Terror Attacks Didn’t Stop IDF Officer

The Fellowship  |  December 27, 2017

An IDF soldier standing with two civilians embracing them.
Terror Attacks Didn't Stop IDF Officer

Serving with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is not the only reality that every Israeli faces. So, too, must they all face the threat of terror. But in this moving story from the IDF, we see that an Israeli officer never let terror attacks keep him from defending the country and people he loves:

Lieutenant Aviv didn’t let two terror attacks stop him. When he was a baby his mother used her own body to shield him from a stabbing attack. Years later, his family’s car was hit by a Molotov cocktail and his sister was badly burned.

Lt. Aviv was only a month old when armed terrorists attack his mother with a knife at the entrance to their home in Gush Katif. His mother was stabbed more than 20 times while she used her own body to protect him and his young sister.

“My mother, my sister, and I were saved because people heard shouting, rushed to help, and overpowered the terrorists. It was not an easy time for my family. It was especially hard for my mother to be away from us [during rehabilitation], her little children.”

Lt. Aviv later enlisted to the IDF to serve in the Golani Brigade. After a challenging year serving in the Golani Brigade, he chose to go to Squad Commanders Course. Right before he finished the course, terror struck his family for the second time.

It was October 2015, and his father and mother were traveling with three of his younger siblings to Beit El, north of Ramallah, when Molotov cocktails were thrown at their car. The first one hit the car window, and the second exploded on his 3-year-old’s sister’s seat. His sister, Tal, was badly burned. “It’s not easy to see your sister wrapped in bandages from head to toe – [during her recovery] she didn’t respond or laugh. To this day she has a pressure suit designed to reduce the scars.”

With the support from his family, Lt. Aviv successfully completed the squad commanders course and became a sergeant. But he wasn’t done yet…