Shoshanna Shechter saluting her former commander, Maj. Gen. (res.) Israel Tal. Photo: IDF Spokesperson

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If someone had told Shoshanna Shechter forty years ago, when she served as the secretary of the Chief Officer of the Armored Corps at the time, Maj. Gen. (res.) Israel Tal, that four decades later she would return to her former work place, the Armored Corps Building in Tel Aviv, and be received almost royally by Maj. Gen. (res.) Tal amongst the audience, she probably would have called that person a dreamer. It turns out that dreams sometimes do in fact come true.

Shoshanna Shechter and her husband Leroy who live in Miami, are two of the most generous donors of the Friends of the IDF (FIDF), and supported the renovation of the Armored Corps Building by donating 24 million NIS. Today it serves as a soldiers’ hostel. Now was the time to thank them in the framework of an emotional ceremony at the site.

Shoshanna was surprised and excited by the presence of Maj. Gen. (res.) Tal. She pulled out a black beret, covered her head with it and saluted her former commander. “Serving under you was so meaningful that it stayed with me my whole life,” she told him. “When I saw your integrity, loyalty and fairness when I first came to your office forty years ago, it strengthened my values which have become milestones of my life over the years. You were always and will always be a symbol and an example to me.”

Maj. Gen. (res.) Tal was asked if he remembered his secretary Shoshana, and said: “You could never forget a face like that.”

The funds that were donated by the Shechters will be used to add a new wing with 41 rooms to the Armored Corps Building, which will house 160 soldiers. With the completion of the building in 2011, the Armored Corps Building will become the largest soldiers’ hostel in Israel, hosting 340 soldiers. In addition, the existing wing of the building and its rooms has recently been renovated with the couple’s donation, in order to make the soldiers staying there feel as much at home as possible.

“Leroy and Shoshanna, you represent our good friends in the US,” the chairman of the Association for the Wellbeing of Israel's Soldiers (AWIS) - the Israeli organization that works in collaboration with FIDF in this project -, Brig. Gen. (res.) Avigdor Kahalani, addressed the donors. “I am saluting you, in the name of the soldiers, and I think that your family needs to be very proud of you.”

At the ceremony for the laying of the foundation stone, Shoshanna explained the decision to support the Armored Corps Building. “Two years ago we heard of the need to build a new building for lone soldiers. We wanted to make it easier for them and give them a warm and pleasant place they could return to at the end of the day or week, a corner they could call home, a room where they could watch television.”

“Our contribution,” she emphasized, “is insignificant compared to that of the IDF soldiers, especially the lone soldiers who serve the country despite all their difficulties.”

The National Director of FIDF, Maj. Gen. (res.) Yizhak Gershon, also praised the couple’s important donation: “This donations comes from a good place of love for Israel and the desire to support those who protect not only the State of Israel, but also the Jews in the entire world,” said Gershon, and added: “Helping and supporting lone soldiers has an immense importance which will make the term ‘lone soldier’ irrelevant, because those soldiers will be welcomed as if they had a family and a home here.”