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After The Bloodshed
Orthodox volunteers collect the remains for burial.
LARRY DERFNER ISRAEL CORRESPONDENT
A first...
Apartment living in a
Skilled Nursing facility
hey were there after the
suicide bombing at Beit Lid
junction near Netanya.
They were there after the
suicide bombing on the Tel Aviv
bus. On television they are seen
walking slowly amid the devas-
tation — religious men, mainly
haredi (Orthodox), wearing rub-
ber gloves, carrying nylon bags,
searching for body parts and gore
for burial.
They are among the 210 vol-
unteers of the Israeli organiza-
tion "Chesed Shel Emet" ("True
Mercy").
"The Torah says that a person
must be whole for burial. When
parts of the body are missing, the
person does not get proper bur-
for "Hatzolah," the haredi branch
of Magen David Adom, Israel's
emergency medical service.
On Sunday, Jan. 22, at 9:30
a.m. — 10 minutes after the
bombing at Beit Lid — Rabbi
Gelbshtein got a message on his
beeper from Jerusalem police
about a major incident. He start-
ed calling volunteers who have
beepers or mobile phones. "I put
a siren on my car and started dri-
ving about 100 miles an hour,"
said Mr. Weissberg. Twenty vol-
unteers showed up -- 13 from
Jerusalem and seven from the
haredi city of Bnei Brak.
They reported in to the police
and army rabbis in charge of the
operation. "We saw that they
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Moruners cry over the coffin of a bombing victim.
ial, so whatever can be done to were working mainly in the im-
help toward a proper burial is a mediate area of the explosion, so
mitzvah," said Rabbi Elazar we went out to the periphery,"
said Rabbi Gelbshtein.
Gelbshtein.
The two terrorists had each
Rabbi Gelbshtein, 47, a burly,
white-bearded Jerusalemite, strapped an estimated 10 to 20
founded Chesed Shel Emet in pounds of explosives to their bod-
1989, after a terrorist comman- ies. They and 21 Israelis died, and
deered a bus and forced it over some 60 people were wounded.
`The first thing we did was see
a cliff near Jerusalem, killing 16
people. While helping to gather if anybody lying on the ground
body parts at the site, he saw the was still alive, and if they were
difficulties police and the Israeli we gave them first aid," said Yoel
Army Rabbinate had trying to do Klabholtz.
Human remains were all over
the job. "Nothing good gets done
without volunteers," said Rabbi the ground, on cars, between
Gelbshtein, a clerk for Israel's na- chunks of concrete and metal, on
tional chevra kadisha burial so- trees, on fences, on walls.
Using paint scrapers when
ciety.
Four of the other volunteers in- necessary, the volunteers climbed
terviewed with him in the strict- trees, went up on fire engine
ly Orthodox Mercaz Hotel are cranes, got down on their hands
yeshiva students, Jerusalem and knees. They tagged the body
haredim in their 30s. The other, parts, describing where they were
Chaim Weissberg, is chief ad- found to try to aid the identifica-
ministrator of the haredi politi- tion, and put them in bags, work-
ing for about seven hours.
cal party Agudat Yisrael.
Asked how he could do such a
Besides volunteering for
Chesed Shel Emet, they also vol- task, Mr. Weissberg said: "You
unteer as medics or, like Rabbi have to turn a switch in your
Gelbshtein, ambulance drivers head and not think about any-