ZAKA volunteer Bentzi Lizrovitz, who worked at the scene of the horrific terror attack in Ramot on Erev Shabbos, spoke about the heartrending moments when he came face to face with the mother who lost her son in the attack. [Tragically, by the end of Shabbos, a second son passed away.]
“I received the information about the attack on the communication network of MDA and ZAKA,” he said. “I was at my home in Givat Ze’ev and I immediately began driving toward the scene on my ZAKA motorcycle. The boy [Yaakov Yisrael Paley, 6, h’yd] was already lifeless and all that was left for us to do was to cover him with a ZAKA bag.”
“The rest of the victims were evacuated from the scene in ambulances, some while undergoing CPR. The body of the little boy was transferred to the ZAKA ambulance at the scene. Another ZAKA volunteer, Rabbi Yisrael Wertheimer, called to me and asked if the mother was there because a police officer said that if someone could identify the child, they will release him immediately for burial – otherwise they’ll have to take him to Abu Kabir [Forensic Institute].”
“That’s when Rav Yisrael and I began to search for neighbors or the mother. A neighbor from the family’s building approached me and told me the names of the children. I asked him if the mother was here and he answered ‘yes’ and brought us to her. She was surrounded by neighbors who had come to be with her at these terrible moments.”
“We approached her and asked: ‘Are you the mother?’ She answered ‘yes.’ And then we carefully told her that we’ll need to speak to her in a few minutes. The officer and I want to speak to her. She looked into my eyes and asked: ‘Is my son alive? What’s his condition?’
“I answered her: ‘We need tefillos. We’ll know soon.’ We already knew he wasn’t alive and my heart was breaking – I held back from bursting into tears in front of the mother but tears began running down my face.”
“In the end, at the instruction of the police, we sent the ZAKA ambulance to Shamgar [Beis Halevayos] so that the identification could be carried out there. The mother was sent in a special car with United Hatzalah volunteers who were with her at the moment she was told the bitter news.”
“The mother responded: ‘What’s there to say? Todah Rabah to Hashem that I had the child for five years. I sent a korban back to Hashem.”
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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8 Responses
“The mother responded: ‘What’s there to say? Todah Rabah to Hashem that I had the child for five years. I sent a korban back to Hashem.”
This is what our generation needs to hear! This mother will be the Emuna teacher for many hundreds of thousands! How she can say such words… I feel as though my Emuna is lacking.
I honestly believe that we can say here like the Rabbonim said many times in the past, these 2 young children (zero Aveiros) are definitely a Korban for maybe a large amount of adults.
All us adults have to say Thank You to Hashem that he kept us alive and is giving to us another chance to improve our ways. Sometimes 2 young children are connected to 1000 adults.
OK- lets be practical………let us sign up 1000 yidden to to teshuva for something …. not new kabolos or segulos.real hard Teshuva. Dont stop with words and let it dissipate….
To avraham, and others with this line of thinking: Be careful, now, not to inadvertently fall into the trap of thinking that humans are taken from us as karbanos to be mechaper for the sins of others. We don’t exactly accept that – it’s how the Christians talk about Yoshke; it’s also awfully similar to the idea of throwing human sacrifices into the flames to pacify an angry deity. Please, we don’t think this way. It’s not emes. There is on the other hand the concept of material destruction to be mechaper on someone’s sins so they will be saved and motivated to return in teshuva. That is what the korbanos were for (“There but for the grace of G-d…).
Because HakB”H is not an angry deity, He is both chessed and emes, and all good. Very hard to process this, but also there is such a thing as tzaddikim passing away to be mechaper on a generation. I’m not clear on how to differentiate on this, it is for greater minds. But certainly at least, we should be scared enough to search within ourselves to find the teshuva we must do – rather than interpret the horrifying tragedy of this family as a free pass for 1,000 other adults.
Avraham, such wise words that heal…..
Mrs. D, Sara Rifka, this is a tricky topic but in a nutshell, Hashem exacting punishment is not a contradiction to the middos of Chesed and Emes.
I’m pretty sure that the concept of righteous people serving as a kaparah has sources in Chazal, but even if it doesn’t, it has been mentioned by many Gedolim through the generations.
The Gemara says that there are aveiros that result in children dying young. I am not saying that this is the case here, but it is quite clear that innocents can suffer for the aveiros of others.
I think that the main emphasis user avaraham meant was to say that we should do teshuva becasue Hashem never takes a child for no reason and if we needed a kaparah, let’s make sure that we don’t need it again R”L.
To A Fish out of Water:
Thank You
We all know that sometimes a big Tzaddik can be a Kapporo for the generation.
Maybe young children can sometimes be a Kappora for the generation if the parents and siblings can handle it.
everything bad is a kaporoh
taking out the wrong amount of change is a small kaporoh
the passing of pure children is a huge kaporoh