Poem Written by Deceased IDF Soldier Demonstrates Tremendous Loss to the People of Israel

Every Jew should own a copy of the poem found in the backpack of the late Corp. Hillel Nehemiah Ofen, says prominent Israeli writer.

By United with Israel Staff

IDF soldier Corporal Hillel Nehemiah Ofen, 20, died early Monday morning during a training exercise. It was likely due to the extreme heat. The IDF is investigating.

Ofen, who hailed from the community of Karmei Tzur, near Hebron, reportedly had been perfectly healthy. Drafted just five months ago, he served in the Combat Engineering Corps’ Yahalom special operations unit.

The day after his funeral, prominent writer and journalist Tsur Ehrlich publicized on Facebook a special poem, titled “I Belong,” that was found in Ofen’s backpack. According to Ehrlich, as translated by Israel National News, the poem should “be in the pocket of every Jew. Such a deep insight into the meaning of identity, the meaning of life, the meaning of togetherness, is like a refreshing drink of water and life in the social heatstroke that has fallen upon us,”

The poem, Ehrlich said, “is an all-encompassing, comprehensive fundamental truth, formulated with absolute simplicity, colloquially but with poetic precision. ‘I belong’: not in the sense of property and ownership, but in the sense of belonging and identification. This note, which according to his brother’s testimony he composed himself, with incredible maturity, testifies to our loss.”

It reads as follows:

“I belong!

I belong to a family, a community, a society, a nation.

I belong to the country, to the homeland.

I belong to humanity, to conscience, to honor.

I belong to history, to the future.

I belong to joy, to pain, to expectations, to fear.

Everything that has passed and will pass over me and my people, everything that has been created

My identity, who I am, I belong to it.

And it is my duty to preserve, protect and maintain all of these.

To see to their permanence as much as I am able.

And now, for this duty, I am yours.

I belong to weapons, to what is necessary for victory, to the battle.

I belong!”

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