A4BGU Mobilizes Support for BGU’s Recovery from Missile Damage
A4BGU Mobilizes Support for BGU’s Recovery from Missile Damage
August 11, 2025
Current events, Negev Development & Community Programs
Prof. Ehud Ohana פרופ’ אהוד אוחנה
Jewish Herald-Voice —Americans for Ben-Gurion University (A4BGU) has launched an emergency fundraising campaign to drive the recovery at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) after the campus and its community suffered extensive damage from a recent Iranian missile attack.
On June 19, a missile that directly hit Soroka University Medical Center – BGU’s main teaching hospital – destroyed six BGU research laboratories and damaged nine others. Thirty buildings on BGU’s Beer-Sheva campus and nearly 100 homes of faculty members and students were damaged. More than 65 members of the BGU community were evacuated from their homes.
A4BGU’s emergency campaign provides stipends for student-reservists, repairs to homes and dormitories, renovation of damaged campus labs and facilities and mental health support for a community navigating trauma. To date, more than $2 million has been allocated from more than 200 donors toward A4BGU’s $40 million goal for the campaign.
“BGU students, faculty and staff are living with perpetual traumatic stress – running to shelters and evacuating their homes, all while striving to finish the academic year,” said Doug Seserman, CEO of A4BGU. “We are now facing the urgent need to replace critical lab equipment, relocate laboratories and teaching spaces and even move our medical school.”
Among the BGU research laboratories destroyed in the Iranian missile attack was that of Prof. Ehud Ohana, associate professor in BGU’s Department of Clinical Biochemistry and Pharmacology. Gone are biological samples intended to treat cancer, inflammatory bowel diseases, fatty liver disease and diabetes.
“It’s going to take a very long time to generate them again,” Ohana said in an interview with The Times of Israel. “Some are gone and irretrievable. We’ve been set back from two to five years.”
“It’s a total loss. We were able to go back on track with some of the experiments, but the majority of it will be delayed. We have the knowledge. We’re focused on the colossal project to bring everything back on track,” he said.
At the same time, BGU president Prof. Daniel Chamovitz has identified a “silver lining” amid current challenges.
“Even the Iranians seem to recognize the impact we’ve made on this region,” said Chamovitz. “Innovation. Health. Science. Education. Sport. That’s the ecosystem they targeted. That’s the future they tried to shake. We’re still here. And we’re not going anywhere.”
For more resources and ways to support, visit: a4bgu.org/recoveryresilience.
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