|
Mar. 3, 2008
Two soldiers killed in Gaza buried in J’lem, Beersheba
Shelly Paz
"It is not good to die for any country, and Gaza is certainly not ours to die for. God, if there is one, please stop this madness."
These words were spoken by Yoel Mizrahi during his eulogy for his nephew, St.-Sgt. Eran Dan-Gur, at the Mount Herzl Military Cemetery in Jerusalem on Sunday. Dan-Gur, a Givati Brigade soldier from the capital, was killed in action in Jabalya, the northern Gaza Strip, early on Saturday morning.
"Eran, you are a third generation of Israeli patriotism. Only 20 years old… None of us expected such bloody patriotism, and we didn’t expect your and your friends’ blood to be abandoned and that young men like yourself would be sent to Gaza to a dire fate known in advance. The prime minister and the defense minister stutter just as they did during the Second Lebanon War, and the answers are our children returning home in coffins," Mizrahi said.
"Eran, there are no words big enough to describe our loss. My dear one, I salute you and thank you for letting us be part of your world and of your short life," Mizrahi said.
Eran’s mother, Merri, said her son had died in vain.
"If Eran’s death could have stopped the rockets, I would have been prepared to make this sacrifice,‘ she told Channel 2. ’But that’s not the case. Eran died for nothing."
Hundreds of friends, relatives and soldiers attended Dan-Gur’s funeral.
Dan-Gur, from Jerusalem’s Gilo neighborhood, joined the Givati’s Shaked infantry battalion in August 2006. He died Saturday, during an operation aimed at destroying Kassam rockets and launchers.
"God, I am angry with you. I never gave you permission to take my son from me. Please, bring him back to me,‘ said his mother as she wept over her son’s coffin while his friends carried it. ’How did they send you to Gaza? … On foot, exposed, and you were killed by a single bullet."
Dan-Gur’s aunt said, "I dreamed of the day I would make you laugh at your wedding, but instead I am here, at your funeral."
His unit commander said,"Dan-Gur family, you have lost your son, and we in the Givati Brigade have lost a soldier, a friend and a human being.
"While the nation of Israel slept, Eran and his friends in the Shaked Battalion went to thwart the terror infrastructure inside Gaza. Eran, you fought to leave the training unit and to return to be a combat soldier alongside your friends in the brigade, who continue in these moments to fight in Gaza to bring peace and quiet to the citizens of Israel. You were an excellent soldier and a caring person. I salute you on your last voyage," the unit commander said.
Dan-Gur’s friends from the Gilo Comprehensive High School described him as happy and intelligent.
"We have no words to describe our feelings. It’s hard to believe we won’t see you again except in photos. On the one hand, you were a person who loved life and knew how to live it to the fullest, and on the other hand you were an outstanding student who didn’t need to work too hard to get good grades," Erez said.
"You fought and got everything you wanted, but from now on, nothing will be the same. We never thought this could happen to one of us, but it did," said Hadas.
"Dear Liron, we know that only thanks to you Eran knew what love is, and for that you are our friend, and we will be there for you and for Eran’s family, whose sorrow is ours for eternity," Eran’s friend Omer said to Dan-Gur’s girlfriend, Liron.
Dan-Gur is survived by his parents, Merri and Reuven, and two brothers, Guy, 14, and Nadav, 17.
’I told him: Watch over yourself’
Tovah Lazaroff
Doron Asulin, 20, was so excited to hear that he was heading into Gaza that he called a close childhood friend, Elchanan Cohen, to tell him, "We’ve stopped playing games. We’re going to fight!" On Friday, the young soldier continued to text message and call his friend, with the last conversation coming in two or three minutes before Shabbat started.
"I do not know when I’ll be able to talk with you again," Asulin told Cohen.
"That was the last conversation," Cohen said, as he reminisced on Sunday about Asulin, who was one of two soldiers killed on Saturday morning in a gun battle in Gaza.
A member of Asulin’s unit, Cohen had been on leave at home because of a hand injury. He had left his cellular phone on by mistake, even though he typically shuts it off for Shabbat.
All day Saturday, he noted that it kept ringing, even though all his friends know he’s observant and never answers on Shabbat, Cohen told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday.
But sitting in uniform on a plastic white chair set up in the hallway outside of Asulin’s Beersheba apartment after the funeral on Sunday, Cohen said that for some reason it hadn’t occurred to him to worry that a friend might have died, even though his unit had lost a commander the year before.
"I still didn’t think it would happen," he said. Still, he called his base immediately after sundown on Saturday, only to learn of his friend’s death.
As he spoke Sunday he moved his hand over his face, but paused to smile as he recalled the friend with whom he had studied in high school and traveled to Greece and gone on dozens of road trips.
Asulin, he said, had loved to fish in Ashkelon. He had stuck a photograph of himself fishing with his father on the calendar that hung on his bedroom wall.
In their last years of high school, he would call Cohen in the middle of the night and tell him to be ready to head to the ocean in 15 minutes — and off they would go.
After the army, Asulin had planned to go on a trip to South America, said Cohen. He also had a serious girlfriend. "We teased him and told him it was time to set a date," Cohen recalled.
He said that among the many things that had set Asulin apart was his ability to solve problems, said Cohen. Once he set his mind on a goal, he made it happen.
He was skilled in soccer, basketball and karate and was so strong that his friends still recall how, in high school, he once held his own in a fight against five people.
Cohen said that the army was interested in promoting Asulin to the job of instructor, but their unit commander didn’t want to let him go because he was such a central figure.
Asulin started his military service in the navy, but switched to a combat unit because he wanted to serve where he would be in the midst of the action, his uncle, Yitzhak Asulin, said.
Yitzhak recalled how, during their final conversation last week, his nephew had been frustrated to find himself on the Egyptian border dealing with Sudanese refugees instead of in Gaza.
Stuck on the closet of Asulin’s room in his father’s Beersheba apartment was a sticker that read, "Make peace, not war." But in practice, Cohen said, Asulin took the rocket threat on the residents of Sderot and Ashkelon very seriously. He felt that it was his duty to protect the citizens. Shortly after joining the army, he was in Sderot and found some rocket shards, which he brought home, Cohen recalled.
Sderot Mayor Eli Moyal sent the family a telegram on Sunday to tell them that his thoughts and those of his city were with them.
Asulin’s father, Meir, held it in hand briefly and then put it aside, as he spoke with the Post about the last time he had seen his oldest child and only son, on Thursday.
Doron had stopped by while he was in the city and they had spoken again on Friday before he went into Gaza.
"I told him, ’Watch over yourself,’" recalled Meir.
On Saturday, he knew his world had turned upside down when, on vacation in Eilat, he opened the door of his hotel room to find IDF officers there.
"Tell me he’s just wounded," Meir desperately asked them.
But even as he framed the question, he knew it was in vain, since their presence had to mean that his son was dead. He described how Asulin had been shot in Gaza and then airlifted to Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba.
On Saturday, he identified his son’s body. On Sunday afternoon, he stood in a cemetery filled with hundreds of mourners.
One female relative cried out, "Why a combat unit, why?" Standing next to Asulin’s grave as the mourners filed out of the cemetery were the parents of Rami Zoari, 20, also of Beersheba, who was killed in January at a Shuafat checkpoint.
They had come to visit their son’s grave, located near Asulin’s, and stayed for the funeral. As those who knew Asulin hugged each other before departing, Zoari’s mother placed an eternal flame by her son’s grave, and his father washed the stone down with water.
Stuck on Zoari’s grave was a bumper sticker with his photo and the words, "We won’t forget."
In Memoriam
------------------------------
Back to Timeline »
|
