Tension in Iran, Trepidation in Israel

Yes, my friends, I cannot deny that we are tense. I would say that we are suffering from nail-biting tension, but the apprehension filled the air on Shabbos, when it is forbidden to bite one’s nails.

Incidentally, Rav Shimshon Dovid Pincus once saw a member of his community in Ofakim biting his nails on a weekday and shouted at him, “Chillul Shabbos!” The man was bewildered by this reprimand, but Rav Pincus explained, “If you make a habit of biting your nails, it’s almost inevitable that you will do it without thinking, even on Shabbos. Therefore, you are placing yourself in a situation of potential chillul Shabbos.” This story is a testament to Rav Pincus’s exquisite sensitivity to the observance of halacha. But I digress.

It is very possible that the president of the United States, with his unique and flamboyant personality, is playing games with Iran and its rulers. The whole world is watching as he taunts them, realizing that they are shaking with fear. In my opinion, it wasn’t a mistake when Trump revealed a military secret in a newspaper interview; it was a premeditated move. While discussing the American military raid in Venezuela, Trump revealed that the US forces had used a secret weapon that he described as “the disruptor,” which prevented Venezuela’s weapons from operating. “They had Russian and Chinese rockets, and they never fired even one,” Trump asserted. “We went in, they pressed the buttons, and nothing worked.” When Iran heard this, they were horrified, and for good reason.

The only problem, as far as Israel is concerned, is that the tension and pressure experienced by Iran is felt in Israel as well. Iran is threatening to strike at Israel if they are attacked; they have even identified the specific targets for their missiles. Over the past two Shabbosos, the Home Front Command instructed Israeli citizens to leave their radios tuned to a silent channel, which will broadcast only missile alerts in the event that they occur. To make a long story short, everyone in Israel is anxious about what lies ahead.

There is another type of tension in the air as well—over the draft law. Last Wednesday, the state budget was passed by a small majority. Some of the chareidi representatives (the members of Shas and Degel HaTorah) voted in favor of the budget, while others (the members of Agudas Yisroel, including Meir Porush) voted against it. The support for the budget was due to a last-minute decision for those chareidi parties to refrain from bringing down the government at that time; since it was the last possible day for the budget to pass its first reading, Degel and Shas chose to support the bill, hoping that a resolution will soon be found for the problems created by the attorney general and the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee and that the new draft law will be passed by the Knesset in the next two weeks. But for the time being, we are in suspense over this issue as well, as we all wait to hear the fate of the draft law that has been the subject of so much discussion.

Will the Draft Law Pass?

At the beginning of the week, all the sessions of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that were scheduled this week regarding the draft bill were called off. The committee chairman, MK Boaz Bismut, explained that the committee’s legal advisor needed more time to formulate the final version of the bill. Bismut is scheduled to discuss the bill with Prime Minister Netanyahu. A public statement was issued on his behalf: “A short time ago, the committee’s legal counsel informed us that the work on a final version of the draft law hasn’t yet been completed, and it will take additional time for it to be finalized. As a result, the committee chairman has decided to postpone the discussions planned for this coming week to the following week, to ensure that the next stage of discussion will take place only on the basis of a properly formulated version of the bill, as part of an efficient and focused legislative process.”

According to Bismut, the law is ready; all that it lacks is the legal advisor’s stamp of approval. Last weekend, at the committee session, Bismut said, “I am excited to announce that the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee has finished the reading of all the clauses of the conscription law. We are approaching the finish line. The committee will soon vote on the law in preparation for its second and third readings [at which point it will be brought to the Knesset for those readings and its final approval]. A process that has dragged on for years and that has repeatedly been stuck in endless committee sessions has moved forward on my watch, because we had a clear objective: passing a law. We didn’t hold discussions for the sake of talking; we had a genuine desire to reach a solution, step by step, through dialogue, collaboration, and determination.” Bismut quoted the prime minister, who announced on the same evening, “We are on the verge of completing the passage of the draft law. We are moving on to the next stage. It is now the responsibility of the entire Knesset to continue this process until the law is approved by the full Knesset. This will be a historic draft law that will strengthen the IDF and all of Israeli society.”

Will the chareidim be able to support the draft law after all the changes that will be introduced by the committee’s legal advisor, Miri Frankel-Shor? That is a question that we can answer only after the fact. That is what I meant when I said that the community is tense. Meanwhile, everyone hopes fervently that the law will be approved, which should buy the country’s Torah learners another year or two of peace.

