An Israeli policewoman who narrowly survived a terrorist attack last September is still stuck in hospital — and her only chance of rejoining her family any time soon appears to be a crowdfunding campaign.

Tsippi Yacobian was on duty just outside Jerusalem’s Old City when she was repeatedly stabbed in the neck. The married mother-of-two has lasting injuries and is confined to a wheelchair in Hadassah Mount Scopus Hospital.

She is unable go back to her family home in Jerusalem because it cannot be altered to accommodate her special needs, which are so serious that she now needs 24-hour care and cannot even press a button to call a lift.

But house prices in the city have risen so much that even with the state assistance available, she cannot afford a suitable home there.

Ms Yacobian said that hospital life was deadly boring and she wants to — and is ready to — go home. “From 3pm you sit, you sit, nothing to do,” she said.

Now, a man who bumped into her father has started a crowdfunding campaign to raise NIS 1 million (£215,000) to enable her to buy and adapt a suitable home in Jerusalem. “This woman, like the policemen killed last Friday, was protecting Israel,” said Uri Schechter, adding: “So we need to take care of her.”

Mr Schechter, a senior staffer from the Tzohar organisation of modern-Orthodox rabbis, happened to meet Mrs Yacobian’s father when he was lost in Jerusalem and asking for directions.

“I met a Jewish person who was sad, said ‘what’s wrong?’ and he told me a little about his daughter,” Mr Schechter said.

The story touched him deeply. “She’s in hospital for nine months, and it’s like she’s in prison,” Mr Schechter said. He called friends and they decided to set up the campaign, which is already almost a third of the way towards its target.

He said felt a strong duty to help the family: “They are a simple people — the husband is a trader at [the Jerusalem market] Mahane Yehuda and they don’t have money or connections,” Mr Schechter said.