Israeli rescuer dropped everything to save lives amid rubble in Turkey.

Call Of Duty

AVI MACHLIS
Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Tel Aviv

0

fer Pomeranz had
just arrived in
Baden for a serene
Swiss vacation
with his wife and three chil-
dren when the phone rang.
On the other end was his
friend from Israel's National
Search and Rescue Team.
It was Aug. 17, just hours
after the ground shook for 45
devastating seconds near
Istanbul, Turkey, and Israel
was mobilizing its special res-
cue unit to help find sur-
vivors. It did not take long for
Pomeranz — a building con-
tractor, the rescue unit's chief
engineer and one of its senior
commanders — to realize
that his summer vacation was
over before it even began.
"My family is very
understanding," said Pomeranz in an
interview a few days after returning to
Israel. "My older kids told me if I
didn't go, I wouldn't be able to live
with myself."
Israel pulled out a lot of stops to help
victims of the quake, a move that has
helped solidify its standing with Turkish
citizens and their leaders. Israel sent
some 1,000 tons of agricultural prod-
ucts, frozen vegetables, water, milk, and
new and used clothing collected in
Israel. The IDF deployed a field hospital
at the entrance to the hard-hit town of
Adapazari. The Israeli relief delegation
numbered some 500 rescuers, medical
staff and other experts, including the
IDF's 330-member rescue unit, which
had gained experience in rescue opera-
tions in Lebanon and places of natural
disaster in many parts of the world.
Pomeranz, a 44-year-old with a
boyish face, is an Army reservist. He's
on call 365 days a year. By 10 p.m. on
Aug. 17, as he walked through the

earthquake-ravaged city of Cinarcik,
looked like before they collapsed.
"We try to piece together informa-
his vacation was a distant memory.
tion in order to figure out the most
Since joining the unit in 1989,
likely place to find survivors," he said.
Pomeranz had seen several disasters. He
"It is very difficult because the build-
helped rescue Israelis trapped in build-
ings were destroyed and we essentially
ings hit by Iraqi Scud missiles during the
1991 Gulf War and worked at the
had to reconstruct them."
During the next week,
bombed-out Jewish
Pomeranz
slept very little
community center in
Above: Turkish relief
as
he
shuttled
between
Buenos Aires in 1994.
workers and soldiers
four main Israeli head-
Last year, he was dis-
kneel in silence while
quarters in the earth-
patched to the site of the
others inside a collapsed
quake zone. He was per-
U.S. Embassy bombing
seven-story building lis-
sonally involved in the
in Nairobi, Kenya.
ten for survivors, Aug.
rescue of two people,
But Pomeranz said
24 in the town of
Cinarcik, Turkey.
including Shiran Franco,
nothing looked quite
the 9-year-old girl who
like this.
was dramatically pulled
"This was complete-
out of the rubble alive after five days.
ly different," he said. "In other places,
In total, the unit rescued 12 people
there was a building destroyed here
and pulled 156 bodies from beneath
and there, but life went on as usual..
destroyed buildings.
Here, we saw endless buildings
Pomeranz arrived at the site of
destroyed or tilted on their sides and
Shiran's rescue about an hour before she
thousands of people in the streets."
was saved. Rescuers were reluctant to
As chief engineer, Pomeranz's job
start drilling away for fear of hurting
was to figure out what the buildings

her. Pomeranz realized there
was no choice — and no
time. Despite his high rank,
he grabbed a jackhammer
and began drilling.
"I saw they were hesitat-
ing so I grabbed it," he said.
"There are no ranks in this
line of work." Many of the
soldiers broke down in tears
when Shiran was dramatical-
ly pulled out, but Pomeranz
reacted with the same stoic
professionalism with which
he describes the rest of his
arduous week in Turkey.
"I had no thoughts at the
time," he said. "I was only
thinking about the job."
At other sites where there
was no sign of life, Pomeranz
instructed his troops to press
ahead as if people were alive.
Their efforts did not go
unnoticed. Pomeranz recalls
how the local Turkish pop-
ulation was overwhelmed
with gratitude by the work done by
the Israeli troops. One Turkish Jew
shadowed the Israeli unit from the
moment they arrived, helping where
he could, and at the end insisted on
wearing an Israel Defense Force uni-
form along with the soldiers.
Turkish Prime Minister Bulent
Ecevit said the Israeli contribution was
"remarkable compared to donations by
other countries." Even Nevzat
Yalcintas, one of the leaders of the rad-
ical Muslim Fazilet Party, went out of
his way to praise Israel's contribution.
By the evening of Tuesday, Aug.
24, Pomeranz was home. He was up
for work at 7 a.m. the next day.
Fatigue is not something rescuers can
allow themselves to succumb to, he
says, recalling how his men worked
around the clock.
"When you rescue people alive, you
are pushed to working endlessly," he
says. "There are no bounds to what
you can do." ❑

9/3
199c,

limA Arc

21