Simchas Torah night was beautiful. The shul was packed with people, all dancing and singing with Chassidic and joyous abandon.
The next morning, we were in the middle of Shacharis when Yoav* came in and motioned to me from the back of the shul. Yoav is the chief of police for the Golan. His face was ashen and serious, but I could never have predicted just how bad the news he carried was. Succinctly and solemnly, he explained what had happened. It took a few moments for the full import of his words to sink in, and even then, I had trouble believing it.
“Chevreh,” I said, standing at the head of the shul to address the congregation, “We now have the hardest test of all. We need to dance through our tears; to rejoice even as we mourn.” I broke the terrible news as gently as I could.
“Boaz*!” cried a man hoarsely, his voice cracking. “Boaz went to the Nova festival!” It was Ronen*, Boaz’s father. We all turned to look at him in silent sympathy. “I need to talk to him. I need to see if he’s okay!” Ronen ran out of shul, barely containing his rising panic.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t reach his son, no matter how many times he called.
We hosted hakafot shniyot as scheduled the next day, but with a much smaller crowd than anticipated. As we danced, the crowd grew smaller and smaller, as men received calls from their commanders, calling them up for immediate reserve duty.
Over the next few days, Ronen continued his search for Boaz. His phone calls remained unanswered, but his signal pinged in Gaza. Had he been taken hostage? Determined to find answers, Ronen chartered one of the buses from his company and volunteered it for army duty. He brought along a few soldiers who were part of the chevrah kadisha. They walked through fields of atrocity, transferring the bodies of the slain to be identified and buried with dignity.
Finally, Ronen found his son. His body was flung over the body of his fiance, who he’d protected to the last second of his life. Boaz’s funeral was heartbreaking, a microcosm of the global grieving every Jew felt.
