Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu posted a photo on Tuesday, Yom HaZikaron, showing him wearing tefillin that belonged to a fallen IDF soldier.

This is the third consecutive year that Netanyahu has donned the tefillin of a fallen soldier on Yom HaZikaron. He began doing so on the first Yom HaZikaron after the October 7 massacre, when he donned the tefillin of Moshiko (Moshe) Davino, H’yd, who fell in Operation Protective Edge, at the request of his mother, Ruchama Davino.

The following year (2025), Netanyahu put on tefillin on Yom Hazikaron in memory of Yossi Hershkovitz, H’yd, who was killed in the war in Gaza in November 2023.

This year, Netanyahu put on tefillin l’illui nishmas Sean Carmeli, H’yd, who was killed during Operation Protective Edge in 2014.

Netanyahu wrote: “On Yom HaZikaron, as in years past, I lay tefillin in memory of one of our heroes who fell for our revival and our freedom.”

“This year too, I met with the Rebbe’s shaliach, Rabbi Or Ziv, who brought the tefillin with him. Each time for another warrior, another beloved son, another hero of Yisrael. Each year, a different story. A different heart. An entire world.

“This year, I merited to lay the tefillin of our hero Sean Carmeli, z”l.

“Sean, a lone soldier who came from the United States to defend Israel, chose to tie his fate to our people’s fate—out of deep faith, out of a sense of shlichus. He fell in battle in Gaza—but his ruach continues to live on in us, in the heart of the nation.

“When I lay his tefillin, I feel the deep connection between the generations. Between the mesorah of thousands of years and the heroism of our time. Between a silent tefillah and an act of ultimate mesirat nefesh.

“In this moment, with the straps wrapped around my hand and heart, I offer a quiet tefillah in his memory, in memory of all our fallen, and for the future of our people in this land.

“״וְרָאוּ כָּל־עַמֵּי הָאָרֶץ כִּי שֵׁם השם נִקְרָא עָלֶיךָ וְיָרְאוּ מִמֶּךָּ

(YWN Israel Desk—Jerusalem)