators include:

1. Increased sense of belonging and security.
2. Reduced feelings of loneliness and the need to cope alone.
3. Active mutual support among community members.
4. Development of shared capacities and resources.
5. Establishment of active community and economic mechanisms.
6. Strengthening of both individual and community capacities.
7. Gradual transition of the community to self-management.
8. Greater stability, enabling members to cope more effectively with crises and pursue opportunities in their lives.

A donation to OREK does not merely fund a one-time activity. It enables the development of long-term community infrastructure that continues to support people even after the professional facilitation process has ended.