OBITUARIES
OF BLESSED MEMORY

60 | NOVEMBER 2 • 2023 J
N

continued from page 59

missing people is ongoing: 
The tally, which started at 
20 dead out of 115 missing 
kibbutz members, has now 
grown to 85 dead and is likely 
to increase. Additional people 
who lived at Be’eri, but were 
not members of the kibbutz, 
were also killed, for a total 
death toll of more than 100. 
Each of those statistics is 
an individual known on a 
first-name basis to members 
of the intimate, pastoral 
kibbutz, where cars do not 
enter beyond the gate and 
members’ main source of 
entertainment is each other.
“You read the list of the 
dead,” says Gal Cohen, 
who is 54 and has lived on 
the kibbutz his entire life. 

“These are people you grew 
up with and had countless 
experiences and interactions 
with.”
Cohen’s new routine 
consists of receiving updates 
regarding who in the kibbutz 
family is dead or captured. 
Alongside that, he spends 
his days attending funerals 
and shivahs, all the while 
struggling to hold things 
together emotionally. That 
reality is typical of what 
Be’eri members are currently 
experiencing as the tight-
knit community attempts 
to collectively process an 
unspeakable tragedy. 
Describing one day, Cohen 
lists a series of funerals he 
and his family are attending, 

all of neighbors they knew 
personally.
“I was this morning at the 
funeral of a good friend, 
Hagi, who was in the civil 
defense patrol with me, 
a good friend who was 
murdered in the war to 
defend our home,” he said. 
“Now my daughters are at the 
funeral of Dana and Karmel. 
Avidan is left without a leg — 
they killed them in the bomb 
shelter.”
He continued, “They are 
doing the funeral closer to 
the center [of the country]. 
At 4, I need to go to a funeral 
ceremony that we are doing 
for Yoni, who was able to 
protect his children. He left 
the bomb shelter and hid 

them inside, where they were 
not found, and he was killed 
outside. … I am a strong 
person, but after five or six, 
you are broken.”
There are so many funerals 
and shivahs, some far from 
the Dead Sea, that members 
cannot possibly attend them 
all. 
“There was a day with 17 
funerals, and you are not 
able to race to each one,” said 
Cohen. Shuttle services have 
been offered to help members 
pay their respects as much 
as possible. Some of the 
funerals are being thought of 
as temporary; families plan 
to rebury their loved ones on 
the kibbutz once the military 
allows them access.