In related news, an unprecedented fiasco took place in the Knesset last week, when several members of Yair Lapid’s party, Yesh Atid, barged into Bismut’s office while he was meeting with chareidi MKs. How did they get in? The answer is that one of the interlopers, Ram Ben-Barak, is a former chairman of the committee, and his access card, which is supposed to open his own office, still allowed him to access the committee chairman’s office as well. The group of Yesh Atid members entered Bismut’s office to protest his meeting with the chareidim, and Bismut was outraged. “A red line has been passed!” he wrote in a sharp statement in response to the intrusion. “The same elements who warned against a right-wing takeover of the Knesset behaved with thuggery and vulgarity today, in an attempt to turn a sovereign institution into a lawless space. The intrusion even included the severe offense of improperly photographing committee documents. This situation will be handled with full severity. I have scheduled a meeting with the Knesset Sergeant-at-Arms in response to the violent and forceful intrusion into my office by opposition Knesset members.”

Yesh Atid responded derisively, “The Likud’s reactions are turning whinier and more hysterical than ever. Everyone understands that they were trying to hide their meetings with chareidi activists and to close a corrupt deal for draft evasion on the backs of IDF soldiers.”

Bismut has already imposed sanctions on Yesh Atid MKs who are members of the committee; they will now be barred from classified discussions.

Attorney General Takes Aim at Funding for Foreign Yeshiva Students

There is another issue related to the draft crisis that will surely be of interest to American Jews, especially those with children learning in yeshivos in Eretz Yisroel. The government budget for yeshivos includes funding for foreign students; every yeshiva receives a set sum for every foreign student registered in the institution. The yeshivos submit lists of their talmidim to the Finance Ministry every year, and the Treasury, which is always trying to cut funding—especially funding for Torah learners—takes advantage of this budget clause for a routine ploy. The Treasury first announces that it is cutting funding for students from abroad, which comes as a huge blow to yeshivos with many foreign students—chief among them Yeshivas Mir. The chareidi politicians are then forced to fight to reverse the budget cut, in a fiscal battle that must be fought every year.

When the Supreme Court ordered a freeze on funding for yeshivos—since all yeshiva students have been classified as criminals, boruch Hashem—it did not include the budget for foreign students. Foreigners are not subject to the Israeli draft, and the freeze in funding and future sanctions should not apply to them. However, the attorney general has a different view. Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara is making every possible effort to hamper the government’s operations; I suspect that she hopes to bring relations between the chareidim and Netanyahu to a breaking point, so that their partnership will dissolve and the government will fall. In this case, Baharav-Miara announced that she had decided that government funding for foreign students should be frozen as well, or at least that the amounts should not be updated. What was her reasoning for this? She explained that if foreign students are in the same yeshivos as Israeli students, who are classified as draft dodgers and criminals, then the government funding will end up in accounts that serve both sets of students, and the Israeli students will indirectly benefit from the funds provided for the foreign students. This argument is utterly absurd, but that is what she said. Alternatively, the attorney general suggested that yeshivos should maintain full accounting separation between the two types of students.

Just to put this in numbers, the minister of education proposed raising the amount of funding for students from overseas for the year 2025 to 100 percent of the full normative rate, but the attorney general ordered it raised only to 95 percent of the real rate.

The government’s response came from Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs, who categorically rejected the attorney general’s reasoning. Fuchs argued that the court ruling suspending funding for yeshivos explicitly targeted students “whose military service was not legally deferred,” and that the ruling imposes no limitations on funding for students who are not subject to the draft, such as foreigners or even Israeli talmidim who received full draft exemptions. He claimed that the attorney general’s demand for separate accounting structures for each category of students is not derived from the court ruling and is her own interpretation of the verdict, which exceeds the bounds of her authority. To highlight the absurdity of her stance, Fuchs added, “If all government funding is examined to determine whether it provides indirect benefit to individuals liable to the draft, the government will have to stop funding a long list of activities and services, ranging from cultural activities and municipal libraries to health and welfare services, out of the concern that someone who is not eligible for support may benefit from it indirectly.” Fuchs accused the attorney general of applying different standards in different contexts and of engaging in uneven enforcement.

This is only one part of a much longer saga. The attorney general never stops trying to harm the chareidi community. Last weekend, she called for a large meeting attended by senior officials in the army and the police force. She was angry with the civilian police for failing to help the military police arrest draft evaders, and she was also fuming over the number of arrests taking place, which, in her view, is far too low. The attorney general claimed that sanctions have been proven to be effective and have led to many more chareidim joining the army, and that it is therefore necessary to increase the sanctions and enforcement of the draft—and, in her view, the punishments for draft evasion as well, meaning that stiffer prison sentences should be imposed. In short, she is truly evil.

