I

World

Witness
To Horror

After witnessing death and injuries
at Yeshivat Mercaz HaRav, former
Detroiter Chaim Linden, 20, a third year
student at the school, composed a letter
to be shared with our Jewish commu-
nity:

The Linden family - Paul, Edith, Yochanan, Noam and Chaim - made aliyah five years ago.

Unholy Carnage

Ex-Detroit student in Israel survives yeshivah massacre.

Shelli Liebman Dorfman
Senior Writer

back in Jerusalem at Yeshivat
Mercaz HaRav studying!'
° In the Hamas-ruled Gaza
9 .4 Strip, many Palestinians took
he horrors of last
= to the streets to celebrate news
Thursday's terrorist attack
of the attack.
at a west Jerusalem yeshi-
The yeshivah students killed
vah hit very close to home for a
were Yochai Lipschitz, 18;
former Detroit family.
Yonatan Yitzchak Eldar, 16;
Twenty-year-old Chaim Linden
Yonadav Chaim Hirschfeld;
— who made aliyah from Oak
Neriah Cohen, 15; Roey Roth,
Park in 2003 along with his par-
18; Segev Pniel Avihayil, 15;
ents, Paul and Edith, and brothers
Doron Meherete Trunoch, 26;
Yochanan, now 18, and Noam,
and Avraham David Moses, 16,
16 — is a third-year student at
Mourners grieve at a funeral of one of the young yeshivah
who reportedly was the son of
Yeshivat Mercaz HaRav, where the
students slain in the terrorist atrocity.
two American immigrants.
March 6 shootings took place.
At the funerals Friday,
Not physically harmed in
Merkaz Harav's director, Rabbi
the vicious assault that killed
Ya'akov Shapira, delivered a eulogy charg-
"Somehow he sensed the danger — or
eight students, including the son of two
ing the government with failing to deliver
those around him did — and they all
American immigrants, and wounded
strong leadership and face down a deadly
dozens of others, Chaim witnessed the
pushed into one of the classrooms:' Paul
Linden said. "They laid tables against the
enemy. He called for a "good leadership,
carnage. An army officer arrived and shot
a stronger leadership, a more believing
the terrorist dead. Eight suspects are being door and lay flat on the floor using their
feet to prop up the tables. The shooting
leadership.
detained on the suspicion that they abet-
"The murderer did not want to kill these
lasted several minutes. The IDF responded
ted the shooting spree by Ala Abu Dahim,
people in particular:' he said, "but every-
20, a driver for the yeshivah, police said
quickly.
"The scene in the library was terrible.
one living in the holy city of Jerusalem."
Sunday.
"We were fortunate that Chaim, who
The boys were rushed out. One of Chaim's
Disbelief
was in the library at the time, called us
friends had not made it into the room but
instead hid in the book stacks. He survived The scene of mayhem and carnage
immediately after he got out and before
we heard it on the news:' Paul Linden said. and Chaim went with him to Shaare Zedek shocked students and teachers at Mercaz
Harav, an ideological seedbed for Israel's
Hospital. Later on, they went to Hadassah
"Chaim told us that earlier in the day he
national religious movement. Founded in
and his classmates had all gone to the
Hospital to visit with other classmates."
1924 by Rabbi Abraham Isaac Hacohen
Western Wall to honor Rosh Chodesh [the
Chaim and several other students spent
Kook, the flagship yeshivah at the entrance
start of a new Hebrew month]."
Thursday night, March 6, at the home of
a teacher. On Friday, Chaim attended a
to Jerusalem combines Orthodox piety
The boys had just returned to school,
funeral in Elkanah and then returned to
with pioneering Zionism. Many of the
and Chaim was moving toward a class-
room when he heard gunshots and
Rehovot for Shabbat.
screaming.
"On Sunday',' said his father, "he was
Carnage on page A22

T

Student Chaim Linden

T

o the Jewish family of
Detroit; to those I know
well and to those I've only
met on Mount Sinai:
Last Thursday night, I went
through an experience which I hope
no one will need to go through
again. "The nations came to disrupt
Your Inheritance." My friends and I
were in the middle of it all. I heard
everything and saw most of it.
It's easy to get carried away with
the feelings of shock and fear. We
need to be above all that.
We're Am Yisrael [the collective
Jewish nation]. "This nation I cre-
ated for Me – they will publicize My
praise."
We're living in critical times, the
last steps before the final redemp-
tion of the world as a whole.
The nation is waking up from a
tranquilizer that lasted 3,000 years.
Every Jew has the choice: to con-
tinue 'living' as a nation "spread out
and divided between the peoples of
Your Kingdom ... and it's not worth
for the King to leave them be," or
a "kingdom of priests and a holy
nation."
It is important to understand that
we are fighting for the existence of
our deepest identity, and such a sit-
uation requires sacrifice, as is writ-
ten in the Shuichan Aruch [the legal
code of Judaism] that in a time of
a decree aimed at erasing Judaism,
we risk our lives even for a tradition
not required by Judaic law.

Witness on page A24

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March 13 • 2008

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