Israelis and Palestinians have long been enemies, but for mothers desperate to save their children, the conflict takes a back seat. The Israeli clinic Save a Child’s Heart treats youngsters even if they are from places that are at war with Israel.

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Every hour is touch and go for 14 month-old Abdullah whose little heart was born with a hole in it. “Without the operation in this hospital my son would have died,” his mother said. 

In the next ward is 14-year-old Ronial who was nearing death when she was wheeled in. She was one of five Iraqi children flown from Baghdad to Amman and then driven across the border to Jerusalem.

“She was almost dead,” said the clinic’s pediatric cardiologist Akiva Tamir. “She was so sick that she could not walk. She barely talked. She was very blue.”

Parents that bring their children to the Save a Child’s Heart clinic faced the most difficult decision of their lives: go to Israel, a country at war with theirs and risk punishment, and even death back home, or prepare for the alternative – possibly losing their child.

“Initially, it was very difficult for them because Israel was the enemy country. The parents were very anxious. They did not know what to expect,” said head surgeon Lior Sasson.

Ronial’s mother said that she was very scared to travel to Israel and she had good reason to be afraid. Her country, Iraq, forbids its citizens from visiting Israel.

However, for the Israeli doctors that treat Arab children the decision is simple.

“I am doing what I think is right to do,” Akiva Tamir said. “I am treating kids that need treatment.”

In the last 15 years more than 2,500 children have been taken to the clinic, sponsored and treated. Half of them come from Gaza, the rest from Indonesia, Iraq and Africa.

“The main goal of this organization is to help developing countries create the medical ability to treat children with heart problems by themselves,” said Tamar Shapira of International Relations at Save a Child’s Heart. “In order to achieve that, we bring children from these developing countries to Israel. We also bring doctors from these developing countries for training here.”

It is a vision that is paying off. Not only are mothers eternally grateful to the Israeli doctors that saved their children. They are now brave enough to tell their neighbors back home.

“I will tell everyone we were in Israel and how they saved my daughter’s life,” said Ronial’s mother. “I am no longer afraid to say it because my daughter is alive.”

While the politicians continue to have a go at each other, and Israel and her Arab neighbors grow further apart, on the ground, at least in this spot, a very different story is unfolding.