Iranian Agents in Israel

Let us now move on to another topic, which I have been meaning to write about for several weeks now: the bizarre phenomenon of people in Israel spying for Iran. One could be forgiven for scoffing at the very notion; after all, how could an Israeli Jew possibly spy for the enemy? But the Shin Bet announced last month that since the beginning of the war, the Shin Bet and police have thwarted nineteen serious attempts of Israelis to spy on behalf of Iranian intelligence. Criminal charges have been filed or will be filed against 34 Israelis in conjunction with these cases, some of which involved more than one suspect. In one case, the suspects were a married couple.

One month ago, several such cases were listed in the news: A young man was hired by Iran to take pictures of a floor in a hospital where Naftoli Bennett was staying, a 16-year-old youth was arrested on suspicion of maintaining ties with Iranian agents, a resident of Netivot was charged with taking photographs of IDF bases, IDF soldiers were caught transferring classified information about Israel’s air defenses to Iran, and a husband and wife were charged with monitoring the Mossad headquarters.

Here is an excerpt from one of the recently filed indictments: “Liachov (the suspect’s name) was asked, among other things, to come to Petach Tikvah and take videos of a street and residential buildings; however, he filmed a different street and buildings from those specified by the agent. In exchange for his work, he received payment in a digital wallet. In addition, he was asked to visit a car rental agency in Netanya and inquire about the prices of seven different cars, while videoing his visit. Liachov did not carry out that task.”

Another indictment targeted a 13-year-old boy from Tel Aviv. The charge sheet states, “The youth was asked to carry out tasks for Iranian elements who contacted him, in exchange for pay. He was even asked to take videos of the Iron Dome, but he refused.” Another indictment, this one against an Arab from East Yerushalayim, states that the suspect transmitted information that was liable to benefit the enemy. The charge sheet accuses him of maintaining contact with a foreign agent who presented himself as an agent of Iranian intelligence and of carrying out various tasks in exchange for payments totaling thousands of shekels. The indictment specifies that the suspect was first contacted by the Iranian agent after he posted on a social media platform that he was seeking work.

And there is more. According to the indictment filed against an 18-year-old youth from the city of Yavneh, “The police and Shin Bet arrested Moshe Attias, who was hired by the Iranians and asked to monitor and take pictures of the security arrangements for former Prime Minister Naftoli Bennett while he was hospitalized. During that time, he complied with a request from his Iranian handler to take photographs of the floor in the hospital and the room where the former prime minister had been placed, as well as the guards protecting him.” The young man was accused of carrying out a range of other tasks in exchange for payment as well, including hiding money in specific places, photographing various sites, printing proclamations, and burning a piece of paper and a banknote containing slogans against Prime Minister Netanyahu.

Another suspect accused of espionage for Iran was 65-year-old Edward Yusupov of Netivot, who documented certain strategic installations for Iran in exchange for payment. According to the indictment, Yusupov was arrested after remaining in contact with an individual who identified himself as an Azeri citizen residing in Dubai, but who is suspected by the Shin Bet of being an Iranian agent. Yusupov acted on this contact’s instructions when he took photographs of strategic sites in Israel, including IDF bases, the nuclear research facility in Dimona, and refineries in Haifa. He also rented an apartment overseeing the Haifa port on his contact’s instructions, which was meant to serve an operational purpose.

One of the most serious cases involves two soldiers, one in regular service and the other in the reserves, who are suspected of transferring classified information about the Iron Done to Iran. The two soldiers, George Andreyev and Yuri Eliaspov, both residents of the north, confessed to the crimes attributed to them. Eliaspov, who worked on the Iron Dome system, took a video of the system in operation and divulged classified information to the Iranians. According to sources within the defense establishment, anyone who received the video and possesses working knowledge of such systems would be able to exploit it to harm the State of Israel.

The Chareidi Caught in Iran’s Net

At first glance, this phenomenon boggles the mind. You may be wondering how any Jew could possibly sink so low as to betray his country and work on behalf of Israel’s bloodthirsty enemies. For one thing, many of the suspects are not Jewish. Most of them are Arabs from the north or from East Yerushalayim, or immigrants who are probably not Jewish. This list of names of some of the suspects is a dead giveaway: Rafael and Lela Guliyev, Aziz Nisanov, Alexander Sadikov, Vyacheslav Gushchin, Yevgeny Yoffe, a young couple from Ramat Gan named Vladislav Viktorovson and Anna Bernstein, and Lekachau Demsash. These cases pose less of a question for us.

