The Gift of Independence: How a Self-Taught Clothing Designer Is Helping Israel’s War-Wounded Regain Their Dignity - אתר החדשות דבר (2024)

Since the weeks after the October 7 attack, the phone of Ala Tamarin, a 64-year-old mother of two and grandmother of six from Kfar Saba, hasn’t stopped ringing. She’s been in constant demand ever since sharing a message on WhatsApp in November: “If there are physically injured soldiers who need special undergarments, please send me requests for them. I sew and I’ll make them for free.”

Since then, she’s devoted herself to making boxers and other clothes designed for the wounded, especially those being treated with an Ilizarov apparatus, a large metal device used to treat wounded limbs. She and her volunteer team have made boxers for more than 100 soldiers so far.

Tamarin, who herself has two sons serving in the reserves, started her operation after speaking to a friend who was volunteering at Sheba Hospital in Ramat Gan during the beginning of the war.

“She met a nurse who didn’t know what to do with an injured soldier who had an Ilizarov apparatus on his leg, and because the diameter of the device was very large, he struggled to put on underwear and pants,” Tamarin recounted. “So they just cut the leg of his pants. Later on, that soldier told her that he used a diaper because he didn’t have a way of wearing underwear. When she told me that story, it shocked me. It doesn’t seem logical that a soldier will have to wear a diaper just because there’s no appropriate article of clothing for him. I thought to myself, if there’s one person like this, there’s surely many more. There are many wounded in this war.”

That story followed Tamarin around during the first weeks of the war. An electrical engineer by profession, she tried to find a solution.

“I know how to sew. I grew up in Saint Petersburg in Russia, where we learned how to sew in school,” she said. “I always had a sewing machine, but when we moved to Israel I didn’t use it too much anymore. Here and there, mending and hemming, things of that sort, but it never was any sort of hobby.”

Taking out her old sewing machine to work on a solution, she first tried a prototype that closed at the front like a diaper with velcro strips. “Later I realized that was too complicated,” she said. “And ultimately, if the problem is the wounded person moving his leg, why not put the velcro at the sides?”

Ever since that realization, Tamarin has been totally devoted to her craft. What started as help for one wounded soldier expanded, and today she manages an operation of 50 volunteers, most of whom are female retirees from the former Soviet Union. They use a combination of donated boxers and supplies purchased with their own money to create customized clothing for each soldier according to the type of injury. “We come, see what the injury is, take measurements, and make it according to what’s needed and how many are needed,” Tamarin said.

Special thought also went into the way that the boxers are fastened. “We tried to think of all sorts of ideas, but ultimately, velcro is best,” she explained. “Magnets don’t work because of the metal [in the Ilizarov apparatus]; zippers require fine motor skills that have often been damaged. Velcro is the easiest, but it needs to be high quality so that it will stand up even after being washed.”

Tamarin’s volunteers are spread out throughout nine hospitals in Israel. There, they get in contact with families of wounded soldiers, keep track of requests, and divide up the work. A few drivers, also volunteers in the informal organizations, transport the clothes to and from the families.

After a bit, the team started sewing shirts and shorts designed for people with different injuries as well. Each piece of clothing has a thought process that goes into it: what will be most comfortable given the specific needs of the wounded soldier, what will allow the fabric to sit well, and so on.

“One mother called and said that her son had both arms in casts, and he couldn’t raise his arms at all. He wasn’t able to put on a shirt,” Tamarin said. “We developed a shirt. It turned out kind of fashionable. A friend of mine made special underwear for a soldier with a very high amputation, right at the torso. She needed to do special sizes and sewing.”

Speaking with the injured soldiers can be difficult for Tamarin. “These kids are all in a not so good situation. Most of them don’t know what to ask from us. Their eyes are closed, their gait is stooped, they had dreams, and now they need to change their plans. It’s awful. You go to the hospital and see hundreds of young kids in beds, and their mothers constantly hovering around them. It’s not the place where the child needs to be. There’s a boy that I’ve been caring for since February, and he’s still in rehab at Loewenstein [Hospital]. A 19-year-old boy, missing a leg, the other leg in an Ilizarov apparatus, the light in his eyes has totally gone out. Or reserves soldiers, often with children, who find themselves needing to go around without underwear. It’s awful. It’s very difficult for me. I encounter stories like these all the time, each one more difficult than the last.”

In order to be prepared for any scenario, Tamarin set up a small storage space in her house with completed boxers and pants to give to those in urgent need. “How was there not something like this in Israel before us?” she wondered. “How is something like this not given out in hospitals or healthcare providers? Even without connection to the war, people are injured all the time—in car accidents, work accidents, there’s no shortage.”

Tamarin’s specialized clothes are mostly used for a defined period of time, until the injured soldier’s device or cast is removed. But some soldiers have been disabled for months already. “I have soldiers for whom I made winter clothes and then summer clothes, more underwear after the first ones wore out, or there was an improvement, or, God forbid, a decline, and their needs changed,” she said. “Every injury is an entire family dealing with it for a very long period of time.”

“It can be the difference between using a diaper or not, or whether a person can get dressed on their own or if they need help. It gives something so important, independence. Many times I get a request from the family, and then I meet the soldier, and he says, ‘I don’t need it.’ I tell him, ‘Try.’ Afterward I get a message, ‘I didn’t think that I could do such and such alone, I didn’t think I could be independent.’ Sometimes, when someone suddenly manages to do something alone, it’s the first time that I see him smile.”

According to the latest numbers, there are more than 70,000 Israelis recognized as having been injured in war, almost 9,000 of whom were injured in the current war. That number is only getting higher as the war drags on. As the official institutions of the state have struggled to respond, individual citizens have stepped up to provide for injured soldiers’ needs.

Tamarin hopes that the state will eventually take over the job. “We’re still needed, so for now, we’re doing what we can do. I do receive a lot of joy from this, but I would like to return to my work, to my grandkids,” she said.

Still, in the absence of state responsibility, she understands why people are so eager to get involved. “Israelis need the sense that they’re part of something, that they’re not sitting on their hands while others are getting hurt. People bring us money and say, ‘Thank you so much that you let me be part of this,’” she said.