The transplant patient’s doctor reflects on life in Israel after the deadliest terror attack in the nation’s history.
After being killed in the Hamas terror attack on Saturday, an IDF soldier managed to save the life of a fellow Israeli who was in desperate need of a liver transplant in a final act of sacrifice.
Yoav, a general practitioner in Jerusalem, had a patient suffering from “a very bad liver disease who’s been waiting for a transplant for a long time.” The individual’s name could not be shared due to doctor–patient confidentiality.
“He’s been waiting now for the past few weeks. He’s been deteriorating, and he’s been waiting for a transplant. This morning, he was transplanted by the organs of a soldier who was killed in the attack,” Yoav told National Review.
“I can’t believe this. I can’t imagine the family of the soldier who had a healthy kid before that, and had to face this horrible question to give up his life.”
Yoav, who does not perform the surgeries himself, said that primary-care providers have been swamped in recent days by Israelis seeking out medical attention in historic numbers to treat acute anxiety and post-traumatic stress symptoms. The tragedy of October 7 is triggering difficult memories for many older Israelis “from previous wars, and now everything is coming back to them.”
Although the doctor has not yet dealt with survivors rushed from southern Israel, he has heard from his friends working in neighboring Jerusalem hospitals that most of the people transported to their facilities “were killed.”
“It’s usually the other way around; there’s a lot of injured, and a few people killed. This time — it’s horrible. A lot more people were murdered and killed than people who were injured.”
The bad dream many Israelis have woken up to doesn’t seem like it will end anytime soon, Yoav said. “I don’t feel like we have a good way out of it. I mean, we’re not going to conquer Gaza. It’s just not going to happen. We’re not going to pay the lives of tens of thousands of soldiers.”
The medical profession in Israel is one of the leading fields where people of varying backgrounds work side-by-side in what Israel’s left-leaning outlet, Haaretz, termed a “model of Jewish-Arab Equality and Coexistence” in 2017. Yoav is mindful of the brilliant Arab doctors and nurses he knows and is guided by his peacenik upbringing.
“I work with [Arabs]. I have nothing against them. My mother is a peace activist. She’s a Woman in Black,” Yoav clarifies, referring to the anti-war feminist movement that emerged following the First Intifada in the late ’80s, which was highly critical of Israeli policies toward Palestinians in the territories. “They stood in checkpoints to help the Palestinians with the [Israeli] soldiers. I never grew up to see them as enemies.”
“I always saw them as people who could have been my friends, and I worked with them in the hospitals. We saved lives together,” Yoav continued. “But, now, I just can’t see them. I don’t know if the Gazans or other people are the same, but how can we possibly see them as neighbors we can live with if this is the kind of behavior that they admire?”
“Mahmoud Abbas,” Yoav said, referring to the Palestinian Authority (PA) president – a rival political group to Hamas that is the officially recognized representative of the Palestinian people – “hasn’t even said a word. Today, he commented about something about both sides,” Yoav elaborated. “I understand what’s happening in Gaza is horrible.”
One thing that has heartened many Israelis, including Yoav, has been Joe Biden’s comments throughout the crisis, ensuring unconditional American support. “As an American citizen, I was never as proud as I was listening to President Biden’s speech and seeing all the military assistance that America is giving.”
“We just want to have peace. We just want to — ,” Yoav said, trying to find his footing near the end of the phone call. “I mean, we just can’t seem to get those people to live with us in a normal way. You know? Just act like human beings.”
“Good people have to find a way to live with them; to find greater ways to protect ourselves. I don’t know what the proper way is.”
“I have small kids,” he said in closing, struggling to find the words. “Just seeing them, you feel guilty that you’re alive, and you feel so lucky to have them, and there’s so many families now with parents who’ve listed their kids and kids who’ve lost their parents.”
“Just being able to hug your child is something that’s like — I don’t know — I’m in tears now. I can’t imagine what it’s like for families that lost all of a sudden.”