“Thirty days I’ve been waiting for this call. It was a living nightmare until they finally caught this bastard,” said Baruch Ben Yigal, whose son Amit was murdered by a Palestinian rock-thrower.
By Yakir Ben Zion, United With Israel
Three years ago when Amit Ben Yigal got his mandatory draft notice to serve in the IDF, the only son asked his father, Baruch, to sign the waiver allowing him to serve in a combat unit. IDF policy is that only sons do not serve in combat roles, unless the family agrees.
Last month, just a few weeks shy of finishing his army service, Amit, 21, was killed when a Palestinian dropped a large building block on his head as the IDF finished an operation to arrest terrorist suspects. He was the first IDF soldier to fall in action in 2020.
At his funeral on May 12 his father Baruch mourned the loss and remembered the day he allowed his son to join the Golani Brigade.
“I signed with this hand. You told me, ‘dad, don’t deny me this.’ I signed it and you rejoiced as if you had just won the lottery,” Ben Yigal said by his son’s fresh grave. “You were supposed to bury me, not the other way around. Father in the heaven, give me a reason to wake up tomorrow morning.”
For the past four weeks Israeli security forces have been tracking down Amit’s killer, announcing Sunday they had made an arrest.
Shortly after the IDF updated him, Baruch went to his son’s grave where friends recorded him giving Amit the news.
After laying over the grave and kissing the stone covering, Ben Yigal sat up and spoke to his son.
“My dear son. I came her now to tell you something. To tell you that the person who hurt you with that accursed rock has been caught!”
Ben Yigal then repeated the Hebrew blessing of thanksgiving: “Blessed art thou our Lord our God, King of the universe, who has granted us life, sustained us, and enabled us to reach this occasion.”
“Amit – they caught him! They caught him! They caught him,” he said to the gravestone, telling his son he could finally sleep peacefully in his own bed.
“Thirty days I’ve been waiting for the phone call of redemption,” Ben Yigal told Ynet. “A nightmare until they finally caught this bastard. I hope he pays the highest price, to rot in prison all his life. ”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the IDF and security forces “for apprehending the reprehensible murderer of the late Amit Ben Yigal. I have given the order to demolish the home of this murderer.”
“Whoever tries to attack us – we will find him, sooner or later. In recent years you have seen that it is sooner,” Netanyahu said.