But what about the actual Israelis, such as the young man from Yavneh? How did they become caught up in such activities? In general, this process begins with trivial actions, and the perpetrators are eventually swept into a whirlwind of more serious activity. For instance, an anonymous stranger offers payment in exchange for taking pictures of a local grocery store, and the young man says to himself, “Why not?” After he complies with the first request, he is asked to take a photograph of a house, a protest, or the entrance to an IDF base. The requests gradually become more and more severe, and by the time the perpetrator begins to regret his actions, he has already been ensnared and is unable to extricate himself from the relationship. Soon enough, it is too late, and the Shin Bet becomes aware of his activities.

You may be wondering about the reason for my interest in this matter. Why does this concern me at all? The answer is that a chareidi yungerman was arrested in October 2024 on a similar suspicion. This man was struggling to cope with massive debts, and the Iranians managed to tempt him into working for them at a time when he was extremely weak and vulnerable. Despite the extenuating circumstances, he crossed a red line and is now in major hot water. To make matters worse, after this story came to light, his wife demanded a divorce. The Shin Bet claims that the yungerman was assigned by the Iranians to follow an Israeli nuclear scientist, and that he was aware that Iran planned to assassinate the scientist. Prior to that, according to the indictment, he also operated on an Iranian agent’s instructions and set vehicles on fire, threw pipes onto Israeli roads, sprayed graffiti slogans, and posted hundreds of inciting proclamations in Tel Aviv and Ramat Gan calling for civil disobedience. The newspapers reported that the suspect was a “chareidi from Bnei Brak,” which was somewhat inaccurate; he actually lives on a moshav in the vicinity of Chofetz Chaim. But let us set that detail aside.

I spoke with the suspect’s parents, who insisted that the accusations against him are false. They maintain that he did nothing other than relaying information that was already in the public domain, such as a picture from Google Maps, and that he did not imagine for a moment that he was dealing with an Iranian agent. His parents do not dispute that he made a mistake, but they claim that some of the charges are false. They also claim that their son, along with other men who are interred in a prison in the north, has undergone torture, and that his tefillin have been confiscated and prison officials are denying him access to sifrei kodesh.

Paragons of Chessed

The day care tragedy in Romema may be an old story by now, but I still cannot get it out of my mind. I personally visited the family, knowing that the day care owner would be home since she is officially under house arrest. Sure enough, I found her at home together with her husband, who is a distinguished yungerman. I tried to offer them some encouragement and assured them that the public is convinced that they are the victims of a blood libel, and I offered them my assistance in the event that it is needed. The day care owner, Miriam Friedman, is the daughter of Rav Freudiger, a distinguished resident of Givat Shaul. Mrs. Friedman revealed to me that the tragedy has left her deeply grief-stricken; she feels as if she has lost two children of her own.

In the past, when I had the unfortunate need to visit parents who had lost young children, I quoted Rashi’s account of Miriam’s argument to her father, Amram, after he divorced his wife: “Your decree is worse than Pharaoh’s decree.” As we know, Miriam argued to her father, that Pharaoh’s decree targeted only male children, while Amram was preventing both males and females from being born, and that Pharaoh was a rosha and it was questionable whether his decree would be fulfilled, but Amram was a tzaddik, and his edict would certainly be fulfilled (Sotah 12a). But there is a third distinction that is quoted less often: Pharaoh’s decree applied only in Olam Hazeh, whereas Amram was preventing children from entering Olam Hazeh and Olam Haba. Rashi explains that if children were born and then killed in accordance with Pharaoh’s decree, they would at least go on living in the Next World, whereas if they were never born in the first place, they would lose both worlds. This is a source of great solace to bereaved parents, since the purpose of this world is to prepare a person for Olam Haba, and it is comforting to them to realize that their small children, who never even tasted sin, were immediately privileged to bask in the radiance of the Shechinah.

This Friday night, I also found profound meaning in the words of Kabbolas Shabbos, where the posuk states, “How great are Your deeds, Hashem; Your thoughts are extremely profound.” Radak explains: “‘How great are Your deeds’—When I contemplate them, I recognize that they are great and lofty beyond my grasp. … ‘Your thoughts are profound’—For the wise men are not privy to the answers to difficult questions about this world, such as why something happened and something else did not occur…. This is the decree of His wisdom, and we do not know His thoughts or reasoning.” Hashem’s calculations are a mystery to us, and the reasons for such tragedies are beyond our understanding.

