Our Accomplishments

CHAI is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization formed in the U.S. in 1984 to improve the condition and treatment of Israel's animals. Our membership consists of people from many different countries and religions who are committed to bringing about a better life for animals in Israel.

Hakol Chai, CHAI's Israeli sister charity, is a nonprofit organization registered in Israel in 2001.

Watch a five-minute video overview of CHAI's accomplishments.

THE CHALLENGES

OUR SUCCESSES

Education

CHAI's Website

Providing Services

Assisting Animal Shelters and Veterinarians

Working with the Government

Campaigning to End Specific Cruelties

Promoting Alternatives to Animal Experimentation

The Challenges

Israel, with its security and economic problems, has only recently turned its attention to animal protection issues. Concerned Israelis are now working hard to make the Jewish principle of tsa'ar ba'alei hayim, the mandate not to cause "pain to any living creature," a part of daily life in the country. However, many others see the need to help animals as a very low priority.

• Israel has a severe stray cat and dog overpopulation problem because of a hot climate that allows animals to exist on the edge of survival, and because of a lack of spaying and neutering.
    

• To reduce animal overpopulation, until recently many municipalities periodically put out strychnine poison in food in the fields and on the streets. Pets as well as strays would eat the poisoned food and die a slow, painful death. There is still insufficient awareness in the general public of the necessity of spaying and neutering dogs and cats to control overpopulation.
    

• The few small-animal shelters in Israel receive little or no municipal or national government support and survive on donations from the public. There is a desperate need for animal shelters in areas where there is currently no help for animals.
    

• Veterinary medical drugs and supplies are expensive because they must be imported.
    

• Many immigrants to Israel have come from countries with no tradition of concern for animal welfare. Humane education is essential to foster a positive ethic about animals in children.

These are only some of the challenges CHAI and Hakol Chai are addressing.

OUR Successes

CHAI and Hakol Chai are proud to play an important role in the struggle to improve the treatment of animals in Israel. Our work is highly valued by veterinarians, shelter workers, educators, legislators, and others throughout the country who care about the well-being of Israel's animals.

These are some of our accomplishments in the areas of education, providing assistance to animal shelters, working with the government of Israel to create and strengthen legislation to protect animals, campaigning against specific cruelties, and promoting alternatives to animal experimentation.

Education

• In 2012, CHAI/Hakol Chai, with the cooperation of the Education Ministry, sponsored "Expanding the Circle of Compassion," the first humane education conference for Arab educators in Israel. The purpose is to incorporate humane values into the regular curriculum of Arab as well as Jewish schools throughout the country, so that Arab as well as Jewish children will care about and help animals in their communities.
   

• CHAI, with the approval of the Ministry of Education's former Unit for Democracy and Coexistence, organized and funded the highly successful "Living Together" program, which brought Jewish and Arab children together to help them learn about animals and participate in projects to help them.
   

• The staff of Hakol Chai's mobile spay/neuter clinic provide education about animal care in schools and community centers on an ongoing basis, all over Israel.
   

• CHAI has raised the funds to construct the Isaac Bashevis Singer Humane Education Center on the grounds of the Tel Aviv-based Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Israel (SPCA).
   

• In 1998, CHAI and the Ministry of Education organized the first Humane Education Conference ever held in Israel. This conference was an outgrowth of our successful 1994 conference, "Preventing Violence in Society through Education," on the link between violence toward animals and toward people. CHAI held a second Humane Education Conference in 1999, and has subsequently conducted numerous Humane Education Courses for teachers throughout Israel.
   

• In 1994, CHAI, together with Israel's Ministry of Education, organized the conference "Preventing Violence in Society through Education" for teachers and school counselors. Psychiatrists, psychologists, and educators from the U.S. and Israel demonstrated the link between animal abuse and child abuse (and violence in society in general) and the need for humane education in creating a healthy society.
   

• In 1984, CHAI and Israel's Education Ministry co-sponsored Israel's first nationwide Humane Education Contest. A committee of Education Ministry officials judged actions by children to help animals and compositions submitted by students throughout the country. Winning compositions were displayed at the Ministry, one table for each grade level. Classes and individuals who won were bused to the award ceremony in Ramat Gan, where the Minister of Education awarded the prizes.

CHAI's Website

CHAI has developed a unique and comprehensive trilingual online resource (Hebrew, Arabic, and English), with a wealth of practical in-depth information about issues related to animals. Our site provides reliable information written by our own staff, as well as with the cooperation of experts and subject specialists from all over the world. The website is intended primarily for all cultural communities in Israel, with the goal of improving the situation of companion animals, wildlife, and exploited animals in all industries, such as vivisection, factory farming, and entertainment.

We provide solid material:

• Factsheets on the care of cats and dogs
• Standards for animal shelters
• Profiles on animals used for food and those used for clothing
• Reports about donkeys and horses abused on the streets and those who are the victims of racing
• Humane education information and materials, including discussions of the relationship between animal abuse and human aggression

Our online visitor logs demonstrate that our reach is international in scope. Our essays and documents are downloaded and distributed throughout the Middle East, Africa, and Asia.

Please refer to the Guide to CHAI ONLINE, our Sitemap, or use the    Search    button on every page to help you easily locate information you are looking for.

Providing Services

• In 2002, CHAI bought and sent to Israel the first mobile spay/neuter clinic in the Middle East. The clinic, operated by Hakol Chai, travels from city to city providing low-cost services, changing the future for cats and dogs throughout the country. Clinic staff also provide education about animal care in schools and community centers all over Israel. The clinic will serve as an example that can be replicated throughout Israel, and as a model for the entire Middle East.
   

