France Initiative
Supporting vulnerable children in France through our partnership with OSE.
The YATOM France Initiative supports vulnerable children in France through our new partnership with OSE (Œuvre de Secours aux Enfants), a Paris-based organization founded during the Holocaust to rescue Jewish orphans. Today, OSE supports foster children and other vulnerable children across France, Jewish and non-Jewish alike.
Rooted in Jewish values that call us to protect and uplift the vulnerable, this partnership expands YATOM’s global impact.
July 2026 – YATOM has awarded a first microgrant to OSE in Paris, supporting children in foster care and other vulnerable children across France. The stories below, shared by OSE, show what this support makes possible. Names have been changed to protect the children’s privacy.
Featured Stories
Aaron’s Story
Aaron is ten. He doesn’t speak. He has complex disabilities, and for years the only place he could truly settle was the snoezelen room, a soft, dim, sensory cocoon that wrapped around him when the world got too loud.
By law, Aaron is entitled to an education. In practice, no school knew how to reach him, and he went without one. Last year, OSE began a partnership with a local school, and twice a week, Aaron started showing up.
This year, thanks to donor funding, his team went further: eye-tracking tablets, so Aaron could finally tell people what he wants without needing words. Now he can choose his favorite song. He can point to today’s activity. He can say yes. He can say no.
His educators have started noticing things they suspect his family already knew: he seems to have a head for numbers. And, much to his parents’ amusement, an unshakable devotion to a song from KPop Demon Hunters.
None of that shows up on paper as “outcomes.” It shows up as a ten-year-old choosing his own afternoon.
“Now he can choose his favorite song. He can say yes. He can say no.”
Chmouel’s Story
Chmouel is three. He has an older brother and sister, and he came to OSE’s children’s home the way too many three-year-olds come into care: placed by a judge, after violence at home that a family court needed to stop. He comes from an Orthodox Jewish family, and when he arrived, he barely spoke.
The home couldn’t undo what had happened. What it could do was make sure Chmouel didn’t lose everything at once. Every week, a Talmud Torah teacher comes to the home, so the rhythm of study still feels like his. OSE partners with local associations to bring Shabbat outside the home’s walls, so Friday still feels like Friday.
This year, Chmouel started school, a Jewish preschool, arranged so his first day of rentrée could look like any other Jewish child’s first day. His caseworker let him pick his own pencil case. His own backpack. New clothes, just for him, just for this. Before he walked in, his caseworker told him: do your best, show up every day, you can count on us.
He is, his team says, a joyful kid. Fiercely attached to his brother and sister. Growing a little more each day.
The Talmud Torah lessons, the Jewish school, the kosher meals: these are the parts of Chmouel’s life that a state budget doesn’t cover. They’re funded by people who believe a child in crisis still deserves warmth, not just shelter. That’s the difference between a facility and a home.
“Do your best, show up every day. You can count on us.”
Elisa’s Story
Elisa is fourteen. She has her father’s stubbornness and her mother’s laugh, though she hasn’t heard her mother laugh in a long time. Her mom is in prison, and Elisa, her dad, and her sisters are learning, slowly, how to be a family again.
Fourteen is a hard age to learn anything slowly. Elisa’s friends are chasing quick money online, the kind of money that asks you to sell the only thing violence hasn’t already taken from you. Elisa knows the temptation. She’s fourteen, and she’s tired of feeling like she’s worth less than she is.
This year, she was chosen for something else: a trip to Crete with four other girls, funded by OSE’s culture and recreation program. It sounds simple. It was not simple at all.
Before Elisa could board a plane, she needed an ID card, her first one. She needed to learn to be on time, because a plane doesn’t wait the way people sometimes do. She needed to pass her first swimming certificate, so she could go into water that blue without fear. She picked out a suitcase that was hers alone. She picked the color of her sandals. She kept her word to the group, day after day, until keeping it felt normal instead of hard.
She had never flown before. She had never had a room to herself before, either.
She came home changed. Not fixed, since fourteen-year-olds don’t need fixing, but a little more sure that she is someone worth investing in. That certainty came from a swim test, a suitcase, and five days on an island, funded by people who will never meet her.
“A little more sure that she is someone worth investing in.”
Help a Child Thrive
Small grants can make an immediate difference—helping children access school, clothing, and the basic support every child deserves.
Apply for a YATOM Microgrant
Are you a foster or adoptive family navigating unexpected expenses? YATOM microgrants provide timely assistance so families can focus on creating safe, loving homes.
Help a Child Thrive
Small grants can make an immediate difference—helping children access school, clothing, and the basic support every child deserves.
Apply for a YATOM Microgrant
Are you a foster or adoptive family navigating unexpected expenses? YATOM microgrants provide timely assistance so families can focus on creating safe, loving homes.