Terribly sad story this.

A heart-wrenching struggle for the life of young South African Jewish youth leader ended sadly this weekend with the death of Gideon Prodgers, 20, from Cape Town.

Gideon passed away this Saturday at Rambam medical center in Haifa after an eight-month battle with leukemia. He will be buried in Cape Town later this week.

Gideon came to Israel on a gap-year program with the Habonim Dror youth movement. He spent his first three months at the Jewish Agency’s institute for training youth movement leaders in Jerusalem. He took ill and collapsed on one of the hikes organized by the institute in July and was taken to a Jerusalem hospital, where he was diagnosed with leukemia. According to his Habonim friends, Gideon’s doctors were very pessimistic about his chances. Continue reading →