• In August and September 2005, many of the people who were evacuated from settlements in Gaza and the West Bank left their animals behind. CHAI's sister charity in Israel, Hakol Chai, entered the settlements with our mobile clinic, veterinarian, staff, and volunteers, and rescued over 100 animals.
   

• In July and August 2006, during the Hezbollah rocket attacks, many of the people who were forced to leave their homes in northern Israel left their animals behind. CHAI's sister charity in Israel, Hakol Chai, worked in highly dangerous conditions, night after night, to rescue the abandoned animals, giving them food, water, medical help, and shelter. Hakol Chai subsequently reunited several lost animals with their families and found new homes for many more, in Israel and in the U.S.

Assisting Animal Shelters and Veterinarians

• In 2003, CHAI and Hakol Chai organized a conference for veterinarians together with Israel's Ministries of Health, Environment, and Agriculture. As a result of this conference, the Veterinary Services Division of the Ministry of Agriculture agreed to replace the slow, painful strychnine poisonings of animals with humane animal capture and control measures. This is the first time the Veterinary Services has joined forces with an animal protection charity to improve the treatment of animals.
   

• CHAI held the first ever course on shelter management in Israel. This course, attended by municipal veterinarians, heads of shelters, and workers from all over Israel, has resulted in very significant, positive changes for animals throughout the country.
   

• CHAI, with the assistance of Advisory Board member U.S. Representative Tom Lantos and Mrs. Annette Lantos, obtained land to build a shelter in Tel Aviv. The Tel Aviv-based Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Israel (SPCA) was able to move from tiny, dark, run-down quarters to a new, modern facility in a more central location. It now provides all services, including spaying and neutering of companion animals, at low cost.
   

• CHAI purchased and sent to Israel the country's first animal ambulance, a donation to the SPCA in Tiberias. The vehicle was blocked from entering Israel for 10 years by bureaucratic red tape and enormous customs duties before it was allowed to enter on the same duty-free basis as ambulances for people, thanks to the efforts of Rep. Tom Lantos (D-CA) and Knesset Member Avraham Poraz.
   

• For many years, CHAI provided support to the small-animal shelters throughout Israel in very significant ways, from securing land to major construction and supplying critical medical supplies and equipment.
   

• CHAI imported and distributed the humane euthanasia drug sodium pentobarbital to replace the slow-acting, painful strychnine poison that was used at municipal pounds around the country. CHAI also supplied sodium pentobarbital to the shelters.
   

• CHAI campaigned successfully in Israel to introduce early-age spay and neuter, an important component in the control of the overpopulation of cats and dogs.

Working with the Government

• CHAI supplied model legislation and expert testimony to the Inter-Ministerial Committee established to draft legislation to protect animals. In January, 1994, the Knesset passed the country's first Animal Protection Law, which provides for fines and a jail term of up to three years for acts of cruelty.
   

• CHAI provided the Veterinary Services with model regulations that helped form the basis for soon-to-be issued regulations to enforce the Animal Protection Law.
   

• CHAI provided model legislation (Swedish, British, and others) on farm animals. This will be used to help draft legislation on farm animals in Israel.
   

• CHAI successfully lobbied the government of Israel to begin using the humane oral rabies vaccine. The vaccine, which has all but wiped out rabies in much of Western Europe, is now being distributed throughout Israel, and funds have been provided by the EU to conduct a similar program in neighboring Arab regions.
   

• CHAI won the right for rescue vehicles imported into Israel to enter duty- and tax-free, on the same basis as similar vehicles for human hospitals.  We imported the Middle East's first animal ambulance and first mobile spay/neuter clinic.
   

• In 2006, Hakol Chai, CHAI's sister charity in Israel, was instrumental in the formation of the first pro-animal caucus (a group of Knesset Members who will promote legislation to the full Knesset) in the history of the Knesset. Hakol Chai participates in caucus sessions at the invitation of MK Yoel Hasson, caucus Chairperson.

Campaigning to End Specific Cruelties

• Horse racing: In 2005, CHAI and Hakol Chai began an extensive campaign to prevent the large-scale horseracing industry from entering Israel. In that year, Hakol Chai filed a petition in Israel’s Supreme Court to block the building of two large racetracks — the government’s first attempt to bring gambling on horseracing to Israel. The government authorized the plan after considering only financial gain and not the welfare of the animals, as required by law.
   

• Carthorse and donkey abuse: In 1999, CHAI and Hakol Chai began a multifaceted campaign to end horse and donkey abuse in Israel, including having horse-drawn carts banned from city streets. See the highlights of the first 10 years of our campaign, which include exposés, rescue and rehabilitation of abused horses, education, demonstrations and other public events, and legislative action. For example, in 2003, Hakol Chai exposed and shut down a place in the old part of Tel Aviv where horses were being starved and otherwise horribly abused, including being hacked to death with an axe, their meat sold in the market as beef. In 2009, Tel Aviv's Mayor banned horse-drawn carts from the city.
   

• Over the years, CHAI has successfully campaigned to end many other cruelties, including:

• The Israeli Army's practice of strapping dogs with bombs, sending them into underground Palestinian tunnels, and blowing them up by remote control
   

• The Ministry of Tourism's practice of promoting the Samaritans' slitting of lamb's throats at Passover as a tourist attraction

Promoting Alternatives to Animal Experimentation

• CHAI organized a major international medical conference, keynoted by Henry Heimlich, M.D., inventor of the Heimlich Maneuver, on alternatives to the use of animals in laboratories. This was the first conference of its kind anywhere in the world. CHAI's second alternatives conference, scheduled for April 2000, was cancelled because of intense resistance on the part of Israel's pro-vivisection community.
   

• CHAI has established a fund to promote alternatives to the use of animals in laboratories in Israel. The money may be used to fund an exhibit of currently available alternatives for Israel's biomedical research community or to award a grant to a student or a scientist working on developing an alternative.