Israel Fest 2008

The year 2008 marks Israel's 60th birthday. Here in Cocoa, we celebrated this occasion in honor of our new sister-city-- Beit Shemesh-- with our first annual Israel Fest. Project: Restoration helped sponsor this event along with City of Cocoa and Friends of Beit Shemesh- a local citizen- led group dedicated to maximizing the mutual benefits of our sister-city relationship. The festival featured Israeli dance, drama and live bands, food, Israeli vendors, interactive educational displays of ancient Israel, children's activities at the Kidz Kibbutz, a children's Israeli art class, The Springs of En Gedi (a themed water slide), and birthday cake for everyone. Local residents learned that many of the items that they use daily- such as cell phones, computer chips, blue jeans, and remote controls were invented or developed in Israel or by Jewish people. We dedicated our new official sister-city tree olive tree. In Israel, each tree has a birthday, a name and a residence. Our tree's birthday is October 7, 2007 (in honor of the signing of the sister-city agreement). It's name is Haver, which means "friend" in Hebrew, and it's residence is Cocoa Riverfront Park. Two bands and four dance teams shared the stage, including our Restoration dance and drama team and Project: Restoration's new youth performing arts team Inspire. Our on-stage finale included an honoring of 8 Holocaust survivors who currently reside in Brevard County, a symbolic passing of the Israeli flag from one generation to the next and a symbolic joining of hands and hearts between our citizens and those of our new sister city in Beit Shemesh, Israel. Over 1000 people enjoyed the festival activities and are happy to see this as the first of many Israel Festivals in Cocoa.