De Toledo High School’s 10th-grade students will never forget their semester in Israel this year. Shortly after arriving for the exchange program, the war with Iran began on Feb. 28.
At 8:30 a.m., while staying at a hotel in Jerusalem, the students heard sirens and quickly rushed six floors down to the underground parking garage. “No one panicked,” recalled Head of School Mark Shpall. “They handled it with great calmness. It helped that they were already awake and weren’t jolted out of bed.”
What may have also eased the students – many of whom had never experienced war – was the almost nonchalant way the Israelis around them reacted. Some even set up folding tables and chairs for a picnic right there in the parking garage. Yes, Iran was sending ballistic missiles to Israel, but life, and meals, must go on.
The Jewish high school, located in West Hills, was founded in 2003 and has been running an exchange student program for 23 years. Each year, Israeli students arrive in Los Angeles in the fall and stay with de Toledo families; in the spring, American students travel to Israel and stay with the same families they hosted.
This year marked the first trip to Israel since the Oct. 7, 2023 attack. Initially, nearly 40 students were scheduled to depart, but some parents, concerned about the possibility of war with Iran, withdrew their children.
In the end, 12 students participated in the extended three-month program beginning Feb. 15, and a week later, 15 students joined the shorter three-week program. All were excited to reunite with their Israeli friends, whom they had met a few months earlier at their school.
On March 28, after visiting Kibbutz Lotan in the Negev, the two groups met in Jerusalem to enjoy the weekend together before joining their hosting families in Tel Aviv and Ramat Gan.
Once the war began, Shpall informed the parents back home that they were going to arrange for their kids to return to Los Angeles ASAP.
“Most parents actually advocated very strongly to keep the kids there,” said Shpall. “They wanted their kids to have the experience of being with their host families and living in Israel. There was a hope that the war would end quickly.”
The students were well prepared for the possibility of war. Prior to their arrival in Israel, they were briefed on what to do in the event of sirens. Upon arrival, they were also shown where the mamad (safe room) or bomb shelter was located.
“They were not exhibiting any fear, but after the fourth and fifth time they heard the sirens – about every two hours – and needed to rush to the mamad, they started getting annoyed,” Shpall said.
Once they got to the mamad, they were on their phones, played card games or went to sleep.
It was a surreal experience for students who had never heard air raid sirens in their lives, let alone the sound of bombs dropping. From the moment the war began, there were no more trips, sightseeing, visits to the Old City of Jerusalem or outings to the market to shop for souvenirs.
“We moved to another hotel in town that had a mamad on every floor and we allowed the kids to go out to get food at restaurants that were still open on Ben Yehuda Street. We made sure they were within 60 seconds of the hotel so that if the sirens went off again, they would be able to get back quickly.”
With Ben Gurion Airport closed and flights canceled, the students had to travel to Taba, Egypt, near the Israeli border, for their flights home. From there, they flew to Rome on March 5 and then continued to Los Angeles the following day.
The second group – who were still waiting for available flights – joined their host families in Ramat Gan and later flew back to Los Angeles on March 20 via El Al from Ben Gurion Airport.
“They are proud and glad that they went,” said Shpall. “Nobody said they wish they hadn’t gone. Their parents were happy about it as well, and they were quite appreciative of everything we did for them.”
The school also has additional exchange student programs with schools in Madrid, Rome, Mexico City, Hungary, Uruguay and Istanbul, but the Israel program is considered its most significant.
“We are 100% committed to our exchange programs, and we definitely plan to continue our program in Israel,” said Shpall.
He added that the experience was one de Toledo students will never forget, giving them a real-life understanding — far beyond what any classroom could teach — of what it means to live in Israel during wartime: not only the tension, the destruction, and the constant need to ensure safety, but also the resilience and strength of the Israeli people during such times.