In the dark night that fell on the military cemetery in Jerusalem, the funerals of the young Israeli soldiers massacred by Hamas followed in leaden silence, broken only by angry tears.
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The ocher-colored earth of the Berg-Herzl Cemetery, named after the founder of political Zionism, has just been freshly dug by a miniature excavator. Eleven young soldiers will be buried here one after the other between Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning.
Just a few steps from the grave of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was murdered by an Israeli extremist in 1995, the brothers in arms of 20-year-old Noam Elimelekh Rottenberg, a talented computer scientist and good comrade, carry him to the ground.
AFP
Alerted by a chain of messages on the social network WhatsApp, a thousand people, most of whom had nothing to do with or had anything to do with the deceased, stood in tense silence. Their gazes are hard, their jaws are clenched, their faces are closed, everyone stands tall and struggles to hold back their tears.
“Noam, this war will be the last. We don’t want to live like this anymore. Their shed blood will be avenged a hundredfold,” promises Colonel Nissim Yitzhaki, who commands the unit in which Noam served.
Volunteers, mostly ultra-Orthodox Jews, also rushed to help workers digging the graves, overwhelmed by their large numbers.
“A cowardly and cruel enemy”
After Palestinian Islamists Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel at dawn on Saturday, “difficult days await us in the face of this cowardly and cruel enemy,” the officer added in front of the soldier’s remains placed at his feet.
None of his relatives are willing to describe the circumstances of his death. Your pain is visible. Added to this is their lack of understanding in the face of such an attack, which is unprecedented since the country’s founding in 1948.
AFP
“It is so fitting for you to die, Noam,” chokes Rabbi Yitzhak Revah, who heads the Talmud school in Galilee (north), where the young man studied.
He repeats his words and hammers them home: “You only died because you were Jewish. Because you were Jewish. It’s unbearable. Simply unbearable.”
Another rabbi, Yitzhak Neiman, speaks with his throat tight and his fist pounding the platform angrily. “The last time I felt this anger was at the gates of Auschwitz,” he says, referring to the largest Nazi death camp in Poland.
In the sky, the rumble of a fighter-bomber sends shivers through the crowd, which has just been informed that in the event of a warning siren of a Hamas rocket attack, everyone must seek shelter or place both hands on the ground with both hands on their heads.
AFP
Gatherings are high risk during this time.
The Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for the dead, rises at night. The crowd dries their tears.
A few meters further on, the small excavator is used again. More holes must be dug to bury Hamas’ dead. The night will be long.
More than 1,000 people have been killed in Israel since Saturday morning, mostly Israeli civilians, some soldiers and foreign workers.