But aside from the tragedy itself, I am also appalled by the public reaction to it. The libelous attacks on the chareidi way of life are especially galling to me. A religious Jew’s concern for health and safety is unparalleled; we are raised with an abiding sense of respect for the concept of pikuach nefesh. It is surely the height of insolence for others to accuse the chareidim of callous indifference to life. In what other sector of society can one find the extraordinary proliferation of chessed that exists within the religious community? This has been evident in many tragedies, including the one at the day care center, where the volunteers who rushed to the scene to provide lifesaving aid, and then to ensure respect for the deceased, were chareidim. This was also evident at a recent Matnas Chaim convention in the International Convention Center in Yerushalayim, which was attended by thousands of kidney donors, the vast majority of whom were religious.

This week, I was also exposed to another outstanding chessed organization, this one in Beit Shemesh, known as Ezras Achim, which is under the direction and management of its founder, Rabbi Avrohom Kop. On motzoei Shabbos, an event was held for the parents of children with special needs, centering on the theme of connection. Rabbi Kop remarked in his speech, “Connection doesn’t mean a link to one person or to the management of this organization; it is a living force within every counselor, in their daily investment of effort and emotion in the children for whom they care. There are also things that are not revealed to the eye—complicated situations and challenges that are not written anywhere. But that is where we see the true connection, the boundless giving, which is heartfelt and fueled by a sense of mission.” Ezras Achim is all that and more.

Moshe Abutbul, a supporter of the organization, is the former mayor of Beit Shemesh, who helped Ezras Achim receive an allocation of land to conduct their activities. “Avreimi Kop is a one-man chessed factory,” Abutbul told me. “He is a giant who has turned Beit Shemesh into the chessed capital.”

I examined a series of messages fielded by Rabbi Kop over the course of a day and discovered a veritable ocean of chessed. His organization’s activities in that short span of time included advising families on their rights to government funding, distributing cooked food to the sick and needy, searching for a young man who had disappeared, transporting patients to a hospital, organizing a Shabbos ambulance, checking babies’ bilirubin levels, and collecting food to distribute—and that is only the tip of the iceberg. All year long, Ezras Achim organizes programs for children with special needs, which the children attend at the end of their official school programs. This gives their parents an extra two or three hours of much-needed respite. The programs operate even on Chom Hamoed and Yom Kippur. A group of girls who volunteer for these programs once expressed uncertainty as to whether they should spend the entire Yom Kippur in shul or participate in the Ezras Achim programs. Rabbi Kop placed a call to Rav Moshe Sternbuch, who was heard telling his gabbai in response to the question, “Tell Kop that they should go.”

“Where should they go?” Kop asked.

“To the Ezras Achim programs!” Rav Sternbuch replied.

The Jewish people have many needs, but our nation also has many baalei chessed. Ezras Achim is just one example, a single testament among many to the true nature of Klal Yisroel. Let the critics from the secular community conduct their own introspection before they turn their critical gazes against us. They have no business preaching to religious Jews about the meaning of sympathy and kindness!

Cabinet Meets in Kiryat Shemonah

There is much more that I could report to you. For instance, last week’s polls deserve some attention. I mentioned last week that the Arabs are uniting to avoid losing votes. The Arab parties have ten mandates today, having lost many votes due to a third Arab party failing to cross the electoral threshold in the previous election. If the Arabs unite, the polls show them potentially winning between 13 and 15 mandates in the next election. This news was greeted jubilantly by the left; however, it seems that the extra mandates for the Arab parties might come partially at their own expense, since the polls still show the right-wing bloc winning an election. The Likud, together with the right-wing parties led by Smotrich and Ben-Gvir and with the chareidim, has exceeded 61 mandates in every poll.

On that note, I should mention a video released by Gadi Eizenkot, who parted ways with Benny Gantz to launch a new party known as Yashar. Eizenkot’s party is projected to win five or six mandates on its own, although the center-left bloc has been planning a union of the parties, which might lead him to combine his slate with those of Bennett, Lapid, possibly Gantz, and possibly even the Democrats party, which is the most liberal of all. After the vote over the budget, Eizenkot released a short video that shows Netanyahu and Deri shaking hands, spliced together with a computer-generated image showing money changing hands between them as well. The implicit message is that Netanyahu used monetary incentives to secure the chareidi vote. The video drew sharp condemnation, with many arguing that it smacked of antisemitism. Eizenkot quickly tried to defend himself, claiming that he had been misunderstood and that all he wanted was to make it clear that he is opposed to the draft law.

