As part of a great club tradition, Maccabi Tel Aviv players paid a visit this afternoon to the Beit Levinstein Rehabilitation Centre in Ra'anana. Dan Einbinder: "This is a great privilege for us"
Maccabi Tel Aviv have made it an annual club tradition to visit the Beit Levinstein Rehabilitation Centre in Ra'anana, and today four of Maccabi Tel Aviv's leading stars – Eytan Tibi, Reef Peretz, Carlos Garcia and Dan Einbinder – spent time with the centre's patients and handed out club gifts to each and every one of them. Beit Levinstein is Israel's largest rehabilitation centre, where sufferers from a wide variety of injuries undergo a comprehensive recovery procedure. The four Maccabi players visited a number of wards, among others the children's ward, devoting their full attention to all the patients they met and acceding to all requests to have their photographs taken with them. One of those young patients was Asraf Ben Haim, a passionate Maccabi Tel Aviv fan, who proudly awaited his visitors dressed in his Maccabi matchday jersey.
Team defender Eytan Tibi, participating in his second consecutive visit to the centre for the club, described his feelings about meeting with the patients: "Every time I visit an institution like this I find it a very moving experience, even though it's sometimes difficult to see people in this kind of situation. I can only hope that we succeeded in bringing them a bit of cheer and joy to their hearts and that it will help them get better that much faster". Dan Einbinder was also keen to express his feelings at the end of the visit: "My feelings are a bit mixed because on the one hand it's hard sometimes to see people who are in real pain and suffering. On the other hand you feel satisfaction at having helped to give them a bit of strength and endurance. And in every respect this was a great privilege for all of us".
Listen to the players' full reactions in this short video clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTu6yotTndY&feature=c4-overview&list=UU-oWQqnf8B8a_TsmVi0mTUg
