The Levaya of one of the victims killed in the boating accident in Chile last week was postponed at the last second.
Dina Porat A”H and Glila Biton A”H were the two victims R”L killed when a boat capsized in Southern Chile last week. As YWN had reported, a total of 16 Israelis were injured in the tragic incident, and two had lost their lives.
Israel’s ambassador to Chile, Eldad Hayat, and the Department for Israelis Abroad in the Foreign Ministry’s Consular Department worked diligently to have the bodies brought to Israel for burial.
But something tragic happened along the way.
On Tuesday morning, more than 100 people gathered for the Levaya of Dina Porat at the Rishpon Cemetery. Dina’s daughter asked to see the body of her mother one last time. Shockingly, the body of Glila Biton was found inside the coffin. The Levaya was delayed, as the Chevra Kaddisha rushed to switch the bodies.
Officials at the Israeli Foreign Ministry are pointing a finger at Chilean officials for the switching of the bodies.
In a statement, the ministry says Israel’s consul in southern Chile accompanied the families of the victims to the funeral home in Punta Arenas, where the bodies were identified by family members and sent to Santiago to be flown to Israel. Somehow, in Santiago, Chilean personnel involved in the shipping of the bodies accidentally switched the identify documents of the two victims.
The Levaya was postponed until tomorrow.
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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4 Responses
So sad for the families that they have to endure such additional stress and fortunately, the error could be corrected quickly so the levayah could be rescheduled immediately. I have traveled to the Patagonia region of Argentina and Chile and always found the locals to be very friendly and helpful. Indeed, some of the signs along the hiking trails on both side of the border are mult-lingual including directions in Hebrew, along with English, French and Spanish.
I thought it was common to ask a family member to identify the body before the funeral. The chevra kadisha asked a family member to check right before my mother-in-law’s funeral. The article makes it sound like if he daughter hadn’t asked, they woukdn’t have known.
The word “Wrong” in your title should be in front of “Israeli,” not in front of “Body.”
Boruch Dayan HaEmes.
Why do the Israelis always have to have the last word, which is we are right and someone else is wrong? Even if a Chilean official did muddle up the documents by mistake, why not just say, somehow the papers got muddled, but we are sure it was a much-regretted mistake. If there is another Israeli killed in South Chile they may remember some officials at the Israeli Foreign Ministry pointed a finger at Chilean officials in March 2019, and say this time we will take our time to make 200% sure things are OK, thus delaying the transfer and kevura. People don’t like being publicly slagged off for genuine mistakes.