In other news, there was a special cabinet meeting on Sunday in the city of Kiryat Shemonah. During the war, Kiryat Shemonah was practically deserted, and the government is eager to convince the residents to return to the city and bring it back to life again. To enhance the residents’ sense of security and to demonstrate the city’s importance to the government and the state, the cabinet held its weekly meeting there. However, this didn’t exactly lead to much of a change for the residents of Kiryat Shemonah. For now, we can only hope that this city, which lies in the north and used to be shelled repeatedly from Lebanon, will welcome its former residents back soon, as it does not seem to be facing a threat from Israel’s northern neighbors any longer.

Another Blatant Double Standard

Another story that bears mentioning is that of Mordechai David, the right-wing youth who decided to teach the left a lesson by personally blocking the cars of various leading liberal figures. Last week, he blocked the car occupied by Professor Aharon Barak, the former chief justice of the Supreme Court, for a few minutes, triggering a major uproar. He was accused of chutzpah, abuse, and thuggery, and the police even opened an investigation into his actions. This only served to evoke more accusations of hypocrisy against the left. “Where were you when left-wing protestors attacked MK Tally Gottliv’s sick daughter?” many demanded. “Where were you when a barbershop was besieged while Sara Netanyahu was there? Where were you when elderly people who live near Prime Minister Netanyahu were harassed?” Bli neder, I will cover this story in greater detail next week.

For now, I should mention a couple of notable yahrtzeits that fall this week (aside from the yahrtzeit of Rav Meshullam Dovid Soloveitchik, who is the subject of a separate article). One of those yahrtzeits is that of Rav Beinush Finkel, who accepted me as a talmid in the Mir yeshiva many years ago. Another is the yahrtzeit of Rav Yitzchok Scheiner, whom I interviewed at length several years ago for an article in Yated Neeman.

Ran Gvili HY”D

On Monday evening, I received a telephone call from Rav Shimon Grillus, a righteous Jew and talmid of Rav Yitzchok Zilber and Rav Eliezer Kugel. Rav Grillus, who is involved in kiruv work among the immigrants from the former Soviet Union, teaches the sefer Chochmah U’Mussar to his students, and he called to alert me to an interesting passage. “The Alter of Kelm writes,” he said, “that when a person leads a life immersed in gashmiyus in this world, then his body is consumed and decays in the grave, which is known as the experience of chibut hakever. However, if he leads a life of ruchniyus, the earth will fear him.” He proceeded to ask me to confirm a rumor that had come to his attention: that the body of Ran Gvili, the last hostage held in Gaza, who was brought to Eretz Yisroel for burial last week, had remained intact.

The next day, I spoke with one of the soldiers who had participated in the search. “That’s right,” he confirmed. “Gvili’s body was whole.” The soldier shared some details of the search process with me: “We worked in an organized way. We had received information that Gvili had been buried in an Arab cemetery in Gaza for over a year, and we removed nearly 1000 Arab bodies from the cemetery while searching for Ran. We examined the bodies one by one, and we positively identified him at approximately the 300th body. His flesh had remained intact.”

This soldier was a member of the IDF’s search and recovery unit in the south, which consists mostly of religious soldiers. It is because of its religious composition that this unit has been tasked with searching for victims of the atrocities of October 7. “We have a greater connection to Jewish burial and to our mission,” he said. “We were also accompanied by a large team of dentists, who are able to identify a body by its teeth, and by a pathologist.” He felt that it was miraculous that Gvili was located so quickly. “We were sure that it would take us at least two weeks to find him. There were thousands of bodies in the graveyard; who could say for sure when we would find Ran? It took us 16 hours to exhume the first 100 bodies, and we knew that if we had to empty the entire cemetery, it would take a long time. We called for more soldiers to join our efforts, and then the news came that he had been found. We quickly placed calls to everyone, informing them that there was no need to come anymore.”

“How did you feel?” I asked.

“I cried for a long time,” the soldier admitted. “For me, it was an incredible source of closure. I had barely slept since October 7, but I was able to sleep last night. We were assigned to retrieve the bodies of hostages since the beginning. Our unit does not operate within Israel at all; we operate only in enemy territory, and we have been involved in these efforts since the war began. We have located and retrieved many bodies of IDF soldiers; I was personally involved in four such cases.”